"Another unintended consequence of testing in early childhood is that children may come to believe that they are not capable, that they are slow in learning to read or in doing math, when the real problem is that the test does not permit them to demonstrate what they know and can do. Children may be unfairly held back or tracked into a slow group as a result of test scores, and teachers’ expectations can be altered about children’s abilities. We have to be extremely careful when assessing young children."  -Samuel J Meisels



When commenting on a study of self regulation done with young children, psychologist Elena Bodrova, creator of the Tools of the Mind curriculum, said, "Today's 5-year-olds were acting at the level of 3-year-olds 60 years ago, and today's 7-year-olds were barely approaching the level of a 5-year-old 60 years ago," Bodrova explains. "So the results were very sad."  

Gee . . .did we have TV 60 years ago?