Arizona's First Things First partners with other agencies to create a high-quality, family-centered, comprehensive, and collaborative early childhood system that supports the development, health, and early education of all Arizona's children through age 5, helping ensure they enter kindergarten healthy and ready to succeed. One of First Things…

We examined whether the early learning environment predicts children's 5th grade skills in 2,204 families from ethnically diverse, low-income backgrounds; tested the mediating roles of children's pre-kindergarten school-related skills and later learning environment; and asked whether lagged associations generalize across White, Black, Hispanic…

Background: The acquired skill set prior to school entry has emerged as an important issue in research and policy internationally. Much evidence exists advocating the importance of early numeracy and literacy skills in later academic achievement and economic outcomes of students. Aim: The goal of this study was to determine the association between…

We present evidence of a positive relationship between school starting age and children's cognitive development from ages 6 to 18 using a fuzzy regression discontinuity design and large-scale population-level birth and school data from the state of Florida. We estimate effects of being old for grade (being born in September vs. August) that are…

At least half of states administer or are developing kindergarten entry assessments. In fall 2017 the Illinois State Board of Education began requiring teachers to report data on every child's skills at kindergarten entry using the Kindergarten Individual Development Survey. State and local stakeholders have asked for more information on the…

At least half of states administer or are developing kindergarten entry assessments. In fall 2017 the Illinois State Board of Education began requiring teachers to report data on every child's skills at kindergarten entry using the Kindergarten Individual Development Survey. State and local stakeholders have asked for more information on the…

Since 2007, nineteen Houston Independent School District (HISD) campuses have partnered with Literacy Now to offer the Reading Intervention program. The Reading Intervention program provides individualized, small group reading tutorials for at-risk students in kindergarten to second grade to create proficient readers by the end of third grade.…

Michigan's public education system remains in a perennial rut, as it has for decades. According to the National Assessment of Educational Progress (NAEP), Michigan's fourth grade reading scores show no significant change over the past 16 years. Even before the pandemic, too many dreams have stalled, and academic achievement remains largely…

We tested a culturally integrative model examining the associations among economic hardship during infancy and Latino children's later sociobehavioral problems and academic skills prior to kindergarten entry, whether mothers' mental health problems and positive parenting behaviors mediated those associations, and whether they varied by mothers'…

Although research has shown fade-out of the cognitive benefits of classroom-based preschool interventions, less is known regarding the durability of social-emotional impacts. This study examines the extent to which the multicomponent Chicago School Readiness Project (CSRP) intervention lowered risk of internalizing, externalizing, attention, and…

This study used a family-centered ecological lens to examine predictive relations among fathers' and mothers' language acculturation, parenting practices, and academic readiness in a large sample of Mexican American children in preschool (N = 880). In line with prior early childhood research, parent language acculturation was operationalized as…

The current study uses nationally representative data drawn from the Early Childhood Longitudinal Study-Birth Cohort (ECLS-B) to estimate a structural equation model that examines the associations among parents' academic and behavior-oriented school readiness beliefs, home- and school-based parental involvement, and children's academic achievement…

The Condition of Education in the Commonwealth project is one way the Rennie Center fulfills its mission of producing non-partisan and independent research that promotes improvement in public education for all Massachusetts children. Its principles include: (1) Education encompasses more than academics; and (2) Schools should not--and cannot--work…

The Illinois State Board of Education (ISBE) develops and maintains a continuing five-year comprehensive strategic plan for elementary and secondary education in accordance with Public Act 93-1036. Agency staff members revisit the plan each year to review the agency's accomplishments and to refine the agency's strategies. The State Board amended…

"Child Development and Learning" integrates concepts of learning and development into one comprehensive text for understanding child development. At its core is the belief that learning and development are intertwined. As children learn, they also develop. As children develop, they also learn. With an understanding of how children…