The overriding goal of the NCLB legislation, to maintain a minimum proficiency level for all schools and students, begins with a level playing field at the kindergarten level, according to the U.S. Department of Education. While the phrase "level playing field" may seem like it refers to the blank slate that the unschooled child has, it more accurately means that all preschoolers should come to kindergarten with a base amount of previous knowledge. In order to effectively slide into the proficiency ideal of NCLB when it comes to literacy and mathematics abilities, preschoolers need to all have an age-appropriate level of skill when it comes to learning their letters, understanding simple vocabulary and recognizing their numbers. As this doesn't always happen, and a level playing field doesn't truly exist, many children may struggle to keep up with early primary-level learning expectations.
Whether a child actually attends preschool or not, his elementary school will expect him to have the knowledge to master the reading and math elements of NCLB state assessments. This means that a young child who doesn't go to an early education program or attend a child care center must learn the basics at home. The trickle-down influences of NCLB that result in incoming kindergartners having an already growing knowledge base when it comes to literacy and math skills is changing the ways parents interact with their children at home during the preschool years. Parents must act as teachers, helping their little learners start on a road toward literacy, teaching them letters, helping them to read and building vocabulary. Additionally, they must also help them to build math skills such as number recognition and solving basic equations.
Young children who do attend a formal preschool program must, due to the grade school-level NCLB requirements, participate in a much more academic-oriented curriculum than in past decades. While the modern pre-k curriculum may mean focusing more on content in areas such as reading, mathematics and science, this doesn't mean that it isn't developmentally appropriate or only uses rote memorization techniques. Many states -- more than three-fourths of them -- now use a standards system. State standards typically reflect the content that children should know as they enter kindergarten, and prepare them to enter school NCLB ready. Preschool programs, in an effort to prepare young children for the reading, writing and math that they will need to know to pass NCLB-related assessments, often follow these standards when creating and implanting a curriculum.
Starting school with an adequate understanding of educational basics and a good foundation is often an outcome of the family's socioeconomic status. Preschoolers who live in poverty are more likely to have less school-related skills when starting kindergarten, according to the National Association for the Education of Young Children. NAEYC also notes that the kids who are on the lowest end of the socioeconomic spectrum were found to score, on average, 60 percent lower on cognitive evaluations than those in the highest, or most wealthy, group. NCLB legislation may mean that preschoolers who are living in poverty may find themselves in a direct disadvantage when they get to school and have to produce test scores that are on a like level with their more affluent counterparts.