The Educational Program: Early and Middle Childhood. An Overview

Abstract

THE educational program for early and middle childhood is composed of three and usually separate parts: the nursery school, the kindergarten, and the elementary school. The program for early and middle childhood includes children of ages three to 12 or 13. In this program the nursery school usually provides for children aged three to four, the kindergarten for children aged five (some kindergartens admit four-year-olds), and the elementary school for ages six to 12 and 13. There is an overlapping of ages at all points. The greatest amount of controversy as to institutional responsibility centers at age four. While Caswell and Foshay (3), Davis (5), Forest (8), Hymes (16), and Otto (30) propose that the educational program for young children be seen and planned in some continuous over-all fashion, the above units come from different historical backgrounds and sources of support and vary widely in their presence in the educational program of any given community. The elementary school is a part of all programs of public and private education for young children. The kindergarten is found much less frequently, but Deffenbaugh (7), Gans, Stendler, and Almy (10), and Goodykoontz, Davis, and Gabbard (11) indicated that the kindergarten and the primary grades are closer to the elementary school in existence and practice than to the nursery school. The inconsistencies in the support and control of educational programs for young children have been brought out by Simpson (33). He indicated that in California, the state and school districts support the elementaryschool program; kindergartens are supported by the local district entirely; nursery schools are supported by the colleges or on a private basis; and child-care centers have been supported by the federal government. He concluded that this picture is inconsistent; it does not make sense; it does not reflect soundly developed educational policy. It is evident from the study by Goodykoontz and others (12) that the depression, and the war period which followed, accelerated the development of educational services for the young child. While not as dramatic during the past dozen years, the extension of education downward to young children parallels the similar extension upward of higher education and adult programs for young men and women and adults. The motives for such extension downward are mixed and complicated. Care for children of working mothers, more adequate personal and social development for children, and the concept that the public school should provide for children of all ages, combine to actuate the interest and support for educational programs at this level.