Kinder Grind

Forget blocks, dress-up and show-and-tell. Five-year-olds are now being pushed to read. Are we asking too much too soon?

It is 11:30 a.m. on Monday, and Mrs. Wampler is squeezing in one more math lesson before her morning kindergarten class leaves for the day: "If you have three bunnies and three apples, and there is an apple to go with each bunny, then they are...equal." It's hard to tell whether her 25 pint-size students are still with her. They have been busy all morning working on language skills, word recognition, counting, sets, days of the week and primary colors, in addition to trying to complete an art project and work on assorted social skills, such as raising one's hand before...

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