Swipetarded: Online Preschool
February 9th, 2020Via: Concord Monitor:
We read with concern David Brooks’s Jan. 28 article about the New Hampshire Department of Education’s goal of enrolling 200 families in a pilot program for online preschool called Upstart.
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A strong body of research, accumulated over decades, demonstrates how young children learn best – through exploration, play and interactions with each other and with caring adults.
Children need to use their bodies and their senses to learn about the world. They need to move! They learn about language by engaging in conversations with responsive adults and hearing and joining in to stories, songs, rhymes and play with words. And they learn to think creatively and solve problems through experiences like playing pretend, building with blocks and making up their own games in play with other children. Play also supports the development of social and emotional skills that we now know are essential for school success, such as self-regulation, persistence, perspective-taking and attention.
In contrast, online preschool programs like Upstart focus on discrete academic skills, like recognizing letters, colors and shapes. Rather than promoting creative or divergent thinking, they focus on right or wrong answers. They don’t engage children in give-and-take interactions or conversations. Instead, they promote the false idea that learning happens when young children sit quietly in their seats, staring at a screen.
An overwhelming body of research demonstrates that young children learn through play, and that the skills they need to be successful in school are most effectively learned through hands-on play. The American Academy of Pediatrics, in its research-based Policy Statement on Media and Young Minds (2016), states that, “Higher-order thinking skills and executive functions essential for school success, such as task persistence, impulse control, emotion regulation and creative, flexible thinking, are best taught through unstructured and social (not digital) play.”
