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Photo: Jackie Mader/The Hechinger Report
The Hechinger Report
How play is making a comeback in Kindergarten
A Washington state district made an entire school just for kindergarteners where joy and play are the focus.
By Jackie Mader
February 8, 2020
EVERETT, Wash. — On a sunny winter morning in Sara Stevens’
kindergarten classroom at Pathfinder Kindergarten Center, 5- and 6-year
olds spread out across the classroom learning about colors, shapes,
engineering and design.
Not a pencil or worksheet was in sight, however. These kids were playing.
Standing in front of a child-sized kitchen in the corner of the
classroom, Jamila dropped a plastic tomato, a hot dog, a banana and a
fish into a small metal pot.
“The cake’s ready!” she proclaimed to her friends.
A few feet away, her classmate, Ivan, was sprawled on the ground surrounded by blocks and small toy cars.
“This is a house with an invisible force field,” he proclaimed,
carefully adding a block to the structure. “I didn’t build the force
field,” he clarified. “I imagined it.”
Originally intended to ease overcrowding in local schools, the
Pathfinder Kindergarten Center, located about 25 miles north of Seattle
in the Mukilteo School District, is a haven for its 545
kindergarteners. The $26-million school opened in 2017 with a central
goal: to make kindergarten here more playful and joyful. Classrooms
mirror high-quality preschools, with artwork papering the walls,
children playing gleefully on colorful carpets, and classroom shelves
stocked with bins of toys. Heated floors invite the children to play
and rest on the ground and multiple play areas both inside and outside
the school offer kids opportunities to learn and burn off energy.
It may seem frivolous to spend so much money on a school dedicated to a
grade level that students aren’t even required to attend in most
states, but research shows kindergarten can be one of the most
important years in a child’s educational career. Positive experiences
in kindergarten can improve non-cognitive skills and early test scores,
and even increase the likelihood that children will attend college and
ultimately make more money as adults.
At last count, 14 states and the District of Columbia required
districts to offer full-day kindergarten, up from 10 states in 2008. As
kindergarten has become more widely available in the last several
decades, it’s also become more academic. In some districts, full-day
kindergarten schedules are packed with back-to-back academic activities
and lessons.
While recent research shows kids can, for the most part, handle more
rigorous content in early years, educators and experts are worried that
schools have been getting it wrong. Experts say children shouldn’t be
sitting at desks, completing worksheets or listening to teachers talk
for the majority of the time. An older, more extensive body of research
suggests children should be playing both within lessons and between
lessons, because that’s the best way for a 5-year-old to grasp
difficult concepts, whether it’s working with a classmate or counting
to 100.
Now, several states, including Washington, are rethinking the
kindergarten curriculum and encouraging districts to revive time for
block-building, coloring and imagining invisible force fields.
“Play is not divorced of learning,” said Kathy Hirsh-Pasek, an author,
professor of psychology at Temple University, and senior fellow at the
Brookings Institution, who has studied child development and the role
of play in learning for years. “It is the natural way in which we
learn.”
Play is what Friedrich Froebel imagined kindergarten would include when
he founded the first kindergarten in Germany in 1837. The kindergarten
day started with songs and then transitioned to playtime and included
nature study, stories and dramatic play. For more than 100 years,
that’s what kindergarten was known for.
The first kindergartens in America were play-based and grounded in
Froebel’s vision; they were meant to build cognitive and
social-emotional skills. By the 1960’s, subjects like reading, writing,
math and science were informally included in the kindergarten day,
which typically lasted about two-and-a-half hours. But by the 1980’s,
after the publication of “A Nation at Risk,” a report by the National
Commission on Excellence in Education which described America’s
education system as largely failing and in need of dire reform, many
parents called for public kindergarten and a more standard, formal
curriculum.
States and districts responded. From 1998 to 2010, the time spent on
nonacademic subjects in kindergarten, including free play, decreased in
favor of more time on academic subjects, such as conventional spelling
and writing simple equations, a 2016 study found. During the same time,
the percentage of classrooms with a dramatic play area dropped from
nearly 90 percent to 58 percent.
Opportunities for free play also dropped: The study found the number of
classrooms that provided at least one hour per day of child-selected
activities decreased by 14 percent and the number of classrooms
spending more than three hours daily on whole-class activities more
than doubled. More kindergarten teachers also reported regularly
teaching topics that used to be covered in later grades, like
conventional spelling, writing equations, and composing and writing
stories, than they did in 1998.
More recently, widespread changes in academic standards, like the
adoption of the Common Core standards and concern over low reading
scores, further increased the rigor of kindergarten to the point that
it has been referred to as “the new first grade.” Kindergarteners now
are expected to count to 100 by ones and tens, for example. Previously
some states only required kindergarteners to count to 20 or 30. In
California, concepts like the counting system are now taught in
kindergarten instead of first grade. In Mississippi, concepts like
plural nouns and three-dimensional shapes shifted down from first
grade. Kindergarteners must be able to write several sentences about a
specific topic and draw a related picture, while pre-Common Core, they
were only expected to draw a picture and write a single sentence. And,
in some states, Common Core added new concepts young children are
supposed to master, like the ability to put two shapes together to form
new shapes.
Many teachers at Pathfinder remember a time early in their careers when
school and district officials made it clear that kindergarten was to
have a new focus. Pathfinder teacher Missy Turtzo, who started teaching
in the late 2000’s in Florida, recalled walking into her classroom
after district officials had removed play kitchens and other furniture.
“They had taken out all the fun to make it more academic,” Turtzo said.
Pathfinder teacher Stevens, who started teaching elementary school in
Washington in 2001, also remembers a more academic kindergarten, devoid
of the toys and play areas you see in her classroom today. She said
half-day kindergarten is partly to blame.
“[We had] two and a half hours. Get it done. Reading, writing, math.
Reading, writing, math. Reading, writing, math. And now, it’s just
like, a lot more balanced … you have more time,” she said.
Some states and districts are moving back to a play-based kindergarten
classroom after the creation of state early learning standards that
emphasize the importance of hands-on experiences. For others, the
realization that students were struggling with social-emotional skills
in kindergarten was a wake-up call. And for some, ongoing feedback from
teachers and experts calling for “developmentally appropriate”
activities, rooted in play, inspired a change.
The Mukilteo School District’s adoption of what officials here describe
as a developmentally appropriate and joyful kindergarten experience was
also inspired by recommendations by Washington’s early childhood
experts. A state law mandated full-day kindergarten starting in the
2017-18 school year. To receive funding, districts had to provide
experiences in science, arts and physical education, opportunities for
hands-on learning and setting up classroom environments that “promote
creativity.” State officials also released a guide that encouraged more
time for play and cited extensive research on why play is important.
A similar mindset was behind New Hampshire’s move to a play-based
kindergarten in 2018, when the legislature amended the state’s
education law to mandate that kindergartens adopt a play-based model.
“Rigorous structure and heavy curriculum are not intended to be part of
the kindergarten experience,” New Hampshire education officials
declared. “Rather, educating kindergarten age children can be done
through social imitation, learning through expression, and unstructured
play within the classroom setting.”
Some districts don’t just stop at kindergarteners: The Watertown City
School District in upstate New York has adopted a play-based curriculum
for first graders, too.
Kids have reaped benefits from such changes. In West Chester,
Pennsylvania, district officials noted referrals to occupational
therapy are down, which educators there attribute to the increase in
time to work on fine motor skills while playing. A 2016 study of two
schools in Texas found that when kindergarten and first grade students
received additional time to play in the form of extra recess breaks
each day, their academic performance on reading and math “significantly
increased.”
Providing more time for play is a popular decision with 5-year-olds.
The youngsters in Sara Steven’s classroom at Pathfinders are unanimous:
Playtime is their favorite time of the day. A close second? Recess.
During playtime on the recent winter morning, three students in
Stevens’ classroom were carefully building a “place for cars” out of
magnetic shapes. As one student moved closer to place a square on top
of the structure, it suddenly collapsed.
The other two students whipped around and stared at the ruins, both
quickly masking their initial look of disappointment. “We can make
something else,” one of the students said matter-of-factly.
“Or we can share ours!” the other student said, motioning to a second structure.
Research shows play is a proven way for students to learn academic and
nonacademic skills. And Stevens said this is evident to her. During
playtime, students naturally learn to identify colors and shapes as
they draw masks and build towers, and learn to write as they plan
pretend birthday parties, complete with invitations and signs. But more
important, she said, her students acquire social skills, like how to
work together, use kind words and share.
“Sharing is really hard,” Stevens said as she watched a group of
students eagerly hovering around a game on the floor. “They have to
talk it out and take turns.”
Child development expert Hirsh-Pasek cautioned that adding play needs
to be done thoughtfully. “Don’t just stick play in,” she said. “Make it
part and parcel of the learning experience.” While free play has its
benefits, Hirsh-Pasek said if the goal is for children to learn, adults
need to set up an environment so kids can “muck around” and play with a
purpose. “By doing so, they learn more because it’s their learning,”
she said.
At Pathfinder and other kindergarten classrooms in the district,
playtime is officially called “Play to Learn,” a nod to the fact that
the two concepts are intertwined. The block of time devoted to play is
bookended by a planning time, when children choose the activity or area
of the classroom to spend their time in, as well as a reflection time,
when children share what they did or what they made.
When Play to Learn time ends, students eagerly put away their toys and
rush to the colorful carpet in the center of the room to tell their
classmates about their playtime.
Students at Pathfinder are still learning their letters and numbers and
becoming more proficient at writing their names and short sentences.
But, in addition to at least 50 minutes of playtime, they also enjoy 35
minutes of recess and 45 minutes of physical education, art, technology
or music each day. And teachers say they have the freedom to adjust
schedules as needed. When they noticed the introduction of writing was
leading to meltdowns at the beginning of the year, for example,
teachers pushed their lessons back and devoted time just teaching kids
how to hold a pencil.
Educators here said there’s more to their model than just giving kids
more time to play. They’ve designed a kindergarten experience based on
the needs of 5-year-olds, rather than expecting 5-year-olds to fit into
an existing elementary school model. Administrators and teachers said
they feel they have more freedom to adjust schedules as needed. When
they noticed the introduction of writing was leading to meltdowns at
the beginning of the year, for example, teachers pushed their lessons
back and devoted time just teaching kids how to hold a pencil.
“You hear a lot of people say ‘this kid is not ready for kindergarten’”
said Boze, the principal. “I think with our philosophy and in our
vision with an all-kindergarten school, it’s our job to be ready for
the kids no matter where they’re coming from. It’s our job to meet
every single child wherever they are.”
Daily schedules district-wide for kindergarteners are structured with
the understanding that a full-day of school is a lot for a 5-year-old.
Annie Johnson, executive director of the department of elementary
education for the Mukilteo School District, said for this reason, the
district encourages schools to plan more academic-heavy lessons and
activities for kindergarteners in the morning. “Some students really
struggle with the full day, they are literally exhausted by the
afternoon,” Johnson said. By frontloading academics in the morning,
“kids can kind of relax and play” during the time when they are most
tired from a day of stimulation.
The school environment helps as well: The Pathfinder building was built
specifically with kindergarteners in mind by the DLR Group, an
international architecture firm. The two-story building is shaped like
an S and organized into four mini schools, or “pods,” within the larger
school. Each pod has its own specialist who teaches a rotating schedule
of art, music, physical education and technology to the students every
day. Six classrooms share a large common area flanked by an entire wall
of windows. Child-sized bathrooms are located between classrooms,
making bathroom breaks quick and efficient. Kids walk through wide
hallways painted with colorful wildlife murals. Little nooks under the
stairs give children cozy spaces to read or color and provide private
areas for one-on-one tutoring. Outside the school, nestled between the
building and a protected woodland area, are two large playgrounds with
turf, slides and climbing equipment.
Educators here say the intense focus on one grade level is having a
positive impact on students, 50 percent of whom are English language
learners and 61 percent of whom are low-income. The school boasts an
attendance rate of 83 percent, which is slightly higher than the state
average. And 93 percent of Pathfinder’s English Learners are making
progress, according to school officials.
That’s not to say Pathfinder is without its challenges. Having a
separate school for kindergarteners means an extra transition to yet
another school when students start first grade. And while
kindergarteners at traditional elementary schools can benefit from
having older students as mentors, there are no such mentors at
Pathfinder.
Although Pathfinder officials don’t have data on how their graduates
perform in first grade, principal Cheryl Boze said she frequently hears
from first grade teachers who say they can pick out the kids who
attended Pathfinder.
“They’re better prepared, they’re further along academically, socially
and emotionally. They see our kids as more kind and caring,” Boze said.
“So I do believe that what we’re doing is working.”
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