Some evidence indicates that pre-k score convergence (also known as pre-k fadeout) may occur because kindergarten teachers focus instruction on children furthest from meeting end-of-year benchmarks, or those with weaker behavioral skills, bringing pre-k attenders and non-attenders closer to parity over the course of the year. To examine this possibility, we conducted path analyses using data from a study of kindergarteners from low-income backgrounds with and without pre-k experience. 975 children (59.6% Hispanic, 15.2% Black, 11.8% Asian, 10.3% White, and 3.1% other races/ethnicities; 50% with pre-k experience) were individually observed during kindergarten to determine how much time they spent in teacher-led individual work and small group instruction. Children were assessed in the fall and spring on language, literacy, and mathematics achievement and were rated by teachers on task orientation and disruptive behaviors in the fall. Descriptive path analyses illustrate that pre-k attendance was associated with higher school entry academic skills and task orientation as well as elevated disruptive behaviors. Stronger academic skills, higher task orientation, and lower disruptive behavior problems were associated with children spending less time with teachers. However, time spent with teachers in small group or individual work was largely not associated with achievement gains. Results suggest a need for more research on individual classroom experiences that may explain pre-k score convergence.
High-quality caregiver–child interactions are central to children’s development in early childhood education and care (ECEC) settings. Professional development programs have been shown to improve caregivers’ interactional skills, but evidence from large randomized controlled trials among caregivers working with infants and toddlers remain limited. The present study evaluated the effectiveness of the Caregiver Interaction Profile (CIP) training, a video-feedback-based professional development program designed to enhance caregivers’ interactional skills in ECEC settings.A two-armed cluster randomized controlled trial with a wait-list control group was conducted in childcare centers in BLINDED, Denmark. Professional caregivers (N = 248; care groups = 48) working with 0-2-year-old children were randomized to either CIP training (n = 123; care groups = 44) or a wait-list control group (n = 125; care groups = 44). Caregiver interactional skills were assessed using a standardized observational measure before and after the intervention.Compared with the control group, caregivers who received the CIP-training showed significantly greater improvements in Respect for Children’s Autonomy (β = .27, p =.044), Verbal Communication (β = .39, p =.004), Developmental Stimulation (β = .41, p =.004), and Fostering Positive Peer Interactions (β = .52, p < .001). Improvements in Sensitivity were also significant when adjusting for caregivers´ educational background (β = .32, p =.026). No intervention effects were found for Structuring and Limit-setting.The findings add to the growing evidence that video-feedback-based professional development programs can improve caregivers´ interactional skills in ECEC settings. Future research should examine whether improvements in caregiver-child interactions translate into positive developmental outcomes for children.
Empathy, defined as sharing and understanding others’ emotional experiences, is key to the formation of social groups and plays an important role in children’s social development. While enhancing this skill in early education has been a focus in the field, whether trainings employed succeed at enhancing children’s empathy, and what the mechanisms are behind their effectiveness, is still unknown. Importantly, understanding this is crucial to effective intervention. A meta-analysis of 30 studies (44 effect sizes) measuring empathy before and after a training, including 2,820 preschool children (Mage = 5.08, range 3.41 to 6.46), was conducted using robust variance estimation to account for multiple effect sizes within the same study. Results revealed that interventions had a small to medium-sized effect in improving children’s empathy (Hedges’s g = 0.49, CI: 0.32, 0.66; p < 0.0001). Further, the impact of interventions on children’s empathy was moderated by intervention leader and the size of intervention classes, with researcher-led interventions delivered in groups having a larger effect on children’s empathy development than other interventions (g = 0.77, CI: 0.55, 0.98; p = 0.002 vs g = 0.34, CI: 0.14, 0.54; p < 0.0001). Child age and intervention dosage (number of intervention sessions times the length of each session) did not moderate the effect of interventions on children’s empathy. Our in-depth results urge researchers to use a variety of empathy measures to gain a better understanding of empathy development in early childhood, and encourage practitioners to target empathy in small groups, performing activities linked to emotion understanding, or book-reading and discussing characters’ emotions. Further implications for future research and practice are discussed.
Although defending behaviors represent early-emerging prosocial responses that can effectively counter peer aggression or bullying, age-appropriate measures for preschoolers remain scarce. Across two studies, we developed the Parent-report Preschool Defending Behaviors Questionnaire (PDBQ-P) and conducted an initial psychometric evaluation in a Chinese preschool sample. Study 1 (N = 927 parents; Mage = 4.92 years) used Exploratory Graph Analysis (EGA) to identify the dimensional structure of defending behaviors. Bootstrapped EGA supported a stable four-dimensional structure, including comforting victims, reporting to authority, aggressing against bullies, and physically interrupting bullies. Study 2 (N = 752 parents at the 5-month follow-up) examined reliability, validity, and item-level invariance within the EGA framework. All subscales showed adequate internal consistency (αs = .66 – .88) and modest test–retest stability, as indexed by the Pearson correlations (rs = .39 – .53) and intraclass correlation coefficients (ICCs = .39 – .53). Construct validity was supported by positive associations with attention to others’ feelings (rs = .17 – .44) and prosocial behaviors (rs = .14 – .66), and differential associations with externalizing problems. Confirmatory factor analysis provided additional support for the EGA-derived four-factor structure. No items were flagged as noninvariant across time or gender within the permutation-based EGA framework. Overall, these studies developed the PDBQ-P as a parent-report measure of preschoolers’ defending behaviors and provided initial evidence for its psychometric properties and for the distinct forms of defending in early childhood.
