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Looking in as lifetime of learning is launched

By ANDREW SKERRITT
Published March 5, 2006

It's 9:15 a.m. Thursday and some of Cindie Wise's students are journaling.

Their tiny fingers draw letters, numbers, stick figures.

On the page, Ronda Webster, 4, draws five or six stick figures in pencil.

Journaling is important in pre-K. The students filled one journal already, and they're well into their second. They'll be expected to journal in kindergarten and first grade.

Later, Wise sits with Ronda, and they discuss the drawings. The figures are Ronda's family members: mom, dad, brother, sisters.

"I like that," Wise says as she labels each family member.

In the other room, Megan Palmer, 4, paints a multicolored house.

"Megan is our Picasso," says Miss Ida Smith, a grandmother who volunteers with Wise's class at Sacred Heart Early Learning Center in Dade City.

Each class is part of the state's grand experiment: voluntary pre-K, the mandate by voters to improve the quality of public education, to ensure youngsters are better prepared when they enter kindergarten.

Wise's students are among the 1,200 children enrolled in year-round pre-K in Pasco. If the methods used in Wise's class work, then FCAT scores will improve a few years from now. We all hope so.

Each center teaches students differently, but the goal is the same: to meet the state's general standards. Students should enter kindergarten ready to learn. They should know colors, shapes and letters. They should know how to share and get along with their classmates. They need to be able to use pencils and scissors - those kindergarten projects involve lots of cutting and pasting.

Full disclosure: I have a vested interest here. Many of us do.

I have a 4-year-old in pre-K. She comes home with practice assignments so she's ready for her weekly tests on Friday. She has her sight words she needs to know on the refrigerator door. My daughter seems ready to tackle kindergarten.

With everything written and said about pre-K in the last few years, I set out to see how it works seven months since the first day of class.

I began at Sacred Heart Early Learning Center - one school in one county. In the next few months, I'll visit other schools in Hernando and Citrus.

Operated by Sacred Heart Roman Catholic Church, the Early Learning Center is one of 56 providers in Pasco County. In Hernando, 31 providers serve about 900 children. Nearly 600 Citrus County children attend pre-K at one of the 20 private day care providers or one of the school district's 17 pre-K sites.

Located on St. Joe Road in one of the most idyllic stretches of east Pasco, Sacred Heart seems the perfect setting to learn. I had expected to see 4- and 5-year-olds sitting at desks getting drilled by teachers who are trying to teach them to read and write in a frantic academic rush toward August. I was wrong.

Some educators want to control how children learn and what they learn. Not at Sacred Heart.

Director Toni Watkins says the staff tries to develop critical thinking skills: How do we put this tool together? Why are we doing it this way?

Wise's students are like the moveable parts of a clock, going in 10 different directions, yet moving in time, collaborating, negotiating, socializing.

With 18 students between them, Wise and fellow teacher Shelia Frye move around the classroom, asking questions. Later they'll break for music or a visit to the church sanctuary, as they did on Ash Wednesday, or they'll go outside. Then they take the balls and all the props.

Learning never stops. It never sounds dull.

After spending two days visiting her classroom, I asked Wise what she wants her students to take with them at the end of the school year in May.

"I hope they'll take away the excitement of learning something new, even if it's something small," she said, her excitement for teaching still fresh after 15 years at Sacred Heart. She apologized for sounding too corny, too idealistic.

"If they just have the love of learning, they can succeed in anything they do."

The love of learning, the first lesson in a lifelong education.

Andrew Skerritt can be reached at 813 909-4602 or toll-free at 1-800-333-7505, ext. 4602. His e-mail address is askerritt@sptimes.com

[Last modified March 5, 2006, 00:52:12]