Three-quarters of kindergarten teachers consider it important that a child arrives able to count to 20, and fully 85 percent deem it important that a child arrives knowing the letters of the alphabet. At the same time, 86 percent say it is important that a child not disrupt the class, and every kindergarten teacher considers it important that pupils start kindergarten able to get along with other children and show sensitivity to their feelings.6

Children enter kindergarten differing from one another in ways that go beyond their experiences. They vary in height and weight. Some run faster and some are stronger. Their personalities have already diverged.

They are of differing ages—some as young as four and some as old as six, disparities that can represent one-fifth of a lifetime. Some still need stuffed animals to nap, while others have divested themselves of such vestiges of early childhood. One way of teaching will not meet all needs.

These variations add to the anxiety of adults who suspect that schools may ask too much of children. Kindergarteners often face tests and get report cards, practices once reserved for pupils in the numbered grades. Journalists, in turn, seem to revel in writing about the disappearance of naptime and how elements of first grade are showing up in kindergarten, exacerbating the unease of parents.