Standardized Childhood?

Two Reviews of Bruce Fuller’s Book

George Morrison: False Alarm

Pamela Rigg: A Real Threat

George Morrison

False Alarm

Standardized Childhood: The Political and Cultural Struggle over Early Education, Stanford University Press, Stanford, CA, 2007

Every now and then authors lob books at the early childhood establishment, hoping to create a stir. They usually succeed. These books are written to grab the public’s attention concerning the perils of contemporary child rearing practices; education and social policies that may have harmful effects on children; and focus on ideas that seem contrary to the best interests of children and their families.

I am reminded of David Elkind’s The Hurried Child, published 25 years ago. Elkind played the role of Henny-Penny and trumpeted the alarming news across America that the sky was falling on childhood as it was fondly remembered (for some). Elkind prophesied that this immanent childhood calamity could be laid at the feet of society and parents because they were hurrying children to grow up too soon, too fast. According to Elkind, childhood was disappearing right in front of our eyes! Interestingly, the world of childhood has survived, and many, including me, think many children are better off today than they were 25 years ago.

Then, almost a decade ago John Bruer, in his book The Myth of the Early Years, argued that the commonly held belief that the first three years of a child’s life are the most important for brain development is a myth. True, there is not as much talk or practice of brain-based education today as there was 10 years ago, but nonetheless, we all know that the first three years are not a myth for children’s brain development. Neuroscience research has had and continues to have a strong influence in early childhood practice. Early childhood educators today are more informed about children’s brain development and the practice of early childhood education is enriched because of our ability to apply it in our daily work with children. (See for example Pam Schiller’s books). Another good example is the growth, popularity, and application of responsive caregiving with infants and toddlers. Brain research has helped early childhood professionals learn that positive and responsive relationships with caring adults are essential for children’s growth and development. As they say, it’s all about relationships, especially in the first three years!

Now it is Bruce Fuller’s turn to act the bogeyman and scare parents, early childhood professionals and others across the country with the specter of a standardized childhood. In Fuller’s book, Standardized Childhood: The Political and Cultural Struggle Over Early Education, (with Margaret Bridges and Seeta Pai), the authors argue that universal preschools inevitably lead to “a one-size fits all institution regulated by government” which in turn leads to “the new push to standardize childhood.” Fresh off helping engineer the defeat of California Proposition 82, a constitutional amendment that would have established the right of parents to voluntarily enroll their four-year old children in free pre-school, Fuller now turns his attention to the rest of the country.

For Fuller, the issue is: “Should government advance free, universally accessible preschool as the exclusive remedy—the single sanctioned organization in which all young children should be raised?”
I doubt that anyone would answer “yes” to this straw man of a question. Certainly Montessorians wouldn’t and neither would I.

On the other hand, I have no trouble at all answering “yes” to this question: Should government (whatever that government should be—local, state or national) advance free, universally accessible preschool for all young children? But on the other hand, (and there is always another hand), I doubt if all the operators of proprietary Montessori programs would answer “yes” the same way that I do.

What also worries Fuller is if government funds and regulates preschools—what he refers to as UPK—it will impose its view of how children should be raised on families and communities.

In addition, Fuller also believes that with the advent of universal preschools, diverse ethnic leaders at the local level and parents are cut off from involvement in decision-making about local preschool programs and their operation. Fuller also worries that the current “colorful array of childcare and preschool potions” will disappear to be replaced by a “one best [state and/or federal] system of childhood,” that will not be responsive to “America’s rainbow of families.”

Fuller paints an ominous Orwellian future of the “...the homogenized brave new world of UPK that advocates envision for a more engineered form of childhood.” (275) Fuller sees UPK as a “welfare state remedy, replete with uniform institutions and central regulation.”

What is Fuller’s solution to the growing specter of standardized childhood brought about by universal preschool?

He thinks a plan for “… how to strengthen the capacity of families to raise their own children, especially how the nation’s employers and big institutions can support a more healthy balance between work and child rearing.” Fuller would have the prospect of a standardized childhood replaced with a subsidized childhood!

So what are we to make of Fuller’s claims about the ominous and imminent threat of a government-run preschool standardizing childhood?

First, I believe the notion that there ever was, is, or ever will be a standardized childhood or standardized children is far-fetched. As a professor of early childhood and child development, I constantly stress, and I believe other professors do too, that each child is a unique individual. The uniqueness of each child is at the heart of developmentally appropriate practice (DAP) and the Montessori Method. All one has to do is to consider Urie Bronfenbrenner’s ecological model of development to understand that all children are reared in environmental contexts that are unique for them. Even siblings reared in the same household are different!

Second, it is, I believe politically naïve to assume that governments will advance free, universally accessible preschool as the exclusive remedy—the single sanctioned organization in which all young children should be raised. I believe parents, Montessorians and the public are too savvy to allow this to happen. The blossoming of home schooling over the past decade is testimony to the democratic spirit and that people want to have, and make, choices. In my neighborhood, parents drive past public schools to enroll their children in private programs of all “colors” (to use one of Fuller’s favorite words).

What I am concerned about, and I think Fuller is too, are the repeated attempts of the entrenched education bureaucracy (think teachers’ unions such as the NEA and the AFT) to limit the opportunity for parents, especially the parents of underprivileged children, to make choices. Witness the recent rejection of 17 charter school applications by the Atlanta Board of Education.

Third, issues of parent and public disenfranchisement that government funding and operation of preschools could bring is troubling, but is not inevitable. Head Start and other early childhood programs across the country are wonderful examples of how parent and family involvement makes these programs richer and responsive to the needs of families and communities. Parent/family involvement should be a key element of any universal preschool movement.

Fourth, Fuller’s idea for derailing the preschool movement by empowering families, while on the surface seeming like a well-intentioned idea, is also overly naïve. As we all know, there are families and there are families. Some families don’t need any empowerment at all, thank you, while other families need help with a whole array of family living problems, from how to get next month’s rent money to how to manage four preschool kids. Programs such as Head Start have been very successful at empowering parents, but within a government-run program, the type Fuller opposes.

All in all, Fuller’s book is worth reading and one that all Montessorians should read for the simple reason that a lot of what he has to say applies to their proprietary efforts to preserve preschool options for parents. The rise and increase of government funded and controlled preschools would seem to portend the demise of private, for profit Montessori preschools as we know them. Montessorians should be part of Fuller’s efforts to provide a variety of options for how children are educated and raised.

Fuller has a lot to say, some worthwhile and some that isn’t. Fuller does present some interesting educational and sociological ideas that are worth considering, particularly regarding the need to “… strengthen the colorful array of CBOs (community-based organizations) that operate along side local schools to offer preschooling.”

George S. Morrison is Professor of Early Childhood Education, University of North Texas and Senior Editor for The Public School Montessorian

Pamela Rigg

A Real Threat

Dr. Bruce Fuller, professor of Education and Public Policy at the University of California-Berkeley, was formally a research sociologist at The World Bank, and instructor at Harvard University.

During the debate surrounding California’s Proposition 82: Universal Preschool in the winter and spring of 2005 (before it was defeated by 61 percent) Fuller was invited to editorial board meetings by major newspapers throughout California. His dispassionate and well-researched perspective on the issues surrounding universal preschool was respected because there was not a hidden agenda of power or money. During those editorial sessions I had the impression that Fuller was forced by time constrains to distill his thoughts to sound-bite conclusions. He would have preferred to elaborate and fully explain the genesis of his conclusions regarding the past decade move toward universal preschool.

In his fourth book in a decade, Fuller brings the required depth and elaboration to the Universal Pre-Kindergarten discourse.

Fuller voices concern that preschool locus of control is shifting away from Community Based Organizations (CBOs) which presently comprise more than 113,000 diverse early childhood settings serving more than 9 million under-five-year-old children in this country. The CBOs articulate a diverse array of best practices reflecting the community norms and unique child-rearing practices found in our pluralistic society.

Fuller informs us that the Universal Pre-Kindergarten (UPK) movement gained political traction from state boards of education and teachers unions, with funding from a pair of charitable foundations (Pew Charitable Trusts and the Packard Foundation).

UPK moved to consolidate, and to bring under the control of public schools, the existing community-based preschools. Not unlike the kindergarten movement of a century ago, when the diverse kindergarten movement was swallowed up by public schools, Fuller wonders if preschool will not become just another grade level in the public school. Will preschools, within the public school setting, also fall prey to poor delivery on the promise of providing quality education?

Fuller provides the historic and philosophic context of early childhood discourse over the past five centuries. The centuries-old historic debate examines the nature of the child and the nature of childhood.

Chapter 2 is a must-read for Montessorians seeking the philosophic basis of earlier discourse on childhood. Preceding Rousseau, Froebel and Pestalozzi was the romantic enlightenment perspective.

Fast forward to the latter part of the 20th century, Fuller challenges us to consider the multiple pressures on family life. As women entered the workforce, preschool/daycare flourished. The dilemma for the woman, in balancing career and child rearing while continuing to bear an estimated 90 percent of household tasks, is the question of who will raise the child: the family or the state?

Add to this debate current public school academic reform. As educators discuss the role preschools could have in delivering on the dream of equality of educational access, will state education standards be pressed upon the preschool? The UPK curriculum could align with public school standards to get our children ready for kindergarten!

In the universal pre-kindergarten debate Montessorians may identify with CBOs, given their focus on cultural and linguistic diversity, rather than centralized, state-generated standards and practices.

After these dense, chocolate-decadence-for-the-mind chapters, Fuller presents the “play book” for how UPK has evolved.

Oklahoma was the first state to implement universal preschool (1993) as a vehicle for filling the empty kindergarten seats vacated in population-shrinking rural sectors of the state. Four-year-olds were permitted to fill vacant seats in kindergartens. Little discussion regarding the developmental appropriateness of this experience for the four-year-old seems to have occurred! Seat time dropped straight to the bottom line for the public school ledger. Rural schools quickly filled the empty kindergarten seats with four-year-olds and reaped the financial rewards. Vignettes abound in these chapters that visit Oklahoma, California and the “Rainbow Room” (no state mentioned) as states and communities grapple with complex issues facing a pluralistic democracy.

Catch your breath and move into the most riveting section of Fuller’s book: all that we “know” that the research tells us, is not so!

Fuller explains that the earliest studies, in the 1960s and 1970s, were based upon very small samples of a homogenous group of young children. Statistics 101 cautions against generalizing:

(1) to a whole population from too small a sample size, and
(2) from a sample of a population to an entirely different population without the same cultural or linguistic characteristics.

The early studies did just that! And actual brain research, in more recent years, debunks what much of this brain-research-pop-culture would lead us to believe! Further, across cultures, gender and race children react, and profit, from differing preschool experiences. For example, early research would have us believe that preschool is better for all children. However, current research which focuses a cultural subsets shows that Asian children do better by staying at home!

Another sub-set factoid: long hours in day care correlates with aggressive behavior in young white males.

Finally, the sacred cow assumption of the movement: a BA-degreed teacher working with young children will provide a richer, measurably superior experience for the young child. Not true, according to replicated research. Not a degree, but specific coursework in childcare practices is predictive of quality care.

Familiarity with the essential issues in the UPK and CBO debate is essential for the Montessori practitioner. Our schools and our communities will be impacted by the political outcome. Standardized Childhood crystallizes the issues in this well-documented, research-based book.

Pamela Rigg is director of several schools and the Montessori Teacher Education Center of the San Francisco Bay Area. As president of the California Montessori Council, she opposed the state’s Universal PreK initiative.