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Head Start to Nowhere
by: Malcolm A. Kline, October 04, 2005
Article from Accuracy in Academia's
www.campusreportonline.net
At its best, the record on the 40-year-old federal Head Start program was
mixed. Now, the middle-aged government program is becoming downright
dangerous, according to Karen Effrem, a director of EdWatch.org.
We've had 20 million children go through Head Start at a cost of $50
billion and we've had 600 studies of the program, Dr. Effrem, a
Minnesota pediatrician, pointed out on the last broadcast of Accuracy in
Academias Campus Report. Those studies, Dr. Effrem notes, show that when
children do show progress in the program, as measured by the U. S.
Department of Education, those gains disappear after the first year of
primary school.
Aimed at three- and four-year-olds, Head Start is a creation of President
Lyndon B. Johnsons Great Society. Moreover, many of the gains recorded
in Head Start are psychosocial rather than cognitive so that children in
the program are polled rather than tested.
On the one hand, there are the Head Start Child Outcome Framework
standards on Math. These standards urge teachers to make sure that the
student demonstrates increasing interest and awareness of numbers and
counting as a means for solving problems and determining quantity and
develops increased abilities to combine, separate and name how many
concrete objects.
But the guidelines for Head Start, whose originator specialized in the
ecology of human development emphasize the whole child. Thus, the
Emotional Development section of the Head Start Outcomes urge that the
child shows progress in expressing feelings, needs and opinions in
difficult situations without harming themselves, others or property and
demonstrate increasing competency in recognizing and describing own
emotions.
And, the Self-Concept section urges the teacher to see that the child
begins to develop and express awareness of self in terms
[See
the
complete article here.]
Malcolm A. Kline is the executive director of Accuracy in Academia.
Other links:
*
Minnesota Nanny State Tidal Wave Held Back
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Questions and Answers regarding the Nanny State
System
*
Commentary on Baby Ed
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