School Readiness: Getting Children Ready to Learn
What does it mean?
The overall goal of Smart Start is to assure that children arrive at school healthy and prepared to succeed. What does school readiness really mean? Should children be ready for school or should schools be ready for children?
Many educators view children’s learning as an ongoing process that begins at birth and continues throughout life, not just when a child enters school. While measuring school readiness is not easy, there are some key areas, identified by the National Education Goals Panel, that must be considered when planning for a child’s success in school.
Health and Physical Development
Children will be best prepared for school when they have access to good preventive health services, proper nutrition, and participate in activities which adequately develop their large and small muscles. Even before birth, good pre-natal care promotes a child’s health and development. Low birth weight, for example, is a risk factor for future health and learning problems. Untreated childhood illnesses, such as ear infections, can interfere with the normal language development of a young child.
Social and Emotional Development
Children learn positive self regard through the messages, both spoken and unspoken, given to them daily by the important adults in their lives. When children feel good about themselves and their abilities, they have the confidence needed to learn new things. On the other hand, children who are ignored, criticized, or punished for exploring their world, become discouraged, passive and unwilling to try new things.
Social skills are an important aspect of readiness. Research shows that if children are not socially competent by age 6, they are at risk for social and emotional problems for the rest of their lives. Children should have opportunities from a very early age to work and play with other children in order to practice social skills and learn to get along with one another. Getting along with others and knowing how to manage one’s behavior in a group are critical to good school adjustment.
Approaches Toward Learning
The ways that children approach the task of learning may be as important as what they know when they come to school. From a very early age, children need opportunities to safely explore their environments in ways that create the desire to find out more. Young children are concrete learners and need opportunities to use all their senses as they explore and question the world around them. They will not learn best in environments where they are asked to "be still and quiet." Children who are prepared for school success are curious about everything and are able to play and work independently without constant adult intervention. They have the ability to stay with a task until it is completed and they are proud of their work. In addition, they are able to listen and follow directions.
Language Development
Good language development is one of the best indicators of future school success. Young children learn language as a result of meaningful experiences. When children experience success in using language, they quickly develop more advanced language skills.
Children should be included in conversation from birth. It's not enough to talk in the presence of children. When a child is engaged in conversation from birth, she will more likely respond to and use language appropriately at an earlier age.
Cognition and General Knowledge
Children who arrive at school with a broad knowledge about themselves and their world are better prepared to learn more complicated concepts. Brain development research highlights the critical nature of the early years in developing brain connections to allow a child’s brain to develop to its fullest potential.
Family members and other caregivers play a crucial role in stimulating children’s minds and helping them learn about the world. Children are born with a strong sense of curiosity and a desire to learn. A child’s learning can be enhanced as they interact frequently with the people around them, participate in appropriate activities, and play with toys and materials that build on the child’s present knowledge and lead them to a more advanced level of thinking.
Children learn best when their interests are encouraged, not through memorization. Memorizing colors, for example, is difficult for some children. However, when a child learns that his favorite fire truck is red, the color then has meaning for that child. Young children learn about spatial concepts through puzzles and block play. As they pour water or sand from one container to another, they begin to understand volume. These early experiences then build the foundation for later mathematical learning.
Conclusion
Making sure that all young children enter school prepared to succeed and that all schools are ready to help every child succeed are critical to the future success of our state and nation. While the debates over readiness issues continue, it appears at a minimum that a comprehensive vision of child well-being would certainly involve areas of health, nutrition, mental health, education and care. Ready for school or not, the answers may depend on the things we do and the decisions we make, both personally and through public policy.