[tomder55]

The Aussies are sheeple . I am surprised . I thought they were more fiercely independent . Clete you say 'the kids will recover ' but that is far from a given . You say lockdowns work . I say we are trading liberty for safety and we are not guaranteed any safety . We will learn down the road what we have sacrificed in public health ....... and it is clear that the camel has it's nose in the tent and our leaders have gone to school about how much liberty they can take away during any time they declare "crisis " .

[jlisenbe]

if the gap closes with the new transitional kindergarten starting at age 4 and continuing until Kindergarten.

The book was not so much about the existence of a gap so much as it was about why the gap existed. I seriously doubt that 30 hours a week of additional schooling will overcome several years of parental problems.

'the kids will recover '

If the kids can indeed "recover", then why bother to have a year of school to begin with? Let's just go to school every other year and count on the kids recovering. It's clearly folly.

[paraclete]

The Aussies are sheeple . I am surprised . I thought they were more fiercely independent . Clete you say 'the kids will recover ' but that is far from a given . You say lockdowns work . I say we are trading liberty for safety and we are not guaranteed any safety . We will learn down the road what we have sacrificed in public health ....... and it is clear that the camel has it's nose in the tent and our leaders have gone to school about how much liberty they can take away during any time they declare "crisis " .

Tom we are not sheep, but we have learned to trust the judgement of those we elect because our system is very different to yours. Now these shutdowns are wearing thin but I learned today they were tracing a contact in my own town, so I say anything they can do to keep it confined is acceptable for the moment, however that won't always be so. Those who are leaders will pay at the ballot box

[teacherjenn4]

[QUOTE=jlisenbe;3871677]The book was not so much about the existence of a gap so much as it was about why the gap existed. I seriously doubt that 30 hours a week of additional schooling will overcome several years of parental problems.

I know what the book(written a long time ago) talks about. Many families can’t afford preschool. So, allowing students to attend transitional kindergarten beginning at age will help bridge the gap. And for anyone who thinks online learning was successful for Kindergarten, it was not. Most of my students could not hold a pencil, use scissors, write their letters and numbers, etc. I taught summer school just to catch many of them up. Unfortunately, their first grade teachers will need to teach Kindergarten for quite a while when school begins. That being said, some parents worked with their children after Zoom, and they did better than those who were stuck in front of the computer and received no help beyond my class sessions and extra support hours.

[jlisenbe]

I'm not opposed to some sort of targeted pre-school. I am opposed to the idea that schools can just step in and provide that which is not coming from the family. It can help, but it generally does not genuinely "bridge the gap".

I think your observations of online instruction are accurate.

some parents worked with their children after Zoom

The incalculable value of family.

[tomder55]

JKP told a whooper of a lie about covid school closures

Press Briefing by Press Secretary Karine Jean-Pierre and Director of the Office of Public Engagement Stephen Benjamin | The White House

She accused Trump for school closures that extended well past the time it was justified to stay closed .

She said when Clueless Joe assumed command "more than 50 percent of schools were shut down because of COVID, because the last administration didn't have a plan—didn't have a comprehensive plan—to deal with COVID and what it was doing to our economy and what it was doing to our kids. And because the president put…schools reopening and businesses reopening and making sure that people got shots in arms, made that a priority, we were able to open up the schools."

Press Briefing by Press Secretary Karine Jean-Pierre and Director of the Office of Public Engagement Stephen Benjamin | The White House

The facts are that the schools are run by states and schools that were closed in January 2021 were closed because Dem Guvs and leaders wanted them to remain closed . It was a policy of choice. Europe was already back to school as were private schools and Repub controlled state's schools .

It is silly to say Trump did not have a plan when he had no power over that call. All Clueless Joe did was find ways to funnel Federal money to Dem states and teacher's unions in those states.

How much ? $1.9 trillion in the American Rescue Plan of which $122 billion went to K-12 schools (on top of the $70 billion in emergency federal school funding those schools had already received), as well as an additional $350 billion to state and local governments.

Even with the $$$$ available for the picking ,AFT President Randi Weingarten bellyached .

Why schools may not fully reopen in the fall (yahoo.com)

Sadly there are still schools not fully opened ;and with covid as a pretext ;the Dems are planning covid restrictions part deux.