Overview
Topic
Area Focus
This What Works Clearinghouse (WWC) review focuses on early childhood education (ECE) interventions (curricula and practices, as defined below) designed for use in center-based settings with three- to five-year-old children who are not yet in kindergarten or are in preschool, with a primary focus on cognitive and language competencies associated with school readiness (cognition, language, literacy, and math). The review also includes center-based ECE interventions designed to improve the school readiness skills of preschool children with developmental delays or diagnosed disabilities and children who are English Language Learners (ELL).1
A systematic review of evidence in this topic area addresses the following questions:
- Which ECE interventions improve preschool children’s cognitive and language competencies associated with school readiness (cognition, language, literacy, and math skills)?
- Does the effectiveness of ECE interventions differ by type of outcome?
- Which ECE interventions are particularly effective for which children?
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Key
Definitions
Early Childhood Education Intervention. The WWC ECE review examines evidence of the effectiveness of center-based early childhood education interventions (curricula and practices) designed to improve children’s school readiness, focusing on those interventions that have as their primary goal improving preschool children’s cognitive and language competencies.
- Curriculum: A curriculum is a set of activities, materials, and/or guidance for working with children in classrooms that has a clearly identified name; includes a thorough write-up/description; and can be replicated by others based on written guidance, staff training, or technical assistance. Some ECE curricula are the primary classroom curriculum, addressing multiple domains of development, whereas other ECE curricula are focused on one or two areas and, therefore, are used as supplements to a primary curriculum.
- Practice: A practice is a named approach to promoting children’s development that staff implement in interacting with children and materials in their classrooms. The
named approach must be clearly described and commonly understood in the field and literature.
Programs defined by funding streams or service delivery models are not considered interventions for this review. For example, Head Start programs and state-supported prekindergarten programs are not considered interventions, although specific curricula or practices used by these programs may be eligible for the review.
ECE policies that influence the conditions under which curricula and practices are implemented are not considered interventions for the review at this time. Examples include mandates concerning teacher qualifications or student-teacher ratios; however, to the extent possible, the association between these policies and the impact of an intervention is reviewed.
Short-term learning trials, which are relatively brief studies of systematic variations in parameters of how children are exposed to materials or assessed, are not considered interventions for the review at this time. Short-term learning trials often involve systematic manipulation of stimulus presentation, feedback type, or material content. Outcomes are generally measured immediately following the manipulation, which may last one or only a few sessions, often in a within-subjects experimental design.
School Readiness. Within the field of early childhood education, children’s school readiness is typically understood to encompass the following:
- Cognitive and language competencies associated with school readiness (cognition, language, literacy, math)
- Social-emotional development and approaches to learning (social relationships, self-concept, self-control, cooperation, reasoning and problem solving, engagement and persistence, initiative and curiosity)
- Physical well-being and motor development (for example, physical health, gross and fine motor skills)
Preschool curricula and practices may focus on cognitive and language competencies, social-emotional development, or both. Preschool curricula also may address explicitly the issues of physical health and motor development. The initial focus of this review is on curricula and practices that have cognitive and language competencies as their primary focus. A subsequent focus of the review may be on curricula and practices that have social-emotional development as their primary focus. Curricula and practices with a dual focus (that is, both cognitive and language competencies and social-emotional development as determined by a scope and sequence or other explicit statement of focus) are reviewed with other interventions that have a focus on cognition and language development. Curricula or practices that have a primary focus on physical health and motor development, although important, are not included in this review.
The WWC review of interventions for ECE addresses student outcomes in six domains: oral language, print knowledge, phonological processing, early reading and writing, cognition, and math.
- Oral language domain. This domain includes the ability to understand spoken language, express thoughts or ideas through speech, understand or produce vocabulary, and display grammatical knowledge or skill.
- Print knowledge domain. This domain includes a combination of the following:
- Alphabet knowledge: knowledge of the names and sounds associated with printed letters
- Concepts about print: knowledge of print conventions (directionality, difference between letters and words, uppercase and lowercase, punctuation) and concepts (common book characteristics such as the cover, illustrations, text, author)
- Early decoding: simple sound-letter correspondence
- Phonological processing domain. This domain includes the following:
- Phonological awareness: the awareness of larger spoken units such as syllables and rhyming words; the ability to notice and manipulate the sounds of spoken language as fundamental components of words and speech (such as the ability to blend words, syllables, or phonemes; segment and delete syllables or phonemes; and rhyme)
- Phonological memory: the ability to hear a sequence of words or sounds and reproduce them within a short period of time
- Early reading and writing domain. This domain includes the following:
- Early reading: the ability to read common sight words, to decode simple words, to read with fluency, or to read and comprehend simple texts
- Early writing: the ability to copy shapes accurately, to write letters in isolation, or to write one’s own name or other simple words
- Cognition domain. This domain includes memory, problem solving, cognitive processing and flexibility, general knowledge, and IQ.
- Math domain. This domain includes recognizing numbers, concepts of numerical order and one-to-one correspondence, simple operations such as addition and subtraction, pattern recognition, classification, size, measurement, and geometry.
Preschoolers. Preschoolers are three- to five-year-old children who have not yet entered kindergarten or are in preschool.
Preschoolers with Disabilities. Preschoolers with disabilities are three- to five-year-old children who have not yet entered kindergarten or are in preschool who are eligible for special education and related services under Part B of the Individuals with Disabilities Education Act (IDEA). Eligible children are those with diagnosed disabilities and developmental delays who need special education and related services.
Preschoolers Who Are Nonnative Speakers of English. These preschoolers are from homes in which English is not the primary language spoken by adults to the children.
1 Studies with samples including at least 50% of children with disabilities or delays will be reviewed by the Early Childhood Education for Children with a Disability topic area.
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