What are your feelings on all-day kindergarten for children? Do you believe starting children earlier in school will lead to a better educated individual?

The sooner we can get them the better. Parents are so busy these days that some aren't able to give their children the foundations they need to be successful....like reading to them, teaching them to count, taking them to different places, etc. If they are in school, we are also able to make sure they eat breakfast and lunch, have immunizations, and are being taken care of.

Kids need to not be so pressured to learn. Playtime is important and the social interactions are a learning experience too. All Day K sounds terrible.

All day kindergarten often means 2 full days of kindergarten with 3 full days off at home. I teach full day kindergarten and have had 3 of my 4 kids so far in 2 day a week full days. Our family loves it and would not switch to 5 half days of kindergarten. My kids rarely missed school due to sickness as they always had lots of down time at home to play and just be kids. We also enjoyed having our kindergartener home 5 full days a week (including the weekend) which as parents, we loved!!

As far as a better educated individual, preschool, kindergarten and the early childhood years are extremely important but just as important, if not more, is the child's home environment. Good nutrition, lots of sleep, tonnes of exposure to early literacy and math, and a family that values the education of a young child gives that child a head start no matter how early or late they started school.

I don't thing it matters. kindergarten prepares you for elementary which prepares you for everything else.

i don't think more school is the answer. i think better diets, more play, and less pressure and far less organized activities (what kid needs piano, dance, soccer, and art classes in addition to regular schoolwork?!!?) so that they can be *kids* and not burn out on school so quickly. all day k sounds awful.

No I think too much pressure is being put on kids too early. We are no smarter than my parents were but I attended way more school than they did. If you give kids a quality education they will have all the knowledge they need to make it in the world. Longer days, more days, and starting sooner isn't the solution. I just noticed your name and I had an instructor at the school I just finished named Jakie Jones.

I have a kindergartener who goes to school from 8:05 to 2:05. Next year she will go until 2:45. They have so much energy and they have nap time that I don't see any reason not to go all day. It would say a lot on fuel not to have the kindergarten run and they are required to learn so much in such a short amount of time that they need that extra time. Mine has homework and is learning to read. When

I feel that full-day kindergarten is important. If you look at the homework a lot of the first and second graders now have, school is getting tougher and they're learning a lot more at a younger age. Since your brain is like a sponge when you're young, it's important to instill learning when you're ready and willing. That's why they're trying to get spanish being taught to kids in kindergarten. Kindergarteners actually have a lot of scheduled learning time, hardly any of their day is spent playing now. A LOT has changed.

My son attends all-day kindergarten, and I teach all-day kindergarten. I feel, like many others, that there are too many demands placed on our children today. However, society is changing; and there is nothing we can do about that. As a parent, I want to give my son every opportunity available to help him be successful in today's society. As a teacher, it is my job to make sure my students are able to compete in today's society. Standardized assessments are being administered at much younger ages (3rd grade), organized sports start earlier (2nd-3rd grade), and high school curriculum is much more difficult (my daughter is a freshman). Our kids need to be prepared, and all-day kindergarten will help give them that foundation. At the very least, it will help them become accustomed to the routines and procedures of an all-day setting. If handled appropriately, the day will still allow them time to play and be kids. And let's face it, most children come from duel working homes. Why not have your children learning while they are away from you? It will be more "fun" time you can spend with them at home!

The current school year is antiquated and needs to be reformed. Originally schools were set up so the children could be home on the farm to help cultivate the crops during harvest season. This is no longer the case, so schools should consider going to a year round policy with a few weeks off throughout the year.

In a good family where the parent is nurturing and interested in teaching her own child, the safe nurturing environment at home is better in balance with a few hours at school. If a parent merely plunks a child in front of a tv all day, that child would be better served at school.

My personal belief is that too long at school is overwhelming for most children that age.

Some children thrive in it and some have trouble being in a structured environment for that long. I think that children need to be assessed individually for school readiness. Some children (most often boys) are not ready for kindergarten even by age 6.

I think its more about teaching the children to interact with other children and manners. Some schools do teach more, but I think there is a trade off with teaching early as sometimes there is an emotional cost for youngsters.

Many daycares are now certified Kindergarten classes. I gave my daughter a choice. She could go to school all day at the day care, or she could go to an actual school 1/2 day and take a bus to daycare afterwards. She chose to go to the 2 different places and loved it! The bus ride broke up her day, she got lunch and snack when she arrived, and got to have double the friends. She is a very social person now because she was exposed to more children. The day care also taught them Spanish in the afternoons so she got to learn something very useful that the schools weren't teaching. This was a great alternative!

my daughter just finished kindergarten. She was in an all day program and loved it. They went on many fieldtrips, took swimming, skating, yoga,soccer. My older daughter went to a half day kindergarten, she like kindergarten but she hated grade one. All of a sudden school is work not play, but it is also twice as long. She went for about 3 days and wanted to quit. The transition will be a lot easier for my youngest.

I think an all-day kindergarten is a great idea. It seems to me that some of the posters here believe an all-day kindergarten would be like high school -- nonstop classes. If a child's parents are not able to arrange a stay-at-home parent situation (and let's face it, many people are not), then all-day kindergarten is a viable option. The child will be engaged, entertained, and learning. This setup will be filled with activities, not just the "Three R's." However, all children mature at different rates -- a parent must evaluate whether their child can handle the stimulation of being around other kids for that long, etc. If the parent is confident that their child is ready for kindergarten, a full-day schedule makes sense to me. At my school, the kindergarten day was as long as the high school day, and I loved it.

It's a known fact that children are more succeptible to knowledge earlier. If we can teach them as early as possible, the better. They do still need to be a kid, but there should be more knowledge too. Start teaching foreign languages in elementary school. We keep lowering the bar and lowering the bar. Do you want the dumb, smelly kid operating on YOU? Come on guys, think about this!

Society is set up these days that in most families both parents HAVE to work. The cost of daycare is outrageous. Both of my children have been going since babies. All day kindergarten is a lifesaver on my pocket book! We ( my husband and I)have no choice as to have them learning somewhere during the day; all day.

In NSW Australia, children start Kindergarten at 5 yo. Except for the first few weeks, when they are phased in, they are there all day from then on, but they sleep in the afternoon.

I spent the first 2 years of my daughter home with her, finally discovered financial assistant in paying for daycares, and she now currently has to go to a day care full time M-F. In sept she will be going to half day kindergarten in the afternoons. this means that, in the morning i will drop my child at day care, they will bus her to kindergarten. she will stay there for like...three hours, they will bus her back to daycare. she will stay there for another three hours until I can pick her up. Yeah...that sounds like sooooooo much fun, doesn't it? I'm certain my daughter is going to be thrilled with THAT schedule (sarcasm anyone??)

I want full day kindergarten purely to avoid having to move her from one spot the the other to the other. She's been attending full day daycare for the past year, has fully adjusted, I'm thrilled with how they're supplementing the education I instilled in her and continue to work on at home and I just wish she could have a "real school" education sooner rather than next year. I remember half day kindergarten for myself and I think we learned some ABC's, played, napped and was home before I could blink. Honestly, she'd learn more staying in the daycare.

My daughter is an extremely bright, creative, social child. She thrives in the full day day care setting, loves telling me about her whole day on the ride home (through til suppers ready mind you!) and then looks forward to going back. She hated it when I had her in a half day program for a short time awhile back. She didn't understand why she couldn't stay with her friends all day. So...I am all for full time day care.

I believe that the more education a child gets the better he will be when he is an adult.

I believe that a full day of kindergarten can be very good for a child. If I didn't, I'd have no reason to study social education (pedagog), and to work in a kindergarten when I finish. The things that we learn (in Denmark) and use in theese institutions, do not take anything away from the parents or their parenting. We support the parenting, and step in only; if there is a serious problem with the enviroment around the child.
The child still has as close a bond to the parents as the children being watched after at home.

They may not be more educated- we're talking kindergarten here- but they will be a bit more tired and probably in some cases, it will be easier for some worn out moms to handle them when they get home.

My son is 5 years old, and in kindergarten. He goes to an "all day" kindergarten (which is 8am-3pm M-F). He loves school, and the teacher is really involved with the kids. He has learned a lot since he started (and it's only been 3 weeks). I think all day kindergarten is great for my child.

All-day isn't bad as long as there are plenty of breaks and naptime. In this day and age, most parents work and their kids would end up in daycare anyway after school which in my opinion is just as tiring for the kid as kindergarten would be.

In certain cases, many, the kids will end up better-educated of course, because those certain kids have parents who are not involved and not responsible enough parents to even do the parent's part in getting kids school-readied. In those cases (many), it's probably sad to say, but the kids are better-off in school than in a neglectful home I believe.
As one who did licensed home childcare for 12 years, I think that our judicial and social services systems, have long went over-board granting so many less-responsible single parents (who are unsuccessful or even detrimental parents) priviledges of child custody. The thought has crossed my mind, that now they have all these kids sort-of being neglected in bad homes, and I think their solution is to ASAP take all those kids out of the hands of all of those granted-but-incompetent-parents, by offering more and more preschool, and All-Day-Kindergarten.
The sad part of this all? There's probably better-suited parents out there willing and wanting to have the kids and be more involved as a parent, but the system just refuses to let that particular gender of parent prevail in custody disputes. So now the taxpayers can foot the bills for all-day-kindergarten and other new alleged-needy programs which cost so greatly fo fund? Because better-suited parents who could have school-readied the child/ren were not let to have that opportunity? All-Day-Kindergarten probably would not be a necessity, except that the better-suited parents have been unfortunately pushed out of the roles they should be in, custodial parents. Granting custody of kids to a less-suited parent, ends up with kids needing more schooling support and teaching-aids we otherwise would not have to afford. Who else benefits from this scheme of letting the less-suited gain custody? Well, all the social workers, teachers, doctor-institutions, psychs, etc, so it may be that those ones do not intend to let the better-suited parents prevail because there would be less-jobs necessary for them to fill? I'm afraid that is what I discovered in the last 12 years of working with kids and families. Sad but I think true. Is all day kindergarten needed? No, letting the kids live with a better-suited parent is what this country needs to let happen. Parents are a children's first and foremost teachers, that's the way it is intended at least. Give them that priviledge then.