Category: Education Kindergarten

Education Kindergarten

Transitional kindergarten in California — without state help

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In summary

The state mandates transitional kindergarten, but isn’t paying the tab for a small portion of wealthy school districts. Some are balking.

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In a major shift for early education, California is expanding its transitional kindergarten program to eventually include all 4-year-olds. While most districts will receive additional dollars for the expansion, 15% will not — and are facing tough budget choices as they comply with the new fall mandate.

Some of those districts — among the most affluent in California — say they are stretching existing budgets to create classrooms, moving money around

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Education Kindergarten

State by state: America’s teacher shortage

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(NewsNation) — Recruiting veterans and first responders. Offering $60,000 starting salaries. Providing student loan forgiveness. Helping with mortgages.

Every state in the country is coming up with solutions to combat the teacher shortage.

Across the country, there are 36,000 teacher vacancies, from kindergarten through high school, and another 163,000 teachers aren’t qualified for their jobs, according to data collected by the Annenberg Institute at Brown University. The shortage is so impactful, some schools have resorted to untraditional concepts such as switching to four-day school weeks.

Curious about what your state is doing to solve its teacher shortage? Wondering if you

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Education Kindergarten

Brookline Kindergarten Teachers Criticize Curriculum Shifts

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Kindergarten teachers in Brookline are criticizing recent changes in the classroom, saying they’re making kids increasingly anxious and losing joy in learning, and may be working against the district’s equity goals.

“It is now common to hear their little voices announce to us, ‘I don’t know how to read,’ ‘I hate reading,’ ‘I hate school,’ ‘I am not good at anything.’ This is our greatest concern,” reads a letter signed by a group of 19 current and two former teachers from seven of Brookline’s eight elementary schools. They plan to present the letter to the school committee Thursday night.

Teachers

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Education Kindergarten

Meet the kindergarten teacher with 80,000 students

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For most parents, the smaller the class size the better when it comes to early education.

But that apparently doesn’t apply to Megan Jessens, who’s got 80,000 students and is making a difference for each one.

A former kindergarten and now part-time pre-k teacher, Jessens goes live on her Facebook group, Miss Megan’s Camp Kindergarten, each weekday morning at 10 am ET for an hour. On any given day, thousands of kids are watching her go over the calendar, letters, sight words and more.

She does it while teaching and managing her own two young children. She said that’s been

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Education Kindergarten

San Diego’s 4-year-olds to get transitional kindergarten ahead of state rollout

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State leaders have approved a rollout of universal transitional kindergarten over the next few years, but San Diego Unified will jump ahead and offer it to all 4-year-olds this fall.

Meanwhile at least five San Diego County districts do not offer transitional kindergarten and say they don’t plan to change.

San Diego Unified officials said they will offer at least 2,800 transitional kindergarten spots to families this fall. Any child in the district who turns 4 by Sept. 1 will be eligible for the program, which is being offered in 54 schools, district officials said.

“Regardless of where you live,

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Education Kindergarten

Good news? More Maryland kindergarteners are ready for school. Bad news? It’s not nearly enough

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About 42% of kindergarteners across Maryland are considered academically ready for the classroom this year. That’s an improvement on the state Kindergarten Readiness Assessment when only 40% were academically prepared last year, Maryland State Board of Education data shows.

But not nearly enough children are academically prepared for those statistics to be considered successful. Officials discussed the data during the Maryland State Board of Education meeting on Tuesday.

It’s an even more dire situation for the youngest students in Baltimore City, where 33% of kindergarteners are ready for school. About 39% demonstrated readiness in Baltimore County.

The assessment measures the

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Education Kindergarten

Palm Beach County school leaders stress importance of VPK

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PALM BEACH COUNTY, Fla. — New numbers show only about half of Palm Beach County kindergarten students were considered “kindergarten-ready” when they entered elementary school this year.

It comes as parents of Florida 4-year-olds are getting their kids enrolled in voluntary pre-kindergarten, or VPK, for next school year.

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At Kiddie Haven Preschool, west of Lake Worth Beach, voluntary pre-kindergarten is about more than letters and numbers.

“It’s also about social skills, meaningful relationships, and interactions,” preschool director Odalys Gonzalez said. “They are exposed to the diversity that is around them, and they get to see the world

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Education Kindergarten

New kindergarten officially unveiled | Docklands News

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The new kindergarten co-located at Docklands Primary School was officially opened last month with a visit from Minister for Early Childhood Ingrid Stitt.

Minister Stitt joined students and educators, Member for Northern Metropolitan Sheena Watt and Docklands Primary School principal Adam Bright in celebrating the important milestone for the Docklands community on April 22.

Gowrie Docklands Kindergarten includes two children’s rooms and outdoor learning terraces on the first floor of the school. Gowrie Victoria is the approved provider and will offer sessional and integrated kindergarten programs for both three- and four-year-old children.

“We know that education begins much earlier than

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