Objectives: The importance of breastfeeding exposure and children's development of self-regulation, independently, are well established. Each of these domains also has been linked to better cognitive development and academic achievement in children. However, little is known about how breastfeeding affects development of early self-regulation…

Research Findings: The amount of time and type of program that children experience in early childhood settings may be associated with children's kindergarten-entry skills, or kindergarten readiness. Taking a person-centered perspective, in the present study, we examined the extent to which reliable and unique profiles of early childhood…

Research Findings: This study examined age-based developmental trajectories of four key number sense (NS) skills within an accelerated longitudinal design. Using data from 408 preschoolers, ages 45 to 68 months, linear and latent basis growth curves were evaluated. Results indicated growth across NS skills was best represented as nonlinear for all…

Research Findings: Previous research has indicated that low-income children are at increased risk for socio-emotional problems, which may contribute to socioeconomic disparities in wellbeing and academic achievement. The present study examines socio-emotional learning (SEL) across the prekindergarten year in a low-income, racially and ethnically…

Arithmetic ability is critical for daily life, academic achievement, career development, and future economic success. Individual differences in arithmetic skills among children and adolescents are related to variations in brain structures. Most existing studies have used hypothesis-driven region of interest analysis. To identify distributed brain…

Children show marked improvements in executive functioning (EF) between 4 and 7 years of age. In many societies, this time period coincides with the start of formal school education, in which children are required to follow rules in a structured environment, drawing heavily on EF processes such as inhibitory control. This study aimed to…

With a focus on within-person effects, this study investigated mutualism among academic skills (reading, math, science) and between those skills and verbal working memory in a general population sample and groups with high or low skills from Grades 2 to 5 (2010-2016, N = 859-9040, age 6.27-13.13 years, 49% female, ethnically diverse). Mutualism…

This study examined early development of cool and hot self-regulation and how they were related to Chinese preschoolers' early achievement. A total of 951 children (448 girls) aged three to five in Hong Kong participated in this study. Children's self-regulation was assessed with a battery of five tasks tapping either cool or hot self-regulation;…

How do children reason about academic performance across development? A classic view suggests children's intuitive theories in this domain undergo qualitative changes. According to this view, older children and adults consider both effort and skill as sources of performance (i.e., a "performance = effort + skill" theory), but younger…

This report summarizes the findings from a two-year mixed methods evaluation of the effect of the Teach For Nigeria (TFN) teacher training program on whole child development, perceptions of teaching quality, and the school community. This report contributes to a growing body of research on Teach For All organizations across the globe and the…

This study analyzed data on the early developmental status of 7352 children, aged from 36 to 59 months, using the "Early Childhood Developmental Index" (ECDI) to assess literacy-numeracy, physical, social-emotional, and learning domains. The study explored correlates of developmental status with a range of socio-demographic and…

To equitably and effectively serve children, families, schools, and communities, school psychologists must appreciate the dynamic interaction that exists between many variables. Using Bronfenbrenner's (1979) ecological systems theory as an example, this comprehensive conceptual framework provides a model for understanding how interconnected…

Externalizing behavior and low academic performance present key developmental challenges for school-age children, with the potential for these domains to predict each other over time, leading to worsened outcomes. Yet, previous studies have yielded inconsistent conclusions about the directional pathways between externalizing behaviors and academic…

The recent expansion of research on children's understanding of others' minds (or 'theory of mind', ToM) into middle childhood provides fresh opportunities to consider its origins and consequences. In this paper, we propose that, in addition to supporting children's social interactions, individual differences in ToM benefit academic achievement,…

This paper uses meta-analytic techniques to estimate the separate effects of the starting age, program duration, and persistence of impacts of early childhood education programs on children's cognitive and achievement outcomes. It concentrates on studies published before the wide scale penetration of state-pre-K programs. Specifically, data are…