What Has My Daughter Learned in Kindergarten?

The last few weeks of the school year are a time to celebrate the growth and learning of our children and to see them perform some of what they have learned in the past year.  At my older daughter's local elementary school, we have recently been invited to attend an all-school math night, a school carnival, a kindergarten picnic, and a "Tribute to Mother Goose" performance by the kindergarten children.  My husband has attended his last PTA meeting of the year, and I have volunteered in my daughter's  kindergarten classroom for the last time.  As I commiserated with the other kindergarten parents last Friday before and after our childrens' performance of nursery rhymes, we all agreed that they have become strikingly more mature over these past ten months.  As I watched my older daughter and her classmates perform, I was struck with how capable they appear to me in comparison to the youngsters who nervously began kindergarten together last August.  My DD1 has "grown up" before my eyes through this kindergarten year, and so have her peers.   Thus, as I reflect back upon the journey of this kindergarten school year, I am left wondering: Is one of the primary purposes of Kindergarten to prepare youngsters to function independently in school?  What other noteworthy knowledge and/or skills have my daughter and her classmates acquired through their schooling this year?  And how does what she has learned compare to what I hoped she would learn in Kindergarten?

I learned at Math Night that my older daughter can do "brain teaser" problems in which she must determine what combination of coins equal a set amount, such as "if you have four coins that equal sixteen cents, which coins do you have?" I learned during my final observation of literacy block last week that my DD1 can write a summary of a book that is read aloud during circle time.  I learned at bed time several nights ago that my older daughter is able to read her way through unfamiliar picture books from the library.   And I learned at the Mother Goose performance that my older daughter has memorized half a dozen newly refurbished songs, and that instead of being nervous about performing them in front of the parents she was excited.

Because kindergarten has demanded so much self-sufficiency from her, I can attest to the fact that my older daughter has risen to the occasion.  In the mornings at school drop-off, she jumps out at the traffic circle and bounds to the playground unaccompanied by me.  At lunch, she opens her own ketchup packets, milk carton, and other packaged food in her lunch.  She can now tie her own shoes and zip her own sweatshirt. And, most importantly, she has become more willing and able to speak up for herself among her peers to indicate when she wants to join in or when she wants some solitude.  At home, she pours her own milk and makes her own hot chocolate in the microwave.  She brushes her teach in the morning by herself, and she can now also brush her own curly hair and bunch it together with an elastic band into a ponytail.  She likes to read to her younger sister at bedtime, and she often helps to buckle her sibling in and out of her carseat, too.

Before this school year began, did I expect that my older daughter's reading skills and numerical sense-making would be so developed by the end of kindergarten?  No, I did not.  Did I imagine that she would become familiar with how to use internet learning tools, time lines, maps, scales, rulers, magnifying glasses, classroom charts, jump ropes, percussion instruments, the Dewey Decimal system, etc, in kindergarten?  Perhaps. Did I foresee that she would become proficient at listening to instructions, working independently at her desk, lining up with her classmates, and raising her hand when she needs help or wants to contribute her thoughts. Yes -- it was this set of skills that I did anticipate would become routine in kindergarten.  My surprise through this year has been how much of the emphasis in kindergarten has been on learning serious academic content in reading, mathematics, science, and social studies, rather than thoughtfully engaging our children in a collective socialization process that can serve as a shared foundation through the remainder of their public schooling.

In closing, I ask my readers to consider with me:  What should our children learn in Kindergarten?  And to the educators who read this blog, I ask:  How have the learning targets for children in Kindergarten been established in your district?  And are these Kindergarten learning goals holistic or mostly academic?