Full day kindergarten in Ontario

Our premier had an election promise to introduce full-day kindie (JK and SK) by 2010. When I heard the election promise, I was ecstatic. It was my view at the time, way back in September, that half day kindie was a debacle of time management. Two hours and a few minutes of school each day couldn't possibly be beneficial.

Nine months into my first kindie year (Kathleen is a SK, but did JK at our daycare centre), I couldn't disagree more with the idea of full day kindie. For my children, full day kindie would be the wrong approach. Kathleen enjoys her half day of school. She understands the routine, she enjoys recess, reading circle and her time at the art table. She has her little circle of friends - and has even been exposed to the initial phases of 'cliques' (not happy about that, but it is a fact of school girl life). She spends her afternoons with me - reading books, going to swim lessons, shopping for the renovation which she doesn't always appreciate, riding her bicycle, playing quietly, or playing board games. We have lunch together. We even do a few girl-movie afternoons. Most of the time we have fun. We mightn't be breaking records for the books we read (we do read just fine), or the words we spell - but I know she is learning, she is having fun and she is still a very little girl.

We have also been very lucky that our kindie teacher was an ECE first, and a teacher second. I think that background makes her particularily well suited for the kindie classroom. Her speciality is very young children. I think that ECE training is instrumental in the kindie classroom setting. I would be much happier with an ECE than a 'older kiddo' teacher in the kindie classrom. The government is thinking about infusing ECEs into the Kindie classrom - which I think is a wonderful idea, especially if they bring the ratios up the Nursery School Act standards. I do worry about the 'I am this, you are that' kind of ranking but perhaps that already exists with teacher assistants.

Andrew-boy will start JK next year in the school system - and he luckily will also be on the half-day program. We have hired a stupendous nanny that is so excited about caring for four kiddos. I know she will have awesome adventures with the boys - playgroups, swim lessons, maybe a sports class during the morning hours. Andrew will head to school in the afternoon (or at least that is what I have requested)during the younger pair's nap time. He will play at school, sit for circle time, practice his printing/pencil holding, continue his Jolly Phonics and bring home his little readers. It will be a great two years before transition to the full day of Grade 1.

Full day kindie works for those parents who work/live around a 'school days' hours - but no one else. All working parents will still need to find pre- and post-care programs (which is in very short supply), or hire a nanny. It really won't help much. I also seem to live in a neighbourhood of a school over-capacity so it doesn't appear the government plans to send these kindie kiddos to the local school.

In a perfect world, I would keep my kiddos in my daycare - which is regulated under the Nursery School Act (and which has a much higher ratio of teacher/students at 10:1 for the kindie aged children as compared to the 20:1 in the school system, and also requires a quiet time/nap time schedule which I believe is 2 hours each day). I think this makes a heck of a lot more sense than a 9-3 school day for these little people who would then might be ushered off to a post-school program.

I can only hope this is an election promise - and one which will fail to meet its deadlines. I will have kiddos in the kindie era until Seanie-boy goes to Grade 1 in September 2013 so I have my fingers crossed hoping for a delay. It also appears that full day kindie would be voluntary - so if I could send my kiddo to half day school, then I guess I would be happy, and save a few pennies for the taxpayer.

Another suggestion - if we are at all thinking about this full-day kindie ... let us start backing up the age cut-off. A three year old in September heading to full day JK kindie is simply wrong. Many of the US states have a August 31 deadline - at least the kiddos would be four when they started school (a tiny bit better).

I acknowledge that full day might be better for the parents/kiddos who are currently in sub-par child care settings but the lack of daycare should be solved by putting very small children into the school system for extended periods of time.