Calendar Time in Early

Childhood Programs, Yes

or No?

Best Practices in Early Childhood Education Summer 2012

Ruth Lesch

Reasons why Early Childhood Teachers

want children to participate in calendar
time.
To prepare the children for calendar time that
they will be doing in Kindergarten and the
primary grades.
It looks like Big Kid Work.
Children need to learn to sit quietly and listen.
Children need to know the names of the days of
the week and the months.
To show other teachers that preschool children
dont just play all day.
It promotes community in the classroom.
We teach number names, rote counting, colors,
and patterning at calendar time.

Why did I teach calendar

time?
When I was fresh out of
college with no experience ,
the teachers at the first
center I worked at all did
calendar time, so I did it too.

Why did I stop doing calendar

time?

When I began working at Nicolet, none

of the teachers taught calendar time,
so I stopped teaching it.

Are these the right reasons to

teach or not to teach calendar
time?

NO!

Why should calendar time NOT

be taught in a preschool
setting?

Research shows that the development of the

concept of time(childrens temporal understanding)
doesnt develop for most children until somewhere
between the ages of 7and 10.
This means that calendar activities that mark
extended periods of time( a week, a month,)
have little meaning to most children below the first
grade level.
Children who participate frequently in activities
they do not really understand( ie. calendar time),
have a greater chance of loosing confidence in
their own intellectual abilities.

It is vital for young children to develop confidence in their ability

to understand and use mathematics in other words, to see
mathematics as within their reach. In addition, positive
experiences with using mathematics to solve problems help
children to develop dispositions such as curiosity, imagination,
flexibility, inventiveness, and persistence that contribute to their
future success in and out of school.

Quoted from a joint position statement on best practices in early childhood

mathematics learning between NAEYC and the National Council of Teachers of
Mathematics(NCTM)(2002).

Without calendar
time, how do we
introduce time
concepts, number
concepts,
patterning, etc.?

Picture Schedules

Project Work

Documentation
Displays

Games

Linear Representations

Classroom Journals

Learning Centers

Other

Sources

Calendar Time for Young Children Good Intentions Gone Awry.Sallee J.

Beneke, Michaelene M. Ostrosky, and Lilian G. Katz. Young Children, pages
12 16. May 2008.

Calendar Time in Preschool: Are we Missing the Mark? Posted on January

1, 2012 by Judy Ballweg.