NASHVILLE, Tenn. (AP) - Adan Sanchez-Uribe is high-tech. Bilingual. Hard at work on his first e-book.
And he’s 5 years old.
With one finger - sometimes more - the Nashville preschooler takes pictures of his classmates, draws around them on the touchscreen, types his name, records his voice and plays it back right away.
Before class ends, he shows off the e-book to his teacher and classmates. Given a little more time, a much broader audience will take notice.
That’s because Sanchez-Uribe plays with the iPad in one of two city classrooms being studied to see how preschoolers learn with digital tablets. It’s an innovative approach in Tennessee at a time when interest in the state’s preschool classrooms could hardly be higher.
People want to know: Does preschool matter?
How state officials answer that question will determine whether they move to expand Tennessee’s pre-K program. Proposed increases of federal funding for pre-K have butted up against questions about the long-term value for children.
Leading Republican lawmakers have cited emerging research at Vanderbilt University, widely regarded as definitive, as showing that some gains in achievement tend to dissipate over time. Gov. Bill Haslam isn’t expected to include money for preschool expansion in his budget.
But the researchers themselves say there’s more to it than that. They say the most important findings are still to come in the multi-year study. And they’re seeing early evidence across the state that some of the more innovative programs have more lasting impact.
That’s all happening against the backdrop of a national conversation about universal preschool, led by President Barack Obama, who has held out the prospect of significant federal money for states willing to make the investment.
Preschool teachers in Tennessee are eager to embrace innovations. More than 1,000 attended a summit in Nashville last summer on early childhood learning, a record showing.
The Vanderbilt researchers, meanwhile, press on with their evaluations of what they saw over a two-year period in 160 classrooms around the state, where new approaches merged with ideas educators already felt sure about.
The key to expansion, it turns out, could be the 5-year-old boy swiping his fingers across a touchscreen, and others just like him.
When Vanderbilt researcher Debbie Rowe approached Haywood Elementary School about the idea of bringing iPads into the classroom, preschool teacher Rebecca Carty-Groll didn’t take much convincing.
She’s always seeking tools that reach students who learn visually, or through sound and touch.
“There are so many things out there with technology that don’t encourage people to think, or to use critical thinking, or interactions with other people,” she said. “I was excited about finding some software that would be interactive, that adults or teachers could use with children, and that the children could turn around and use to interact with peers.”
When Rowe gave Giovanni Moctezuma his turn last week, other children gravitated to his table and hovered. Moctezuma made a digital drawing of a spider and then recorded himself naming the creature, first in English and then in his native Spanish.
Then he swiped to get a new blank “page” and started again.
Rowe finds promise in the tablet’s ability to teach a whole gamut of skills at once, from obvious ones, such as reading and writing, to some that aren’t as traditional - but are nonetheless valuable. These include comfort with digital technology and taking pride in being bilingual.
There’s no hiding that the iPad makes learning fun and fast.
“They can explore with the built-in camera and draw and write all together,” Rowe said. “I’m the original give-kids-paper-and-a-marker teacher, but now there’s no lag time. The kid goes and takes the photo and it’s right there.”
Because kids rely on visuals as subjects to write and talk about, Rowe likes how the iPad encourages children to create their own images - drawn or photographed - and then write.
With the right mix of adult guidance and free exploration, young children are able to test their skills and creativity. Of course, allowing a child like Sanchez-Uribe to explore can test a teacher’s patience, even for a pro like Rowe.
After watching the boy meticulously scroll through colors, choose the thickness of his lines and fill the screen in a way she had not seen him do before, Rowe had to hold back when he suddenly changed his mind.
“Sometimes they create something really cool and then they choose to use the eraser,” Rowe said, “and we’re like, ’Oh no!’ “
But the tablet can be more than a sleek stand-in for paper and pencil, Rowe said.
Part of her research looks straight at the proliferation of touchscreens, smartphones and hand-held video games in daily life, acknowledging that failing to bring similar tools into the classroom could make schools “obsolete.”
She also marvels at how children get along without the user manuals that accompanied gadgets of years past.
“Tapping around, exploring and realizing you’re not going to break it is a 21st-century skill,” she said.
On top of all of that, Rowe takes interest in non-native English speakers. In Carty-Groll’s class, that’s almost everyone. Five languages chirp out on some days, occasionally at the same moment.
Rowe has found that by the end of the first year of preschool, many bilingual children have become reluctant to use both languages.
That’s not how it should work, she said. Too often, parents and teachers pressure English learners to use English “always and everywhere,” she said. “Children learn English best if they continue to use and learn their home language.”
That’s why Rowe and Carty-Groll ask the boys to record bilingually. The subtle message there is that their ideas, writings and bilingual skills are all valuable.
“To a lot of people it’s just another game that they may be seeing,” Carty-Groll said. “It’s a learning tool. As a teacher, there are specific skills and specific ways we are trying to use it, but also trying to leave that room for creativity and expression.”
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