30 Million Word Gap by Age 3

Reflections concerning

The Early Catastrophe:  

The 30 Million Word Gap by Age 3 

by Betty Hart and Todd Risley

I really enjoyed reading this article, but not specifically for the message that the article provided.  What made the article so interesting is the way that the early childhood education gap data agrees with the personal reading I have done on development.

The theme of the article greatly emphasized the difficulty that exists in creating an intervention that endures over time.  Typically, gains in academic progress by lower achieving students are lost as the student progresses through school.  The article provides insight that by the age of three, many children are already experiencing an educational gap.  The two pieces of supporting evidence were an analysis of differences between word exposure and an analysis of parental feedback by socioeconomic background.  Both pieces of evidence indicate that development issues begin at very early ages.

As I read the results I thought about studies by Annette Lareau, which found that parenting styles differed by economic class, and Lewis Terman, which found that success was better predicted by economic class than IQ.  Karl Alexander determined that schools are not failing their students by showing achievement of the poor often exceeds that of the wealthier but summer breaks cause a decline in learning with the poor that does not occur with the wealthy.  Lastly, data by K. Anders Ericsson indicates that students need a threshold amount of time spent on a subject to gain expertise (10,000 hrs).  The only problem that I see with early development studies in application to education is that developmental changes are typically significant up to the age of approximately 10, which can make comparing students very difficult.

This article really emphasized the effect that accumulated time and culture have on students.  Just as the Fitgerald and Graves article indicated with syntax differences between languages cause perspective changes, culture plays a significant part in learning.

This article can be applied to science education by recognizing that early introduction into science can greatly help students gain the experience necessary to go beyond general knowledge.  In addition, the article shows that young people may need more positive reinforcement in the classroom since they may not be gaining enough positive feedback at home.