How-to-Study Blog

The Alliance for Childhood recently surveyed 254 kindergarten teachers in New York and Los Angeles.  The study found that children in kindergarten spent two to three hours a day being instructed and tested in math and reading.  They spent less than 30 minutes playing.  Edward Miller, a coauthor of the report, stated that “Play at age 5 is of great importance not just to intellectual but emotional, psychological, social, and spiritual development.”  He went on to say that young children develop higher-level learning, language and social skills, and empathy through their play. He also pointed out that play reduces their stress.

We couldn’t agree with Miller more.  Our recollection of kindergarten is one of a lot of fun and many opportunities for socialization.  In this child-friendly environment, we acquired all of the prerequisites for formal learning, which didn’t begin until somewhere in first grade.  There is a great deal of research that children not exposed to formal instruction in kindergarten (and preschool) quickly catch up in reading and math skills to those children who do have early formal instruction.

Let’s not take childhood away from young children.  What do you think?