Children do much better in school if they are allowed to stay home the first five years of their lives. There is no benefit to early schooling, except perhaps for the free food and babysitting.
We have no neighbor kids nor cousins close by for our kids to play with. For the first three years of his life, my son was an only child. Our daughter is almost two, and they are just now able to play together properly. Last year was my son’s first year in pre-school. I resisted so much, but after the first week it was quite apparent that he needed to be around some little kids. We chose a private pre-school that only accepts 10-12 students per grade (half day pre-school, half day pre-k, whole day kindergarten), and is run by older Italian nuns. Trust me, you don’t cross Sister Mary Rose Alba! It is no baby sitting program, and in fact the tuition and schedule make it impossible for it to be a baby sitting program. What impressed us was that the volunteer aids let the little boys wrestle and rough house to an extent. They do not allow them to be destructive or mean, but they do insist on them being boys. Anyway, this was our choice and I’m happy wit the results. Each child is different and it’s the parents who need to make the decisions and not Big Gov.
That has been soundly proven over and over again. Programs such as Head Start give kids a bump at the starting line of school, but all other kids who never attended HS catch up rapidly and soon there is no measurable difference.
Unless some kid is a savant or something early education has no overwhelming value. It’s nice. It makes the parents feel good about Jonny or Susie, but that’s about it, other than free day care.