Putting parents in the picture: Maternal reports of preschoolers' literacy as a predictor of early reading

Emergent literacy research has demonstrated that children begin constructing notions of literacy during the preschool years and that early experiences support children's literacy growth. Given that parents may have valuable insight into their preschool children's literacy development, we examined the hypothesis that parental reports from the preschool years could be good predictors of early literacy development once their children enter school. Drawing on data from a longitudinal study of literacy development among low-income children, we correlate reports prepared by parents when their children were three and four years old with the children's subsequent performance on individually administered tests in kindergarten and grade one and grade one teachers' evaluations of children. Correlational analyses reveal significant correlations between parental reports and grade one teacher reports and assessments. Regression models reveal that parental reports account for about a quarter of the variance in kindergarten tests and grade one teacher assessments and over a third of the variance in a decoding assessment given near the end of first grade.     

Ecological contexts and early learning: Contributions of child,family, and classroom factors during Head Start,to literacy and mathematics growth through first grade

The current study investigated the extent to which child, family, and classroom factors during Head Start are related to children's literacy and mathematics skills at the beginning of preschool and through first grade. Children and families (n = 945) were participating in the Family and Child Experiences Survey (FACES), a large-scale data collection effort that assessed children's developing skills as well as their family and classroom environments. Longitudinal growth models revealed that Head Start children began their academic careers well below their more advantaged peers in literacy and mathematics, although by the end of first grade, their scores were nearly on par with national averages. Demographic characteristics of children, as well as their early language and social skills, were the strongest predictors of children's initial status and growth in both early academic domains. Results highlight key foundations and specific promotive factors of early school success for the nation's most disadvantaged children.     

Transition to formal schooling: Do transition practices matter for academic performance?

This study examined whether the transition practices implemented in preschool-elementary school pairs contribute to children's academic development during the first year of elementary school. Participants were 398 children who moved from 36 preschools to 22 elementary schools in two Finnish towns. Children were tested in respect to their reading, writing, and math skills in the preschool spring and in the grade 1 spring. The most common practices reported by preschool teachers were discussions about the school entrants and familiarizing preschool children with the school environment and the new teacher. Multilevel latent growth modeling showed that the more the preschool teachers and elementary-school teachers implemented various supportive activities during the preschool year, the faster the children's skills developed from preschool to grade 1 spring. Co-operation over curricula and passing on written information about children between the preschool and the elementary school were the best predictors of the children's skills, although they were the least commonly used practices. The need to restructure the transition to elementary school and the use of multiprofessional resources are discussed.     

Executive function facilitates learning from math instruction in kindergarten: Evidence from the ECLS-K

Extensive evidence has suggested mathematical skill in early childhood is a robust predictor of children's later academic skills and eventual labor market outcomes; however, there is substantial heterogeneity in the degree to which different students learn from the same instructional contexts. Using data from N = 12,082 children enrolled in the Early Childhood Longitudinal Study-Kindergarten Cohort, this paper employs a latent piecewise growth curve modeling approach to investigate the role of classroom math instruction and executive function and approaches to learning in the development of mathematical skills in kindergarten, first, and second grade. Findings suggest that overall instructional frequency relates to math development in kindergarten through second, and that this is driven by exposure to advanced content in kindergarten. Further, executive function moderates children's learning in kindergarten, such that children with higher levels of executive function benefit more from instruction than do those with lower levels.     

Preschool Self-Regulation and Preacademic Skills as Mediators of the Long-Term Impacts of an Early Intervention

This study explores children's early academic and self-regulatory skills as potential pathways through which a preschool enrichment program—the Chicago School Readiness Project (CSRP)—may contribute to low-income children's long-term outcomes (N = 466; M_age at baseline = 4.10 years). We find that CSRP's impact on high school grades may be partially explained by early gains in vocabulary and math skills. Although impacts on high school executive function (EF) were more equivocal, our results suggest that early improvements in math skills attributable to the intervention may, in turn, predict long-term gains in EF skills. These results complement the existing literature on preschool fade out, while also shedding light on the cross-domain relations between academic and self-regulatory skills.     

Longitudinal Relations Among Parents' Reactions to Children's Negative Emotions,Effortful Control,and Math Achievement in Early Elementary School

Panel mediation models and fixed‐effects models were used to explore longitudinal relations among parents' reactions to children's displays of negative emotions, children's effortful control (EC), and children's math achievement (N = 291; M age in fall of kindergarten = 5.66 years, SD = .39 year) across kindergarten through second grade. Parents reported their reactions and children's EC. Math achievement was assessed with a standardized achievement test. First‐grade EC mediated the relation between parents' reactions at kindergarten and second‐grade math achievement, beyond stability in constructs across study years. Panel mediation model results suggested that socialization of EC may be one method of promoting math achievement in early school; however, when all omitted time‐invariant covariates of EC and math achievement were controlled, first‐grade EC no longer predicted second‐grade math achievement.     

Social skills and problem behaviors as mediators of the relationship between behavioral self-regulation and academic achievement

Early behavioral self-regulation is an important predictor of the skills children need to be successful in school. However, little is known about the mechanism(s) through which self-regulation affects academic achievement. The current study investigates the possibility that two aspects of children's social functioning, social skills and problem behaviors, mediate the relationship between preschool self-regulation and literacy and math achievement. Additionally, we investigated whether the meditational processes differed for boys and girls. We expected that better self-regulation would help children to interact well with others (social skills) and minimize impulsive or aggressive (problem) behaviors. Positive interactions with others and few problem behaviors were expected to relate to gains in achievement as learning takes place within a social context. Preschool-aged children (n = 118) were tested with direct measures of self-regulation, literacy, and math. Teachers reported on children's social skills and problem behaviors. Using a structural equation modeling approach (SEM) for mediation analysis, social skills and problem behaviors were found to mediate the relationship between self-regulation and growth in literacy across the preschool year, but not math. Findings suggest that the mediational process was similar for boys and girls. These findings indicate that a child's social skills and problem behaviors are part of the mechanism through which behavioral self-regulation affects growth in literacy. Self-regulation may be important not just because of the way that it relates directly to academic achievement but also because of the ways in which it promotes or inhibits children's interactions with others.     

Effects of a Pre-Kindergarten Mathematics Intervention: A Randomized Experiment

Abstract

Research indicates that a socioeconomic status-related gap in mathematical knowledge appears early and widens during early childhood. Young children from economically disadvantaged families receive less support for mathematical development both at home and in preschool. Consequently, children from different socioeconomic backgrounds enter elementary school at different levels of readiness to learn a standards-based mathematics curriculum. One approach to closing this gap is the development and implementation of effective mathematics curricula for public preschool programs enrolling economically disadvantaged children. A randomized controlled trial was conducted in 40 Head Start and state preschool classrooms, with 278 children, to determine whether a pre-kindergarten mathematics intervention was effective. Intervention teachers received training that enabled them to implement with fidelity, and a large majority of parents regularly used math activities teachers sent home. Intervention and control groups did not differ on math assessments at pretest; however, gain scores of intervention children were significantly greater than those of control children at posttest. Thus, the intervention reduced the gap in children's early mathematical knowledge.     

Morphological Awareness and Chinese Children's Literacy Development: An Intervention Study

The purpose of this study was to investigate the relationship between morphological awareness and Chinese children's literacy development. Of the 169 children from elementary schools in Beijing, China, who participated in the study, about half received enhanced instruction on the morphology of characters and words in the first and second grade. At the beginning of second grade and at the beginning of third grade, children were tested on morphological awareness, reading, and writing. The results showed that morphological instruction substantially improved children's performance on the morphological awareness and literacy measures. The best-fitting structural equation models suggested a unidirectional causal relation in early second grade and a reciprocal relation in early third grade between morphological awareness and children's literacy development.     

Comparing multimethod assessment of approaches to learning among preschool children: Direct measure,teacher report,and parent report

A multi‐informant or multimethod approach has been suggested for use in educational evaluation and children's development assessment. However, in the study field of approaches to learning, most previous studies used one method to measure approaches to learning. In addition, compared with kindergarten and elementary children, younger children have received little attention. This study was dedicated to determining whether a multimethod approach (direct measure, teacher report, and parent report) was needed to assess preschool children's approaches to learning. A total of 713 preschool children were enrolled in this study. Correlations and multiple regressions were conducted to analyze the correlation among the three methods as well as their criterion validity based upon comparisons with an assessment of children's early childhood development. The results revealed significant but weak correlations among the three assessment methods. The direct measure of approaches to learning was more relevant to children's early childhood development than the teacher report and the parent report. The criterion validity of using the direct measure to assess preschool children's approaches to learning was also better than that of the teacher report and the parent report. Therefore, the direct measure was recommended for use in assessing preschool children's approaches to learning, and teacher report can be used as a supplement.     

Correlates of young children's interactions with classmates with disabilities

Although including children with developmental disabilities in preschool classes has become increasingly common, little is known about how experiences in an inclusive classroom affect young children's development. In Study 1, 36 typically developing children (mean age = 55.2 months) attending an inclusive, university-based early childhood program were interviewed about their knowledge of and attitudes toward children with disabilities. Parents answered questions about: (a) expectations for their children's prosocial behaviors and (b) their own beliefs about interacting with children with disabilities. Parents' beliefs and children's attitudes toward children with disabilities were positively related to the frequency of children's actual contacts with classmates with disabilities during free play time. In Study 2, the beliefs and behaviors of 20 children from an inclusive university-based early childhood program and 18 children from an inclusive community-based program were compared. There was no difference between the two programs in the amount of contact typically developing children had with classmates with disabilities.     

Children's Temperament and Academic Skill Development During First Grade: Teachers' Interaction Styles as Mediators

The present study followed 156 Finnish children (M_age = 7.25 years) during the first grade of primary school to examine to what extent parent‐ and teacher‐rated temperament impacts children's math and reading skill development during the first grade, and the extent to which this impact would be mediated by teachers' interaction styles with the children. The results showed that the impact of children's low task orientation and negative emotionality on their math skill development was mediated via teachers' behavioral control and, among girls, also by psychological control. The negative impact of children's inhibition on math skill development, in turn, was not mediated via teachers' interaction styles. Temperament did not predict the children's reading skill development during first grade.     

Constructivist Early Education for Moral Development

In this article, we examine the role constructivist teachers play in fostering moral development in young children. Drawing on Piaget's theory and related empirical research, we trace the development of perspective-taking, autonomy, and self-regulation, and examine the effects of different teaching and parenting practices on children's moral development. We then provide examples of autonomous moral reasoning and behavior in preschool and early primary grade children, and describe how teachers can promote optimal moral development through establishing a sociomoral atmosphere in which mutual respect is continually practiced.     

Schooling effects on preschoolers’ self-regulation, early literacy, and language growth

The present study examined the influence of schooling during children's first and second years of preschool for children who experienced different amounts of preschool (i.e., one or two years), but who were essentially the same chronological age. Children (n = 76) were tested in the fall and spring of the school year using measures of self-regulation, decoding, letter knowledge, and vocabulary. Using hierarchical linear modeling (HLM), preschool was not associated with children's development of self-regulation in either year. For decoding and letter knowledge, children finishing their second year of preschool had higher scores, although both groups of children grew similarly during the school year. Thus, our results suggest that the first and second years of preschool are both systematically associated with decoding and letter knowledge gains, and the effects are cumulative (two years predicted greater gains overall than did one year of preschool). Finally, children's chronological age, and not whether they experienced one versus two years of preschool, predicted children's vocabulary and self-regulation outcomes. Implications for preschool curricula and instruction are discussed, including the increasing emphasis on literacy learning prior to kindergarten entry and the need to address self-regulation development along with academic learning.     

Development in early literacy skills during the pre-kindergarten year in Head Start: Relations between growth in children's writing and understanding of letters

Children's literacy skills are an important predictor of success in the early elementary grades. Education programs for at-risk preschool students target children's acquisition of specific literacy skills, including knowledge of letters of the alphabet, in preparing children for early school success. Writing has been proposed as a complementary approach to other instructional strategies for teaching young children about letters. This study examines relations among preschool children's early writing competence, knowledge of letter names, sensitivity to initial sounds in words and understanding of print concepts in a sample of low-income children enrolled in Head Start. Data were collected from the beginning to the end of the school year, which offered the opportunity to examine concurrent development of these early literacy skills. Results revealed that children whose writing was more sophisticated knew the names of more letters, understood more about print concepts and were more sensitive to initial sounds of words. There was evidence of bidirectional influences of writing on growth in letter knowledge, and of letter knowledge on growth in writing competence.     

A deeper dive,a wider pool: Preschool benefits sustain to first grade on a broader set of outcomes

The current study provides new evidence on the sustained benefits of preschool attendance on a broader range of skills—both academic and executive functioning (EF)—than many prior studies have examined. Using propensity score methods, we predicted children's (N = 920, M age at 1st = 6.5 years) literacy, language, math, and EF skills in kindergarten and again at first-grade (2020–2021) based on whether they had attended public preschool (school-based pre-k; Head Start) versus no preschool. In our race-ethnically diverse sample of children (48% Hispanic/Latinx; 21% Black; 14% White; 9% Native American; 9% multiracial) from low-income families, preschool attenders showed advantages on English literacy, English language, and math in kindergarten, which mostly persisted into first-grade. Preschool did not boost EF in kindergarten or first-grade.     

Contributions of Children's Temperament to Teachers' Judgments of Social Competence From Kindergarten Through Second Grade

Research Findings: Children's social competence has been linked to successful transition to formal school. The purpose of this study was to examine the contributions of children's temperament to teachers' ratings of their social competence from kindergarten through 2nd grade. Children (N = 1,364) from the National Institute of Child Health and Human Development Early Child Care Research Network participated in this study. Mothers rated children's shyness, attentional focusing, and inhibitory control with the Children's Behavior Questionnaire at 4½ years, and teachers rated children's social competence with three subscales (cooperation, assertion, and self-control) of the Social Skills Rating System at kindergarten, 1st, and 2nd grade. Latent growth curve analysis indicated that both shyness and effortful control contributed to children's social competence. Bolder children were likely to have higher assertion ratings, and shyer children with greater attentional focusing were likely to have higher assertion ratings. Shyer children and children with greater inhibitory control and attentional focusing were likely to have higher teacher ratings of self-control and cooperation. Practice or Policy: Findings highlight the importance of considering child temperament characteristics when understanding children's social competence and successful adjustment to kindergarten. Information may help parents, preschool teachers, and early elementary teachers prepare children who may be at particular risk for lower social competence.     

One versus two years: Does length of exposure to an enhanced preschool program impact the academic functioning of disadvantaged children in kindergarten?

Research on the effects of preschool dosage on children's early academic functioning has been limited despite the substantial policy implications of such work. The present study adds to a growing literature on this topic by examining how the number of years enrolled in an enhanced preschool program impacts the school readiness of primarily low-income children at kindergarten. Multi-level modeling was used to account for nesting of children within classrooms. To control for potential selection bias since children were not randomly assigned to receive one or two years of preschool, propensity score one-to-one matching was used to create the two participant groups. Receiving a second year of preschool led to significant improvements in children's early literacy and numeracy skills. Implications of these results for preschool interventions are discussed.     

Effective behavior management in preschool classrooms and children's task orientation: Enhancing emergent literacy and language development

This study investigated the relations among preschool teachers’ behavior management, children's task orientation, and children's emergent literacy and language development, as well as the extent to which task orientation moderated the relation between teachers’ behavior management and children's emergent literacy and language development. Participants included 398 children and 67 preschool teachers from preschool programs serving an at-risk population. Teachers’ behavior management was observationally assessed and children's task orientation was measured via teacher-report. Children's language and emergent literacy skills were directly assessed in the fall and in the spring of the preschool year. Hierarchical linear models were used to predict children's residualized gain in emergent literacy and language (i.e., Spring scores with Fall scores as covariates) from their task orientation and their teachers’ behavior management. Task orientation and behavior management each positively predicted children's emergent literacy development, but not language development. There was a significant interaction between teachers’ behavior management and children's task orientation in predicting children's language development, such that high scores on both variables were associated with the most optimal language outcomes. Implications for research and early education are discussed.     

The relationship between early childhood teachers' instructional quality and children's mathematics development

This study examined how early childhood (EC) teachers' instructional quality predicted children's development in mathematics across two measurement occasions. Therefore, EC teachers' (n = 25) instructional quality was assessed using one standardized observation instrument covering both domain-specific and general aspects of instructional quality. Additionally, data on children's (n = 208) outcome in early number skills was collected applying a standardized test. Multilevel structural equation modeling was used accounting for nested data. Children's age and the average size of preschool groups were controlled for. Results revealed that EC teachers' instructional quality predicted children's development but was not associated with their initial achievement. The findings suggest that instruments covering domain-specific and general aspects might be helpful in order to measure EC teachers' instructional quality in mathematics and predict children's learning growth. Understanding the mechanisms between instructional quality and children's development may help EC teachers to enhance their math teaching in practice.