"When you come to the edge of all you know,
you must believe one of two things:
There will be earth to stand on or
you will be given wings to fly."
All children are born equal. None can speak, read nor write. However, by the time they start school 5 years later, they are decidedly unequal. Why? Teachers. That's right. Teachers dole out knowledge unequally based on a number of factors, but mainly socio-economic status. But, before you call the principal or school board, let me tell you that I mean the child's first teachers - their parents.
It isn't that rich parents are better parents or poor parents poorer. And it has nothing to do with how much a parent loves a child. There is something else.
When researchers at the University of Kansas began looking at 4-year-olds, they discovered that some children's vocabularies were quite advanced while others were already significantly behind. When they tested them again at age 9, the differences held.
However, if no child is born with words already in his head, how do some kids get this boost? We know two things for sure. The primary vehicle for learning - especially vocabulary - is repeated and meaningful conversations. In addition, the brain is wired for language learning in the first few years of life.
The Kansas researchers devised a study and recruited 42 normal families - families without drug, violence or alcohol problems. These families represented three socio-economic groups: welfare, working class and professional. Researchers visited the homes for one hour a month for two and a half years. They tape-recorded and transcribed all conversations and actions taking place in front of the child. These totaled 1,300 hours of visits.
In their report, Meaningful Differences in the Everyday Experience of Young American Children (1995), researchers stated, perhaps surprisingly, that all 42 families did the same things with their children. All the parents were good parents. Nevertheless, the researchers still had to account for the disparity in the language levels of the 4-year-olds.
Then they looked at the average number of words heard by each child by age 4. Do you see the difference?
Professional families, 45 million words
Working class families, 26 million words
Families in poverty, 13 million words
By the time they are 4, the children of professional families will have heard more than three times as many words as children of poor families. Again, the primary way we learn new words is through conversation. Moreover, unless children have heard many words, they have little chance of making meaning of them when they begin to learn to read. Words are the foundation.
Where do parents find 45 million words to say to their children? They begin by finding them in the kitchen, the bath, the car, the yard and at the market. Anywhere and everywhere. They talk, they sing, they recite nursery rhymes.
Another place to find words is in books. In 1985, the big deal government report was Becoming a Nation of Readers. It said, "The single most important activity for building the knowledge required for eventual success in reading is reading aloud to children."
What exactly does reading aloud do? Jim Trelease, author of The New Read Aloud Handbook (1989), writes that reading aloud reaps the following benefits for children:
• a positive reading role model
• the pleasures of reading
• new information
• rich vocabulary and good grammar
• exposure to a broad variety of books and lives outside their own experience
• imagination is stimulated and attention span is stretched
• listening comprehension improves
• emotional development is nurtured
• the reading-writing connection is established
So, when should parents start talking with and reading to their children? Some research suggests that it's never too early. Some experts suggest that children need about 1,000 hours of lap-sitting read-aloud time before they are ready for any formal reading instruction. That's the equivalent of 30 minutes a day from birth to age 5.
When school starts, those daily habits will be critical because the number of words a child has heard and the number of hours she has spent cuddled up in someone's lap listening to stories will influence how quickly she learns to read and understand books on her own. More time spent early means an easier time later. It's as simple as that.
It is also a reason why reforms aimed solely at schools will always miss the mark. Education initiatives that fail to recognize the social issues of poverty, family structure, parenting, day care, jobs and healthcare is incomplete. Moreover, any timeline short of a generation is clearly unrealistic.
Therefore, if you believe that a child's education will begin on the first day of kindergarten, you are about five years late. It started the day she was born. I just hope she had good teachers.
n Lorie Schaefer was a reading specialist for 12 years and is now a kindergarten teacher at Seeliger School. She reminds you that kindergarten registration for the 2005-06 school year has begun at Carson City schools.