ABSTRACT
Higher demands on teachers directly affect the classification/identification of non-school ready children. In this chapter, the author unpacks and examines the higher demands from this particular district, which trickle down from the state, that are placed on early childhood educators and analyze how these demands and web of expectations negatively impact the identification of school readiness or lack of school readiness in low-income Black populations. The higher demands are directly related to the implementation of the Common Core, which is now the educational standard in forty-three of the fifty states. In Grayson, each child takes four different reading assessments, two major math assessments, a pre-and post-assessment for each chapter of math, a phonics assessment, a computer assessment in math after each level, two different writing assessments and more. Increased teacher accountability measures lead to more academic pressure being placed on young children and hold the teacher specifically accountable for children that they feel will never measure up.
