The Common Core State Standards in early childhood education: summary

We hope you have enjoyed our blog forum on Common Core State Standards. There are a lot of people paying attention to this issue.

On day one, we outlined some concerns:

  • Rigorous standards may lead to reduced play and less rich activity in preschool and Kindergarten classrooms.
  • Literacy instruction may become limited to a few texts and drill-and-kill teaching.
  • The standards are complex and extensive, and there is little guidance for teachers to implement them in Kindergarten classrooms.
  • Parents don’t understand the CCSS and are concerned about what they mean for their children.
  • The Kindergarten standards for literacy are not appropriate for children that age.
  • Assessment related to reaching standards will not be developmentally appropriate, and results may be misused.
  • Alignment with K-12 standards will mean teaching methods, subjects, and assessments that are not developmentally appropriate will be pushed down to preschool levels.
  • Math standards will be too challenging for young children.

Please visit National Institute for Early Education Research (NIEER) for the complete blog post.