The interrelationships between math and behavioral skill development prior to school entry are not well understood, yet have important implications for understanding how to best prepare young children for kindergarten. This study addresses this gap by utilizing a sample of 1,750 children (53% male; 47% White, 16% Black, 16% Hispanic, 8% Asian, and…

Research Findings: Children's readiness to handle the expectations of elementary school depends heavily on their self-regulation skills. Self-regulation includes both cognitive and behavioral elements; however, past studies have typically looked at cognitive and behavioral self-regulation in isolation or as a composite score rather than examining…

High rates of mental health problems in adolescents have been well documented; less is known about elementary school children in disadvantaged communities. We examined emotional and behavioral health needs in 202 third and fourth graders enrolled in a charter school in a largely Hispanic community. The child-reported Revised Child Anxiety and…

Publicly funded center-based preschool programs were designed to enhance low-income children's early cognitive and social-emotional skills in preparation for kindergarten. In the U.S., the federal Head Start program and state-funded public school-based pre-kindergarten (pre-k) programs are the two primary center-based settings in which low-income…

For socioeconomically disadvantaged children, a positive experience in kindergarten may play a particularly important role in fostering the behavioral adjustment and learning engagement necessary for school success. Prior research has identified supportive student--teacher relationships and classroom emotional support as two features of the…

The objective of this study was to evaluate two early intervention packages to promote successful transitions to kindergarten for preschoolers with behavior problems recruited from Head Start preschools. Fifty children (M[subscript age] = 61 months; 76% male; 98% minority) referred by teachers due to early externalizing behavior problems were…

Learning-related behaviors are important for school success. Socioeconomic disadvantage confers risk for less adaptive learning-related behaviors at school entry, yet substantial variability in school readiness exists within socioeconomically disadvantaged populations. Investigation of neurophysiological systems associated with learning-related…

Over the past twenty years extensive research has been conducted on emotional intelligence and its correlation to effective leadership. The initial studies were in large part related to the business sector. However, in recent years, more emphasis has been placed on its impact in the field of education. Emotional intelligence is the ability to…

Background: School readiness, conceptualized as three components including emotional self-regulation, social competence, and family/school involvement, as well as absence of conduct problems play a key role in young children's future interpersonal adjustment and academic success. Unfortunately, exposure to multiple poverty-related risks increases…

This report from the Washington State Department of Early Learning (DEL) describes some of the Department's work since it's creation in July 2006. Among other achievements, the Department has laid a strong foundation for raising the quality of child care and the state's preschool program, strengthened both the safety in and the reach of early…