Dive Brief:
- NPR's Anya Kamenetz recently compared current pre-K trends to Fred Rogers' views on early education.
- Kamenetz made the case that Rogers is still relevant because he embodies the core tenets of today's early education discussions, which include creativity and imagination, social and emotional learning, the use of new media to teach 3-to-5-year-olds, and free and open educational resources.
- While the article is able to draw various parallels between Mr. Rogers and the current pre-K debate, it ultimately ends by saying we cannot rely too heavily on new media and tablets to teach our youngest learners.
Dive Insight:
According to the end of the article, a person showing love through a TV is never going to be the same as a person showing love and support in real life. As it follows, the current trend of using tablets to teach pre-K students falls short when trying to attain the overall goal of giving students emotional and social skills.
Early education has been a hot topic in the United States this year, starting with New York Mayor Bill de Blasio's public push to provide the city with universal pre-school. It has now become a massive point of debate in the Texas gubernatorial elections, and political heavyweights like Hillary Clinton and Rahm Emanuel have also spoken on the importance of early education this year.
On top of these pushes, a new study out of Rutgers University has found that, despite increased interest in early education, many states are not filling up their pre-K slots.
