“WHERE’S THE JOY IN THE CLASSROOM?” Families’ Sensemaking of the Changed Kindergarten

Over the last 2 decades, policymakers’ standards-based accountability reforms in the United States, such as the No Child Left Behind Act, have fundamentally changed public schooling in general and kindergarten specifically. As this has occurred, little is known about how families make sense of these changes in schooling. By sharing findings from a video-cued multivocal ethnographic research study, this article addresses this issue by providing insight into families’ sensemaking about the changes that have occurred and continue to occur in public schooling. These findings reveal how family members were concerned about what kindergarten has become and were worried this increased academic focus in schooling may negatively affect their children’s social and academic development. Such findings can assist education stakeholders such as teachers, school administrators, teacher educators, and policymakers in working with these primary stakeholders to develop an education system that will prepare their children for success in school and the larger society.