Children's classroom engagement and school readiness gains in prekindergarten.
Child engagement in prekindergarten classrooms was examined using 2,751 children (mean age=4.62) enrolled in public prekindergarten programs that were part of the Multi-State Study of Pre-Kindergarten and the State-Wide Early Education Programs Study. Latent class analysis was used to classify children into 4 profiles of classroom engagement: free play, individual instruction, group instruction, and scaffolded learning. Free play children exhibited smaller gains across the prekindergarten year on indicators of language/literacy and mathematics compared to other children. Individual instruction children made greater gains than other children on the Woodcock Johnson Applied Problems. Poor children in the individual instruction profile fared better than nonpoor children in that profile; in all other snapshot profiles, poor children fared worse than nonpoor children.
Chien
Nina C
NC
University of California-San Diego, 9500 Gilman Drive #0927, La Jolla, CA 92093-0927, USA. nchien@ucsd.edu
Howes
Carollee
C
Burchinal
Margaret
M
Pianta
Robert C
RC
Ritchie
Sharon
S
Bryant
Donna M
DM
Clifford
Richard M
RM
Early
Diane M
DM
Barbarin
Oscar A
OA
D002657:Child Development; D002675:Child, Preschool; D018479:Early Intervention, Educational; D004522:Educational Status; D005260:Female; D006801:Humans; D007398:Interpersonal Relations; D007858:Learning; D008297:Male; D011203:Poverty; D014481:United States; D035862:Vulnerable Populations