“Researchers have found that children who attend preschools that emphasize direct instruction experience more stress at school. At ages five and six, children from academic-type preschools knew more letters and numbers than their peers who attended nonacademic preschools, but by first grade those advantages had disappeared. Researchers have also found that children from academically oriented preschools are less creative and less enthusiastic about learning than their peers who attended nonacademic preschools. And here’s the clincher: Kids who attend academic preschools may also, in the long run, do more poorly in school, and those kinds of schools may be handicapping boys in a way we could not have anticipated.”

from “The Trouble with Boys: A Surprising Report Card on Our Sons, Their Problems at School, and What Parents and Educators Must Do” by Peg Tyre