Clio, Holt and Katie’s first child is due on 4-24-17. The photo shows Katie playing golf last Sunday-never too early to get the kid in the swing of things. Clio has also been skiing a bit and she continues to work out most days. Clio will be a fortunate child, she has educated and motivated parents who understand how critical those early years will be in her lifetime success. Yes, pre-cradle to career education will give Clio a leg up on the competition.
The Idaho legislature has held several hearings this year on early childhood education. Idaho is one of only six states that invest no money in preschool. I hope the willingness to listen leads to the understanding that there is significant research that shows high quality preschools produce long term academic and social benefits for the student and our communities. I have mentioned before that half of the Idaho children show up not knowing their alphabet, not knowing any alphabet sounds, and not knowing how to make a rhyme according to the Idaho state reading indicator. Steven Barnett, Executive Director of the National Institute for Early Education research says those rudimentary skills set the bar too low for measuring school readiness. “the real problem is that a kid who doesn’t know letters probably doesn’t know many words” said Barnett and goes on to say ” vocabulary size…. has been proven to be a strong predictor of later school success.” How does a child build a strong vocabulary? No surprise-“be born into a family of people willing and able to talk, read, sing, and play with them.” Or have the child attend a high quality pre school.” Thanks to the Idaho Statesman for their article on Thursday about this critical Idaho education issue.
Hank and I went to vote in the Boise School District Bond election. He wanted to know what we were voting for, my response, for education. Thanks to those who turned out to vote in the Bond elections across the State. As Confucius reminded us last week, if you have a plan for 100 years-educate our youth. Hank gets it – come on Idaho.
Enjoy another excellent week end. Mike