Search

This paper examines the relationships among the quality and quantity of parent-child shared book reading (SBR) engagements and children's reading and mathematics outcomes in preschool. Additionally, we explore how child and family characteristics predict the quality and quantity of SBR. Quantity was measured using parental reports of the frequency of SBR. Quality was measured by observational protocols evaluating for questioning, vocabulary, and discussion depth. A structural equation model was estimated using data from a nationally representative sample of 700 children living in the United States from the Early Childhood Longitudinal Study-Birth cohort. Results indicated that the quality of book reading was associated with children's mathematics outcomes, and the quantity was associated with reading outcomes controlling for contextual variables. Socioeconomic status, race or ethnicity, and children's age predicted the quality and quantity of book reading experiences. These findings indicate that frequent exposure to high-quality book reading may positively impact children's mathematics and reading development, but that variation in SBR exists. SBR is a common practice among many parents; helping parents understand the multiple benefits of the practice may further increase the frequency and quality of the engagement. Implications for research and practice are addressed. Highlights This paper describes the relationship between parental book reading practices, mathematics, and reading outcomes., Structural equation models reveal relationships between the quantity of book reading and children's reading outcomes, as well as the quality of book reading and children's mathematics outcomes., High-quality book reading may positively impact academic achievement in multiple domains, but results may vary based on contextual factors. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Using data from the Early Childhood Longitudinal Study Kindergarten Class of 2010-2011 ( n = 11,000), this study examined the developmental outcomes of 5-year-old children in multigrade classrooms (combined prekindergarten and kindergarten classrooms serving 3-, 4-, and 5-year-olds) compared with those of 5-year-olds attending kindergarten-only classrooms serving primarily 5-year-olds. Results from regression and propensity score analyses revealed that 5-year-old children who attended multigrade classrooms with prekindergarteners made smaller gains in math and literacy skills and demonstrated less optimal executive function at the end of the school year than children who attended kindergarten-only classrooms. Classroom-level factors largely explained the differences in children's academic achievement but did not consistently explain differences in their executive functioning. No consistent differences emerged for children's social-behavioral development. Highlights This paper examines the implications of multigrade kindergarten classrooms for 5-year-olds' school success and the mechanisms through which these classrooms affect children., Five-year-olds who attended multigrade classrooms demonstrate smaller gains in academics and exhibit less optimal executive function, which was partially explained by classroom-level factors., When possible, the implementation of multigrade kindergarten classrooms may need to be re-evaluated. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Despite the growing body of research on parents' beliefs and practices, relatively little is known about the relations between parents' knowledge of children's development, home-based activities, and children's early reading and math skills. This study used data from the Early Childhood Longitudinal Study-Birth Cohort to examine the differences in Asian, Black, Latino, and White children's early reading and math skills at kindergarten entry and whether parents' knowledge of children's development and home-based activities mediate the relation. Parents' knowledge of children's development was assessed when children were 9 months. Home-based activities, including home literacy and enrichment, were assessed when children were preschool age. Asian and White children started kindergarten with significantly higher reading and math scores than Black or Latino children. There also were significant differences across groups in the frequency of engagement in home literacy and enrichment activities. Associations between race/ethnicity and reading/math scores were mediated by parents' knowledge of children's development and home literacy activities. Discussion addresses the importance of parents' knowledge of educationally relevant activities and how to engage in such activities to foster children's reading and math skills and to close racial/ethnic gaps. Highlights This paper examined racial/ethnic difference in children's reading and math skills in kindergarten and explores whether parents' knowledge of children's development and home-based activities mediate the relation between race/ethnicity and children's reading and math skills., By using data from the Early Childhood Longitudinal Study Birth Cohort, this study found that there were systematic racial/ethnic differences in parents' knowledge of children's development, home-based activities, and children's reading and math skills at the start of kindergarten., Parents' knowledge of children's development and home-based activities were found to mediate the association between race/ethnicity and children's reading and math skills for all groups. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The study used Bayesian and Frequentist methods to investigate whether the roles of linguistic, quantitative, and spatial attention skills are distinct in children's acquisition of reading and math. A sample of 175 Chinese kindergarteners was tested with measures of linguistic skills (phonological awareness and phonological memory), quantitative knowledge (number line task, symbolic digit comparison, and non‐symbolic number estimation), spatial attention skills (visual span, mental rotation, and visual search), word reading, and calculation. After statistically controlling for age and nonverbal intelligence, phonological awareness and digit comparison performance explained unique variance in both math and reading. Moreover, number line estimation was specifically important for math, while phonological memory was specifically essential for reading. These findings highlight the possibility of developing early screening tools with different cognitive measures for children at risk of learning disabilities in reading and/or math. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Spontaneous imaginary companion (SIC) creation in childhood is a typical imaginative play behaviour associated with advanced sociocognitive skills; however, the direction of causality has not been established. To investigate this experimentally, researchers must determine whether children can create, on request, qualitatively equivalent imaginary companions (ICs) to those created spontaneously. We examined whether children could create ICs, and how these compared to SICs. Nine elementary school children were encouraged to create ICs in a 3‐month intervention. Accounts of elicited ICs were compared with an age‐matched sample of interviewees with SICs. Seven children maintained ICs for 6 months post intervention. Template analysis of IC interviews found four themes: Realistic Play, Multifaceted IC Mind, Utility of the IC, and Elicited IC Across Time. Analysis suggests elicited and SICs were similar in nature and utility, although intervention ICs tended to have animal rather than human appearances. Findings support the argument that children can be encouraged to create ICs similar to SICs. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Both theory of mind (ToM) and executive functioning have been related to children's academic abilities. In a longitudinal study with 112 children, we investigated the influence of these two abilities on children's math and reading performance at 7 years of age. We found that math performance was predicted by concurrent working memory as well as by preschool numerical abilities and ToM. Reading performance was predicted by concurrent working memory and verbal IQ at 6 years. This corroborates earlier research demonstrating the importance of executive functioning (working memory) and ToM for later academic abilities. We argue that ToM may be an important developmental precursor of math performance because both require an understanding of representations. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

There has been a long‐standing debate on situational and symbolic mathematics, which is associated with how to design and execute mathematics education for all students. Brain studies can give some clues for how to deal with the debate. There are situational, verbalized, and visuospatial brain networks and the connectivity among the networks, which suggest the representation of mathematical knowledge should be situational, verbalized, and symbolic. Moreover, the representation should be mapped onto one another. Previous studies have shown the importance of situational and verbalized mathematics, but they are typically treated as preliminary and auxiliary introductions for formal symbolic mathematics. Each of the three mathematics types and their mapping would be the core learning goal in mathematics education. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This study investigated the influence of spontaneous focusing on numerosity (SFON) tendency on the performance and estimation patterns on number line estimation (NLE). To examine this question, 147 preschoolers (3.51–4.52 years) completed two types of SFON task (referenced SFON task and non‐referenced SFON task) and three conditions of NLE (non‐symbolic area, number‐to‐position, and position‐to‐number). The participants' SFON tendencies were classified as high, average, and poor using latent profile analysis. Children with high SFON tendency performed better and preferred to use more advanced strategy than their poor‐SFON peers on NLE tasks. The proportion of children with irregular NLE pattern increased as SFON tendency decreased. These findings contribute to our understanding of the relationship between performance patterns of different NLEs and SFON tendencies for preschool children. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

According to Hunt's match hypothesis, the accuracy of parents' beliefs about their children's abilities can influence the nature of the early learning experiences they provide. The present study examined the accuracy of parents' beliefs about their preschoolers' number development and relations to parent-reported frequency of engaging children in number related experiences at home. Parents reported engaging their preschoolers more frequently in conventional numeracy activities, (i.e. counting and identifying numbers) than advanced number-related activities (e.g. arithmetic) at home, though the frequency of advanced activities increased with the development of children's advanced number skills. Parents were most uncertain about their children's advanced number skills, though they demonstrated an overall tendency to overestimate their children's abilities across number tasks. Increased rates of overestimation and decreased rates of underestimation were associated with increased incidences of advanced activity engagement at home. Thus, results suggest guiding parents to understand their own children's numerical understanding in a wide range of number domains could promote more advanced at-home number-related activity engagement. Copyright © 2016 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Starting on positive trajectories at school entry is important for children's later academic success. Using partial least squares, we sought to specify interrelations among all theory-based components of social-emotional learning (SEL), and their ability to predict later classroom adjustment and academic readiness in a modelling context. Consequently, self-regulation, emotion knowledge, social problem solving, and social-emotional behaviour were assessed via direct assessment and observation for 101 preschoolers; teachers provided information on classroom adjustment through kindergarten and academic readiness in kindergarten. Our final outer (measurement) model showed robust latent variables for SEL components. Regarding the inner (structural) model, latent variables showed expected predictive relations among SEL components, and with later classroom adjustment and academic readiness: preschoolers' executive control predicted aspects of their social cognition (i.e., emotion knowledge and social problem solving) and emotionally negative/aggressive behaviour, and emotion knowledge predicted their emotionally regulated/prosocial behaviour. Further, most SEL components directly and/or indirectly predicted teachers' evaluations of later classroom adjustment and kindergarten academic readiness. Our findings extend our understanding of SEL during preschool, suggesting that early assessment and monitoring is possible using these instruments, and potentially aiding the development of programmes to maximize children's SEL in the service of early school success. Copyright © 2014 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Working memory and inductive reasoning ability each appear related to children's achievement in math and reading. Dynamic measures of reasoning, based on an assessment procedure including feedback, may provide additional predictive value. The aim of this study was to investigate whether working memory and dynamic measures of analogical reasoning are unique predictors of children's concurrent and subsequent reading and math achievement. School children (N = 188, M = 7.1 years, SD = 11 months) were administered a dynamic test of analogical reasoning comprising a pretest-training-posttest design. Pretest performance measures static reasoning ability, whereas posttest performance and feedback-needs during training are considered dynamic measures. Verbal and visuo-spatial working memories were assessed prior to dynamic testing. Performance on national reading and math achievement tests were gathered at two time points within one school year. A multilevel mixed-effects model indicated that verbal (but not visuo-spatial) working memory and dynamic reasoning measures formed unique predictors of concurrent and subsequent achievement in math and reading. Verbal working memory efficiency and performance on a dynamic test of analogical reasoning were both positively related to math and reading achievement in children in kindergarten, first grade and second grade. Dynamic assessment, in addition to working memory assessment, may be useful for educational psychologists when attempting to gauge children's future school performance. Copyright © 2013 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]