Kindergarten The Ground Zero of Academic Success

     Pamela Pertillar has been in the education system for over 30 years. She is now a retired elementary school teacher, but still acts as an education advocate and ambassador for children. She has been blogging to empower parents on her website
( http://anenlightenedparent.com/ ) as a response to parents who have reached out to her over the years.

     She has now written a book called The Official Kindergarten Prep Guide. Pertillar said she was inspired to write the book when as a second-grade teacher, she saw the negative “domino effect”, that occurred when students came to Kindergarten unprepared. “There was a segment of the population where kids were coming in and some of them didn’t even know their alphabet, how to sit, or how to be a student.”  Pertillar noted that by the time these children came to second grade they were behind. Kindergarten teachers had to spend time catching them up, instead of building on existing knowledge to prepare them for first grade. First grade teachers then inherited the duty of teaching what the kindergarten teacher was not able to teach, and the “domino effect” continued on into the student’s high school years. “Some kids got caught up, but some kids did not, and so they were labeled with learning disabilities. Some of them really did have a learning disability, but some of them did not, some of them it’s just they weren’t ready when they came and they never could get caught up.”

     Pertillar originally was going to write a different book, but felt the Lord was leading her to write this book first. As our education system continues to deteriorate, she feels that this book is timely, especially in its empowerment of parents. The book through illustration shows various lessons parents can use to prepare their children and also addresses the topic of how nutrition plays a role in education. For those who are Facebookers, she’s even created a series of videos highlighting  (https://www.facebook.com/AnEnlightenedParent/videos/620026568359142/) some of the lessons. Some of the videos are also featured on youtube and below is a sample of her video lesson on teaching letter recognition.

  She's currently running an August Sale on her book where you can get 2 for $10.99 on her website ( https://squareup.com/store/an-enlightened-parent?t=merchant-tw )which also features informative blogposts and other resources. 
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