While playing games and participating in hands-on activities, children of UCLA-affiliated staff, faculty and students learn independence and social skills at UCLA’s early child care and education centers.
According to a new study, activities like those in UCLA’s child care centers could have a large impact on preschooler development and better prepare children for kindergarten.
The study measured the readiness skills of 437 children at 24 preschools in fall 2008 and then reassessed 364 of those children in spring 2009.
This survey was commissioned by Los Angeles Universal Preschool, a non-profit organization that aims to ensure every 4-year-old in Los Angeles access to preschool services.
The study found that the percentage of students who were proficient in activities such as hand-washing, expressing needs and controlling impulses increased from 22 percent in the fall to 72 percent in the spring.
On average, skills across all the measured items increased from 3.2 to 3.7 out of 4, said Julia Love, a research and evaluation specialist for Los Angeles Universal Preschool.
Some of the measured items included self care, social expression and general knowledge, such as recognizing letters and counting numbers.
Love said these items were determined by teachers as well as focus and research groups done by Applied Survey Research, which conducted the study.
However, Love said the study did not look at curriculum and could not say that the UCLA early child care and education center’s science-based curriculum would be better for preschool students.
Love also said that as long as children go to preschool and their school has an adequate teacher-child ratio and a beneficial classroom environment, they will be better prepared for kindergarten, she said.
The UCLA child care center helps children develop skills like critical thinking by allowing them to solve problems among themselves or individually without adult help, said Gerardo Soto, director of the Krieger Child Care Center.
For children who have a hard time saying goodbye to their parents as they are dropped off, the center works to help the child express and deal with emotions openly, as this type of action will continue in the future, Soto said.
The teacher asks the children to express themselves and write down their feelings, and then the children share their words with their parents at home.
The activity helps them learn exactly why they are upset and gives them the opportunity to put their thoughts together and express themselves safely and naturally.
The children learn simple math skills through activities like block play, singing of songs and counting puzzle pieces.
They also learn to recognize what letters make certain words and see those words on the wall, allowing them to formulate thoughts that come naturally.
Soto said parents have told him that the work the center does for the children allows them to be better-prepared for what to expect in kindergarten, especially with the work teachers do to develop critical thinking skills.
The children are well-prepared because they have the resources they need to learn, read and do math, said Gay Macdonald, the executive director of UCLA Early Care and Education.
“We also give them the opportunities to play, because people take the information that they have and it allows them (to build) their worldview,” she said.
Unlike many preschools, UCLA has a unique curriculum developed by teachers and researchers from the UCLA Psychology department instead of policy makers, said Moises Roman, director of the University Village Center.
“In essence, (our curriculum) has a creative mentality and approach,” he said. “We think about everything that (the children) are doing and why they’re doing it.”