Article Link: http://www.exchangepress.com/article/how-the-world-has-changed-in-four-decades/5022065/
History from the Perspective of the Calvin Hill Day Care Center, Inc.Kitty Lustman-Findling Kindergarten
Yale University • New Haven, Connecticut
The world of early childhood has certainly changed since I started working at the Calvin Hill Day Care Center in 1975! In those days, with a masters degree in urban education, experience at the forefront of an exciting educational crusade striving to bring back progressive education through the open classroom movement, and a strong commitment to social justice, I felt I was part of a movement of visionary young teachers who really could change the world. We created curriculum and studied child development together, sought to provide equal access to quality education to the disenfranchised and the poor, made our classrooms laboratories and workshops and studios where children could experiment and play and learn, were partners with parents and as teachers also continued to learn. It was a heady time, one full of promise, very hard work, intellectual challenge, and much joy.
Some of the change that has come since I began in the field is quite positive. While affordable quality child care is still not universally available, parents now have many more options for their children than they did in the 1970s. ...