Some of the most interesting work I've read about early childhood comes from Ross Thompson , a professor at the University of California, Davis. I heard him give a fascinating talk once about the importance of the mother child relationship for early learning.

This week, Education Week published a story about a new study indicating that the quality of the relationship between preschool teachers and students may be even more important to their learning than credentials, class size and other factors.

For reporters covering pre-school, the relationship question is worth pursuing, but tough to quantify. There may be certain clues, though, and all require close powers of observation and some background knowledge. The study provides yet another rationale for visiting pre-school classrooms to help shine some light on what happens inside -- and why it matters.

It's worth reading the study, which was released in the May/June issue of the journal Child Development. Authors include Robert Pianta, dean of education at the University of Virginia, who developed an assessment tool that measures 10 different aspects of teaching and is being used across the U.S. to train pre-school teachers. Some initial conclusions and useful observations can be found in the press release.

The information is a good starting point for classroom visits and questions to ask -- all of which will lead to higher quality journalism.

Jeff Solochek's blog The Gradebook in St. Petersburg says a state auditor's report suggests revising the method by which schools participating in the Voluntary Pre-K program are evaluated to take better account of the gains children make. But linking to this entry also let's me run this photo from the blog, which shows the 2007 "graduating" class of the Li'l Camper's Academy.

The City Paper in Nashville produced an insightful analysis of the Tennessee budget realities that forced Gov. Bredesen to give up on his plans to keep expanding the state's pre-k program. The move shows shows the seriousness of the state's financial problems, said Rep. Les Winningham (D-Huntsville), the chairman of the House Education Committee. “Obviously, he had a goal of continual expansion of pre-K,” Winningham said. “And we have to know and recognize that when he actually pulls back on an investment in that, that the situation financially is pretty serious.”

In reaction to the Ezra Klein post (see next entry), Bennett Gordon comments on the education blog of Utne.com that universal prekindergarten "reinforces existing inequalities" in the public schools and should be denied to middle-class children. That's an argument that Bruce Fuller of the University of California, Berkeley makes as well.

Given limited resources, I understand why Fuller argues that services should be targeted. But I find it hard to accept that it's a good idea to deny some children education to provide it for others. By that logic, one could ask whether the $550 billion or so spent on public education shouldnl't be targeted mostly to poor children? Certainly, more affluent families can send their children to private schools, can't they? Why should they be subsidized?

Ezra Klein, who blogs for the American Prospect, chides liberals for not getting behind universal prekindergarten. He says research shows universal prekindergarten is "tremendously cost effective" and produces "massive educational benefits." He bolsters his case with a link to the well-known William Gormley study of the universal program in Oklahoma. Gormley's study does, indeed, show positive results from the program but the biggest gains were made by Latino children learning English. To quote Gormley: "Preliminary results from a growing body of research on the
effects of pre-K programs are encouraging, but not entirely con-
vincing." He also cites Nobel Prize-winning economist James Heckman as supporting universal prekindergarten. Heckman, however, is something of a thorn in the side of supporters of universal programs because he actually says the higher payoff comes from targeted programs: "There are many reasons why investing in disadvantaged young children has a high economic return. Early interventions for disadvantaged children promote schooling, raise the quality of the work force, enhance the productivity of schools, and reduce crime, teenage pregnancy and welfare dependency. They raise earnings and promote social attachment. Focusing solely on earnings gains, returns to dollars invested are as high as 15% to 17%.”

Klein knows this but has ignored the distinction in the past as well.

The Utne Reader's Science and Technology blog links has a fascinating video interview with Elizabeth Spelke, who heads a team of Harvard
researchers studying the development of language and social awareness in babies. The video was produced by The Telegraph newspaper in London, which published an in-depth story on this line of research. Here's a nugget: babies from the very youngest age show preference for people who speak with the same accent as their parents, for people their own gender, and for people their own race.

At Early Ed Watch, Sara Mead notes statements Sens. Clinton and Obama made over the weekend before Tuesday's primary regarding investing in high quality early education. Clinton repeated her support for universal prekindergarten. (She favors providing states with incentives to invest their own money in high quality programs.) Obama linked high quality early education to improving the global competitiveness of the American workforce. Mead notes that North Carolina and Indiana have two very different approaches to prekindergarten. North Carolina is one of the nation's leaders and Indiana doesn't spend a dime on prekindergarten.

Stories about parents camping out on streets overnight to get their children into a quality pre-kindergarten program are easy targets for the media. It’s not hard to get quotes from exhausted and annoyed adults who have slept outside for several nights in search of a coveted spot in a quality program for their progeny.

That's exactly what reporters for 11 HD News in Atlanta Atlanta Journal Constitution did last week. The photos really bring this story home.

The hope, desperation and anger on those Georgia sidewalks and in the campers and RV's parked nearby speaks volumes about the value of a solid educational beginning for young children and the need for a better system of signing up. In Atlanta, parents sign their kids up on a first-come first-serve basis for pre-k, and camping out to be first is an accepted practice.

Atlanta’s Superintendent of Schools Beverly Hall apparently disapproves of it and had sent out a letter schools discouraging it. But it came too late for the parents who had spent the night on the sidewalk to be the first on line, only to have police barricades blocking them from entering the school.

The process is an education itself. But is it the right kind of education?

Governors who push for pre-kindergarten funding in the face of budget woes won't always get public applause, but they certainly will get adulation from pre-kindergarten advocates. That's what happened last week to Governor Deval Patrick of Massachusetts, who recently told reporters the economy his hampered his ability to expand spending.

But Patrick managed to propose triple funding for prekindergarten education, asking for $22.1 million in next year's budget, earning him accolades from PreK Now. His proposal would boost access for 14,320 3-and 4-year-olds if approved by the Legislature.

In Tennessee, however, it's a different story for Governor Phil Bredesen who has also been something of a darling among pre-kindergarten advocates for expanding programs and extolling the virtues of early education. This week, Bredesen acknowledged how difficult funding for pre-kindergarten will be at a time when the state is faced with a $500 million budget shortfall.

Bredesen told parents, teachers and others that the program is resented by opponents as "publicly funded babysitting,'' and added that there are real difficulties getting General Assembly approval.

While heading out of Chicago Saturday I saw that the early Sunday edition (at the L.A. Times we called this the "bulldog" edition) had a big front page spread delving into scientific, political, and economic issues related to how best to invest in early childhood education. It was an excellent piece that focused on how early some form of early education outside the home should begin. Brain research was cited but the piece also explored the competing interests and tradeoffs involved in early education policy. It was comprehensive, nuanced, authoritative, and balanced. Readers would come away knowing the parameters of key debates on early ed. Journalists should look to it as a model.

A Denver Post editorial last week noted that the universal pre-k program approved by the city's voters in 2006 is only serving 695 children and has prompted a new civic effort to speed expansion. The editorial notes that one reason for the slow growth is that the programs funded by the measure are required to be high quality. While the editorial says that's a problem, others might well disagree and call it a virtue.

A few days later a Rocky Mountain News editorial added the fact that the program is only spending about a third of the amount that was intended. The Rocky opposed the measure in 2006 but it says that it is rooting for its success. Given that the program was authorized only 18 months ago the Rocky said it needs to be given more time. But, the editorial said, if the program isn't running at full or near-full speed a year from now there would be reason to complain.

Here's the Post's news story, pegged to a new $1 million ad campaign to boost awareness. The Rocky published a much more useful story--including details about the program that might actually help parents--here. But neither

Linda Mcconnell / Special To The Rocky

reporter actually ventured into classrooms to explore the issue of quality or give readers a sense of what children are getting.

The program should be serving more students soon. In March it was announced that 1,100 families had applied during a six-week enrollment period and that 100 more centers had become certified to serve them.

I bumped into Steve Barnett, the co-director of the National Institute on Early Education Research, at the Education Writers Association conference in Chicago over the weekend. As we were being jostled by a scrum of p.r. folks, I asked him what he'd thought of the coverage of NIEER's 2007 State of Preschool yearbook. He said the report didn't get much attention from national outlets but that it was the hook for a lot of local stories. Catching up on the coverage I'd missed while on the road this morning I found a perfect example of what Barnett meant. The television station WYMT in Hazard, Kentucky used the report as the news hook for a visit to a preschool in Perry County, Kentucky. Reporter Heather Hale didn't quote any statistics or academic types. Nor did she talk about how much Kentucky actually spends. But the visuals and a couple brief interviews nicely illustrated high quality pre-k.

It's been interesting watching the coverage of the fight for pre-kindergarten funding emerge in two very different states, where advocates -- and taxpayers -- are keeping a close eye on the outcomes.

An editorial in The Tuscaloosa News noted Alabama Gov. Bob Riley's push for an additional $20 million for the Alabama's voluntary pre-kindergarten program, which would allow the state to triple the number of 4-year-olds in the program by 2001.

Earlier this month Riley asked 1,000 pre-kindergarten advocates in the state to walk up to the State House, find their representatives and senartors "and tell them to vote for this budget because pre-K is so crucial to the future of our state.''

Up in Massachusetts, where Gov. Deval Patrick came to office full of promises for an ambitious pre-kindergarten program, economic realities have hit home and derailed much of his education agenda. The Boston Globe pointed out last week that the House is likely to scale back some of Patrick's spending initiatives, including an additional 892 pre-kindergarten classrooms. Patrick no longer is making a big push.

Patrick told reporters the economy has hampered his ability to expand spending, and that there is "no point getting frustrated about the economic times.''

...to promote the long-term value of high-quality kindergarten, Roy Miller, the affable president of advocacy group known as The Children's Campaign in Florida is trying to turn the video of a violent 30-minute beating of an ostracized Lakeland cheerleader into a lobbying opportunity. The video, taken by one of the attackers, briefly popped up on YouTube, which led to the involvement of the local sheriff and the video's removal. It also led to national coverage. "This horrific evidence makes it clear: we must do more for our children" Miller writes in a letter to supporters this week, urging them to write their state representatives. It goes on:

Should Florida make a $2-million subsidy to honor golfers while cutting infant mortality prevention? Can’t Florida close a $63.5-million recreational fishing tax loophole instead of eliminating child protection workers? Does Florida choose a $41-million tax exemption for advertising inserts over quality pre-k and before and after school programs? Now with the eyes of America on Florida, do we truly believe that a $72-million tax exemption for boats and planes is more important than prevention, intervention and rehabilitative services to Florida’s troubled girls?

Sara Mead at Early Ed Watch posted on this before I could get to it: A German, Friedrich Fröbel, created the first kindergarten (literally children's garden) in 1840 to honor the 100th anniversary of Gutenberg's discovery of movable type. Oddly, though, as Mike Estrel recounted on the front page of the Wall Street Journal this week, Fröbel wanted young children to grow up in nature, "cordoned off from letters and numbers." In Germany today parents are again trying to offer their children the chance to play, worried that kindergarten has become too academically oriented. So, they're sending them to what are called waldkindergärten, or "forest kindergartens" to splash about in the mud, dig for worms, examine lizards, and other activities that characterized

Photo from the Wall Street Journal/Mike Estrel

playtime before the Screen Age of computers, TVs, game consoles etc.

Here are some great quotes:

Iwao Uehara, a professor at Tokyo University of Agriculture, says he has been trying to set up such a school in Japan, but the project is struggling. Until there's evidence that Waldkindergärten graduates end up attending "famous universities," it's going to be a tough sell, he says.

Among the nature-based activities, children learn how to handle a real saw. "A plastic saw is no good," says Ms. [Marsha] Johnson. (Johnson set up a "forest kindergarten" in Portland, Oregon, the Journal reported.) "You might as well give them a plastic life." The worst that has happened thus far to the children is the occasional bee sting, she says.

I tried to find anything written about the school in Portland via Google but was unsuccessful.

By the way, the first public kindergarten in the U.S. was established in 1872 in St. Louis. Wikipedia's history is here.