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1.
Although preschool has been shown to improve children's school readiness in many developing countries, preschool attendance in poor rural areas of China is still low. The high cost of preschool is often regarded as a major barrier to attendance. In this paper, we evaluate the impact of a one-year voucher/CCT intervention on preschool attendance and school readiness. To do so, we conducted a randomized controlled trial among 150 young children in a poor, rural county in China. Our analysis shows that the intervention, consisting of a tuition waiver and a cash transfer conditional on attendance, raised attendance by 20 percentage points (or by 35%). However, the intervention did not have measurable impact on children's school readiness. We believe that poor quality of preschool education in rural China (in terms of both teaching and facilities) contributes to our findings.  相似文献   

2.
ABSTRACT

Preschool attendance problems negatively impact children's school readiness skills and future school attendance. Parents are critical to preschoolers’ attendance. This study explored parental barriers and solutions to preschool attendance in low-income families. School-district administrative data from a racially/ethnically diverse sample of parents with children attending the district's half-day preschool program were obtained (N = 111). Subsamples of parents participated in a phone interview and follow-up, in-person interview. Parents valued early learning and preschool. Children missed school due to illness, problems with child care, transportation, and family life. Differences in attendance rates appeared by school, family demographics, and race/ethnicity. African-Americans and Hispanics experienced more barriers than Whites and Asians, and were more likely to miss school because of illness and medical appointments. Hispanics were more likely to miss for vacation. Parents noted a lack of social connection with other parents in the school/neighborhood, making seeking help to resolve attendance barriers difficult.  相似文献   

3.
This study examines the construct of school readiness as understood by rural kindergarten teachers. Kindergarten teachers in 11 rural Missouri communities were surveyed to assess their perceptions of the readiness levels of their incoming children. These data were then compared to the results of the national Carnegie study of 7000 kindergarten teachers' perceptions of school readiness. The rural Missouri sample judged their students as generally more ready than did the national sample; they viewed the incoming kindergarten students as having fewer language, social, and physical problems. A greater portion of the rural sample believed that children are more ready now than 5 years ago (36% vs. 25%). They attribute the improvement to high quality early preschool programs. The diversity within the rural sample as well as the rural/urban distinctions are discussed.  相似文献   

4.
ABSTRACT

Investments in preschool programs for children from disadvantaged backgrounds have historically been supported by research showing that these programs help children build school readiness skills and narrow the income-achievement gap. However, results from recent studies of the links between preschool participation and increases in school readiness skills are more mixed. Significant variation in regular preschool attendance and the availability of high-quality early learning environments could help explain mixed findings on preschool effectiveness. Using data from a preschool expansion demonstration project, we explored associations between children's attendance rates, classroom quality, and neighborhood poverty and children's fall to spring gains in a set of important school readiness skills in executive functioning. Children (N = 197) lived in neighborhoods where 26% of households (range = 0 – 92%) lived below the poverty line and attended 48 classrooms in public and private settings. Attendance rates, including chronic absenteeism, were significantly associated with children's gains in executive functioning skills, but only when children attended high-quality classrooms. Results suggest that efforts to increase attendance rates may benefit children's executive functioning skills among children living in higher poverty neighborhoods the most when communities also invest in increasing preschool classroom quality.  相似文献   

5.
Research Findings: Policymakers preschool reforms that are to prepare young children for school success have sparked important conversations within the field of early childhood education over how these programs are to ready young children for school. This article presents findings from a case study that examined this issue of school readiness across a collection of pre-k programs. Doing so illustrates how preschool reforms can impact early childhood stakeholders' understanding of school readiness, what it is they do with their students in their programs, and why. Practice or Policy: These findings demonstrate how policymakers' pre-k reforms can tighten the link between preschool and elementary school in a way that prioritizes the goals of K-12 education systems. They also suggest that for those who want to expand the construct of school readiness they should do so in a way that addresses and recognizes the challenges pre-k stakeholders in local contexts face on a day-to-day basis. For policymakers, there appears to be an opportunity and willingness within the ECE community for preschool reform. They should take advantage of this willingness for change by considering policy solutions that value the complexity of the child and of the field of early education itself.  相似文献   

6.
Attachment is the emotional bond between children and their caregivers (parents or otherwise). Infants and young children usually have more than one selective attachment, and all of these attachment relationships, including those between children and teachers, have important effects on cognitive and social development. Secure attachment to a preschool teacher may help children to improve their preschool experience. Recent studies suggest that the adverse effect of inadequate preschool experiences can lead to skill deficiencies that mimic the effects of basic cognitive deficits. This study evaluates the relationships among attachment to preschool teachers, school readiness, and the risk for developing learning difficulties in preschoolers using three measures: the School Readiness 4-5 battery, the Precocious Identification of Learning Difficulties, and the Attachment Q Set. This study examined 152 preschoolers. The results showed that attachment to preschool teachers is related to linguistic development level, the psychomotor skills involved in school readiness, and learning difficulty risk.  相似文献   

7.
This study aimed to test a four-wave sequential mediation model linking mother–child attachment to children's school readiness through child executive functioning (EF) and prosociality in toddlerhood and the preschool years. Mother–child attachment security was assessed when children (N = 255) were aged 15 months and 2 years, child EF at age 2, prosocial behavior at age 4, and finally cognitive school readiness in kindergarten (age 6). The results revealed three indirect pathways linking attachment to school readiness: one through EF only, one through prosocial behavior only, and a last pathway involving both EF and prosocial behavior serially. These findings suggest that secure attachment may equip children with both cognitive and social skills that are instrumental to their preparedness for school.  相似文献   

8.
The first national education goal, school readiness, recognizes a need for young children to be better prepared for entry into elementary school. Many low-income children exhibit a pattern of underachievement in school mathematics. Research has revealed a developmental gap between low-income preschool children and their middle-class peers with respect to the extent of their numerical knowledge. Research has also found that many low-income children do not receive a broad base of support for mathematical development at home or in preschool. In each of two studies, we conducted a bi-generation (parent and child) mathematics intervention with Head Start families. The intervention was designed to enhance parental support for pre-kindergarten children's mathematical development. It was found that low-income parents were willing and able to support this area of their children's development once they were provided with the training to do so. The support that parents provided to their children through the intervention was clearly effective in enhancing the development of children's informal mathematical knowledge. Intervention children developed more extensive mathematical knowledge than a comparison group of low-income children. Thus, an important step toward achieving the school readiness goal can be taken by fostering low- income parents' support for young children's mathematical development.  相似文献   

9.
This study examines how parent socioeconomic status (SES) directly and indirectly predicts children's school readiness through pathways of parental investment. Data come from direct assessments with preschool children and surveys with their primary caregivers in Ghana at the start of the 2015–2016 school year (N = 2,137; Mage = 5.2 years). Results revealed SES-related gaps in all parental investment characteristics and child school readiness skills. Preschool involvement served as the primary mediating mechanism in the path from SES to most school readiness skills, though it did not predict executive function. The number of books in the household was marginally positively predictive of early literacy, whereas at-home stimulation was negatively related to motor, literacy, and numeracy skills.  相似文献   

10.
The first national education goal, school readiness, recognizes a need for young children to be better prepared for entry into elementary school. Many low-income children exhibit a pattern of underachievement in school mathematics. Research has revealed a developmental gap between low-income preschool children and their middle-class peers with respect to the extent of their numerical knowledge. Research has also found that many low-income children do not receive a broad base of support for mathematical development at home or in preschool. In each of two studies, we conducted a bi-generation (parent and child) mathematics intervention with Head Start families. The intervention was designed to enhance parental support for pre-kindergarten children's mathematical development. It was found that low-income parents were willing and able to support this area of their children's development once they were provided with the training to do so. The support that parents provided to their children through the intervention was clearly effective in enhancing the development of children's informal mathematical knowledge. Intervention children developed more extensive mathematical knowledge than a comparison group of low-income children. Thus, an important step toward achieving the school readiness goal can be taken by fostering low- income parents' support for young children's mathematical development.  相似文献   

11.
This study investigated the extent to which learning readiness, prior‐to‐school experiences, and child and family characteristics influence children’s literacy and numeracy achievement across the first year of primary school. A sample of 104 kindergarten children was recruited from 16 classrooms and followed from the beginning to the end of their first year of primary school. At the start of school, parents provided information on children’s prior‐to‐school experiences and their preparedness for school; teachers provided ratings of children’s self‐directedness and cooperative participation; and children’s cognitive ability was assessed using the Peabody Picture Vocabulary Test – III. Classroom quality was observed and rated mid‐year. Children’s literacy and numeracy achievement was assessed at the end of the school year, using the Who Am I? (WAI?). Regression analyses indicated that WAI? scores were predicted by child age, gender, cognitive ability and teacher‐rated learning readiness at the start of school. Discussion focuses on the importance of the ‘ready child’ for early academic success.  相似文献   

12.
Arts enrichment provides varied channels for acquiring school readiness skills and may offer important educational opportunities for students from diverse backgrounds and with diverse needs. Study 1 examined achievement within an arts enrichment preschool that served low-income children. Results indicated that students practiced school readiness skills through early learning, music, creative movement, and visual arts classes. Students who attended the preschool for 2 years demonstrated higher achievement than those who attended for 1 year, suggesting that maturation alone did not account for achievement gains. Across 2 years of program attendance and four time points of assessment, students improved in school readiness skills, and there were no significant effects of race/ethnicity or developmental level on achievement growth. Study 2 compared students attending the arts enrichment preschool to those attending a nearby alternative on a measure of receptive vocabulary that has been found to predict school success. At the end of 1 year of attendance, students in the arts program showed greater receptive vocabulary than those at the comparison preschool. Results suggest that arts enrichment may advance educational outcomes for children at risk.  相似文献   

13.
Chinese children with an urban household registration (hukou) normally attend subsidized preschools for three years prior to primary school. This is an experience available to relatively few of China's many millions of migrant children whose families are registered as rural residents but choose to migrate to urban areas. This paper presents research, in the form of a case study, which examined an informal playgroup for rural-registered migrant children whose parents worked in a Beijing market. The playgroup was established by volunteers to provide an affordable, though limited, alternative preschool experience for migrant children. The original programme was derived from community concepts that initially underpinned the “Sure Start” intervention in the United Kingdom. In the paper, survey data is utilized to determine if an informal playgroup can be a positive alternative in a context where migrant children have little capacity to access the preschool programmes available to their urban counterparts.  相似文献   

14.
Child care arrangements change as children age; in general, hours in home-based child care decrease as hours in center-based settings increase. This sequence of child care type may correspond with children's developmental needs; the small peer groups and low child–adult ratios typical of home-based care may allow for more individual child–adult time for infants and toddlers, whereas the social stimulation found in center-based care during the preschool years may prepare children for kindergarten. This study examined associations between school readiness and the timing of child care type among children in NICHD's Study of Early Child Care and Youth Development (N = 1349). Findings suggest that children who experience home-based care during the infant–toddler period and center care during the preschool period display the improved cognitive outcomes, but not the increased behavioral problems, generally associated with sustained center care attendance. Continuous home-based care was associated with higher social status at school entry partially through smaller peer groups during the preschool period. These patterns did not differ by child or family characteristics. Implications for policy and research are discussed.  相似文献   

15.
OP-ED     
There is a general consensus that too many US children are entering school without essential readiness skills. However, there is a lack of consensus as to what constitutes readiness and a corresponding lack of consensus as to the type of early childhood experience that is most likely to prepare children for academic success. This paper offers a perspective, grounded in theory and practice, on issues of readiness and education during the preschool and kindergarten years. This perspective involves a view of human development that stresses the role of adult involvement in young children's learning and emphasizes the preschool years as atime for building cognitive skills that will serve as essential foundations for later academic learning. Images drawn from practice in Korean early childhood classrooms illustrate how teacherdirected activities may foster preschool children's development of these essential cognitive foundations in a developmentally appropriate manner.  相似文献   

16.
Early achievement in rural China: The role of preschool experience   总被引：1，自引：0，他引：1  
Two studies examined the relationship between preschool experiences and the early academic achievement of rural Chinese children. In both Study 1 (n = 165) and Study 2 (n = 205), the school preparedness, and the literacy and mathematics attainment of first graders with different preschool experiences (kindergarten, separate pre-primary class, “sitting-in” a Grade 1 class, no preschool experience) were assessed. In Study 1, educational attainment was evaluated using end-of-semester examinations designed by local educational authorities; whereas in Study 2, better-constructed and identical tests were administered at the beginning and end of the academic year. Further, in Study 2, the different types of preschool programs attended by participating children were directly observed. Findings from both studies showed that children with developmentally appropriate preschool experiences (kindergartens or separate pre-primary classes) had higher school readiness scores than other children. Results from Study 2 also indicated that (i) disparities in children's school attainment were associated with the type of their preschool experience; and (ii) children from the developmentally appropriate kindergarten program showed higher mathematics and literacy achievement at the end of Grade 1 than children who merely “sat in” Grade 1 classes or had no preschool experience. Implications of the findings for the scaling up of preschool services in rural China are discussed.  相似文献   

17.
Research Findings. A growing number of young children encounter group learning environment for the first time when entering preschool at age 3, yet their parents and teachers have no means to discern whether they are ready for this challenge. To address this uncertainty, this study developed and validated the Chinese Preschool Readiness Scale (CPRS), which assesses children’s readiness for successful adjustment to preschool. The scale was validated through EFA in Study 1, with 29 teachers who rated 288 children. The scale was further validated by ESEM and confirmatory factor analysis (CFA) in Study 2, with 46 teachers who rated 765 children. A five-factor CPRS was determined: self-care abilities and emotional maturity, cognitive and communications skills, social competence, learning dispositions, and classroom rules. The construct validity and internal reliability were satisfactory. Its concurrent validity was also established: (1) the CPRS scores were positively correlated with parent-rated self-regulation and (2) the social competence domain of CPRS was positively correlated with sensitive-cooperative behaviors and negatively correlated with anxious-withdrawn behaviors.Practice or Policy. The results supported further development and use of the CPRS to monitor children’s development upon entry at preschool. The findings also highlighted the need for more research on preschool readiness.  相似文献   

18.
Although under-investment in children is an identified problem in low-income developing countries (LDC) and the establishment and use of preschools has been advocated as a partial remedy, the readiness of children and parents for preschool in LDC has been little studied. This paper assesses motivational techniques that parents report using with preschool children in a rural Philippine municipality. The purposes of this study were to examine: (a) whether the motivation strategies used by parents are consistent with a “balanced, holistic approach” to child development and (b) whether the parents’ motivational strategies are associated with school performance. The study suggests some over-weighting by parents of academic achievement, but otherwise more appropriate child-oriented behaviors were observed than reported in some research. Motivation by parents also was associated with preschool performance.  相似文献   

19.
Formal early childhood education programs have been shown to promote the early academic skills of young children. However, the academic benefits acquired through program attendance fade quickly in the early elementary school years. Using a nationally representative sample of Australian children, we describe the programmatic and teacher differences between different types of formal early childhood programs for children between 4 and 5 years old—pre-year 1, school-based preschool, standalone preschool, and center-based child care. We examine the child and family background characteristics that are correlated with selection into different settings and how these settings are associated with children's early academic skills and on their subsequent achievement. We focus on understanding if there are differential academic benefits accrued from each program type and whether or not these benefits persist into the early elementary school years. Results indicate that maternal employment and economic disadvantage are correlated with program participation and that pre-year 1 and preschool teachers have higher qualifications. Results also show that children who attended a pre-year 1 program held an initial, significant advantage in early academic skills compared to children enrolled in center child care. Center child care was associated with higher early math skills than preschools. Children who did not attend any early childhood programming lagged behind their peers in school readiness skills. By middle childhood, all the early skill advantages had disappeared, showing rapid fadeout of academic benefits acquired from these specific types of early childhood programs. Implications for policy and practice are discussed.  相似文献   

20.
This article reports findings from a cluster‐randomized study of an integrated literacy‐ and math‐focused preschool curriculum, comparing versions with and without an explicit socioemotional lesson component to a business‐as‐usual condition. Participants included 110 classroom teachers from randomized classrooms and approximately eight students from each classroom (N = 760) who averaged 4.48 (SD = 0.44) years of age at the start of the school year. There were positive impacts of the two versions of the curriculum on language, phonological awareness, math, and socioemotional outcomes, but there were no added benefits to academic or socioemotional outcomes for the children receiving explicit socioemotional instruction. Results are discussed with relevance to early childhood theory, policy, and goals of closing the school readiness gap.  相似文献   

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