I’m hard pressed to find a preschool these days that doesn’t call itself a “childhood learning center” or the like. But in a recent article in Slate, “Why Preschool Shouldn’t Be Like School,” Alison Gopnik discusses two studies that have found “While learning from a teacher may help children get to a specific answer more quickly, it also makes them less likely to discover new information about a problem and to create a new and unexpected solution.”
In other words, less “instruction” in the early years is better for developing creativity and problem solving. According to Gopnik, though, President Bush’s No Child Left Behind Act (NCLB) “explicitly urged more direct instruction in federally funded preschools.” While I leave it as a rhetorical question as to what type of early education George W. may have had, I think it’s going to be very interesting to watch this year’s attempt to revise the Elementary and Secondary Education Act (ESEA) this year. We’ll get to see, I think, just how well President Obama and Congress have developed their problem-solving skills.