This study investigated how different profiles of kindergarten readiness in terms of student intellectual ability, academic skills and classroom engagement relate to future academic performance. Participants are French-Canadian children followed in the context of the Quebec Longitudinal Study of Child Development (
For every individual child, kindergarten is meant to consolidate early academic, learning and intellectual skills in order to benefit subsequent, more challenging learning experiences from first grade onwards (Zuckerman & Halfon
What kinds of skills are desirable in young learners? General intelligence is a very good predictor of academic achievement, successful and gainful employment, career potential and higher lifestyle quality (Colom & Flores-Mendoza
In addition to general intelligence, children also need knowledge-based intellectual skills in mathematics and language to help them acquire increasingly complex lessons (Westerveld et al.
Finally, researchers are increasingly aware that learning draws upon a number of competencies in addition to intellectual skills typically measured by standardised tests (Duckworth et al.
Classroom engagement represents a reflection of productive behaviour and of person-environment-fit in the school context. A child that is engaged in the classroom is attentive to teacher directions, displays cooperation and completes work independently and on time. When actively applied by students, such behaviours set the stage for short- and long-term academic and personal success (Cunha et al.
There is evidence that early language, mathematical and intellectual and classroom engagement skills represent important components of kindergarten readiness. However, little research to date has examined whether it is possible to describe different types of learners based on these dimensions. The majority of school readiness studies have employed variable-based analytic approaches, which estimate the relative contributions of individual school readiness indicators to academic outcomes. This approach is useful for identifying significant predictors of achievement. However, such variable-based approaches assume that children are a homogenous group, or that relationships between variables are the same for all children. Variable-centred approaches also preclude the existence of subgroups of children that may differ in their profiles of school readiness. One exception is a study by Sabol and Pianta (
The present study draws upon a population-based longitudinal sample of French-Canadian children. A first objective is to employ a person-centred approach to examine whether student risk profiles can be identified in kindergarten on the basis of child school readiness characteristics. A second objective is to estimate whether kindergarten student profiles differentially predict achievement outcomes by the end of the fourth grade. We expect that kindergarten students showing higher levels of risk in terms of their intellectual, academic and engagement skills will perform worse academically four years later.
Several child and family demographic factors may influence both child school entry competence and later academic outcomes. Children who are chronologically older at school entry may be better prepared and maintain an advantage relative to younger classmates. Girls also tend to be better prepared at school entry than boys and tend to show less disruptive classroom behaviour (Duncan et al.
Participants are drawn from the Quebec Longitudinal Study of Child Development (QLSCD, 1998–2017), coordinated by the Quebec Institute of Statistics. The QLSCD is a randomly selected, stratified sample of 2694 infants born between 1997 and 1998 in Quebec, Canada. The sample was followed up on an annual basis from 5 to 98 months and every 2 years from 98 months onwards. Among the 2694 children, some were deemed ineligible or untraceable, which reduced the eligible follow-up sample to 2120 infants from the first wave onwards. Children had to be 60 months on September 30 to be eligible for kindergarten entry in fall of 2002. Data on early academic and intellectual skills were individually assessed at the end of kindergarten for 1145 children. Classroom engagement was also measured at the end of the school year by teacher reports. The mean age of children at the end of kindergarten was 73.68 months. Boys represented 46% of the sample. Some teachers did not provide child classroom engagement data, which reduced our analytic sample to 670 cases. Follow-up occurred in the fourth grade (mean age = 120 months, 46% male).
From school entry onwards, data collection occurred in the spring. Families, teachers and school principals received informed consent forms by mail. Teachers and families also received and returned questionnaires by mail. Parents were interviewed by trained research assistants by phone or in person. Parents were compensated an amount of $25 and were informed that their child would receive a small gift. Direct assessments were mostly done at school. When unable to be evaluated at school, some children were evaluated at home.
Trained examiners administered the Block Design subtest of the Wechsler Preschool and Primary Scale of Intelligence-Revised to assess fluid intellectual skills (WPPSI-R, Wechsler
The Number Knowledge Test (NKT) was administered to assess basic knowledge of numbers (Okamoto & Case
Kindergarten teachers rated items pertaining to productive behaviour in the classroom. A mean classroom engagement score was computed for each participant from seven items: works neatly and carefully; follows rules and instructions; follows directions; listens attentively; completes work on time; works autonomously; and works and plays cooperatively with other children, α = 0.92. Each item was rated on a scale from 1 (never) to 3 (always). The classroom engagement scale has shown good predictive and construct validity (Fitzpatrick & Pagani
Mathematical achievement was assessed using the Canadian Achievement Test (CAT/2) which children completed with a trained examiner at the end of the fourth grade. This test evaluates mastery of four basic mathematical operations: addition, subtraction, multiplication and division. Each question requires the application of basic operations to whole numbers. Children received one point for each correct answer. The sum of correct answers was used in the analyses.
Fourth-grade teachers rated child mathematical, reading, science, spelling and global achievement relative to their classmates by choosing among the following options: near the top of the class (scored as 2); above the middle of the class (scored as 1); in the middle of the class (scored as 0); below the middle of the class (scored as −1); or near the bottom of the class (scored as −2). This outcome measure has been found to be as sensitive and robust as individual achievement tests in detecting even subtle changes in academic performance over time (Duncan et al.
These include child sex, age in months and kindergarten teacher reports of child behavioural characteristics using the Social Behaviours Questionnaire (Pagani et al.
When children were 5 and 17 months, parents reported on some child context variables, including: (1) family functioning (‘planning activities is difficult because we misunderstand each other’ or ‘we avoid discussing our fears or concerns’), coded from 1 (strongly agree) to 4 (strongly disagree) and rescaled as a continuous score from 1 to 10 (Epstein, Baldwin & Bishop
We used latent class analysis (LCA) to detect distinct child profiles which differ in school readiness, based on: (1) general intellectual skills; (2) knowledge-based skills (receptive vocabulary and number knowledge); and (3) classroom engagement. LCA was conducted with MPLUS 5.1. LCA provides classification of individuals based on the relationships among variables. The results of LCA also provide estimated conditional means for continuous level variables (i.e. intellectual skills) and probabilities for each response category of categorical level variables (i.e. classroom engagement), based on class membership. The measure of children’s classroom engagement was positively skewed and violated distributional assumptions of normality necessary for the treatment of continuous level variables in LCA. It was thus transformed into a three category ordinal variable reflecting low (25.5%), medium (35.9%) and high classroom engagement (38.7%), respectively. Maximum likelihood estimation method with robust standard errors and random starting values were used to estimate classes. Observed variables were constrained to be uncorrelated within each class (Muthén & Muthén
Following LCA, our objective is to estimate whether kindergarten readiness profiles predict fourth-grade academic adjustment. Using multiple regression, we first entered all the control variables in a single step. We then entered kindergarten profile membership in a second step to examine how kindergarten profiles contribute to fourth-grade academic adjustment beyond the control variables.
As in most longitudinal large-scale studies, some participants had incomplete data on one or more variables. Attrition occurred for 31% of our sample on fourth-grade teacher reports of mathematical, reading, writing, science and global achievement. For the direct assessment of fourth-grade mathematical achievement, data were incomplete for 14% of our sample.
Because incomplete data could be predicted by covariates included in our sample, it was reasonable to assume that the data were missing at random (Cummings
Descriptive statistics for the independent, dependent and control variables are reported in
Descriptive table for independent, dependent and control variables.
Variables | Min | Max | |
---|---|---|---|
Kindergarten school readiness characteristics (74 months) | |||
Classroom engagement | 2.69 (0.38) | 1.57 | 3.00 |
Receptive vocabulary | 80.57 (17.00) | 15.00 | 30.00 |
Number knowledge | 13.25 (3.27) | 3.00 | 18.00 |
Non-verbal IQ | 19.95 (9.80) | 2.00 | 50.00 |
Fourth-grade achievement (120 months) | |||
Reading | 0.41 (1.29) | −3.00 | 3.00 |
Writing | 0.26 (1.33) | −4.00 | 4.00 |
Mathematics | 0.54 (1.23) | −3.00 | 4.00 |
Science | 0.55 (1.03) | −2.00 | 3.00 |
Global achievement | 0.93 (0.80) | −1.00 | 3.00 |
Mathematics (direct assessment) | 14.88 (3.38) | 0.00 | 22.00 |
Child and family control variables | |||
Hyperactivity (74 months) | 1.96 (2.41) | 0.00 | 10.00 |
Emotional distress (74 months) | 1.70 (1.66) | −1.17 | 8.33 |
Physical aggression (74 months) | 0.96 (2.09) | 0.00 | 10.00 |
Prosocial behaviour (74 months) | 5.29 (2.59) | −2.47 | 10.67 |
Age of the child | 73.68 (3.05) | 68.6 | 80.90 |
Sex (1 = boy, 0 = girl) | 0.46 (0.50) | 0.00 | 1.00 |
Socioeconomic status | 0.01 (0.76) | −2.00 | 3.00 |
Parental antisocial behaviour (5 months) | 0.64 (0.69) | 0.00 | 2.00 |
Family configuration (17 months) | 0.12 (0.32) | 0.00 | 1.00 |
Family functioning (5–17 months) | 1.22 (1.27) | −0.16 | 8.15 |
SD, standard deviation.
Fit indices and entropy for different class solutions.
Classes | BIC | Vuong-Lo-Mendell-Rubin Likelihood ratio test | Entropy |
---|---|---|---|
Two classes | 21110.17 | −10745.36 |
0.76 |
Three classes | 21011.25 | −10507.29 |
0.75 |
Four classes | 21008.19 | −10437.35 | 0.75 |
Five classes | 20999.76 | −10415.38 | 0.72 |
BIC, Bayesian information criterion.
We used one-way analysis of variance to examine whether the profiles differed significantly on school readiness indicators. There were significant group differences on intellectual skills [
We first entered all control variables in the regression equation in a single step. We then entered kindergarten profile membership in a second step to examine how kindergarten profiles contributed to the outcomes beyond the control variables. Regression coefficients for the associations between kindergarten readiness profiles and fourth-grade academic outcomes are reported in
Unstandardised regression coefficients reporting the relationship between kindergarten school readiness profile membership and fourth-grade academic adjustment.
Predictors | Teacher-rated achievement |
Direct assessment |
||||
---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
Reading | Writing | mathematics | Science | Global | mathematics | |
Moderate readiness | −0.80 (0.10) |
−0.71 (0.10) |
−0.75 (0.10) |
−0.38 (0.09) |
−0.40 (0.07) |
−0.98 (0.27) |
Low readiness | −1.37 (0.17) |
−1.26 (0.17) |
−1.45 (0.16) |
−0.90 (0.14) |
−0.72 (0.11) |
−4.07 (0.43) |
Hyperactive behaviour | −0.06 (0.02) |
−0.09 (0.02) |
−0.07 (0.02) |
−0.03 (0.02) | −0.04 (0.02) |
−0.14 (0.60) |
Emotional distress | −0.07 (0.03) |
−0.13 (0.03) |
−0.08 (0.03) |
−0.06 (0.02) |
−0.06 (0.02) |
−0.14 (0.08) |
Physical aggression | 0.01 (0.03) | 0.01 (0.03) | −0.01 (0.03) | −0.02 (0.02) | 0.02 (0.02) | 0.02 (0.07) |
Prosocial skills | 0.04 (0.04) | 0.00 (0.02) | 0.00 (0.02) | 0.00 (0.02) | 0.00 (0.01) | 0.05 (0.05) |
Family functioning | −0.01 (0.04) | −0.07 (0.04) | −0.09 (0.03) |
−0.05 (0.03) | 0.05 (0.04) |
0.00 (0.09) |
Family configuration | 0.01 (0.14) | −0.08 (0.14) | −0.08 (0.13) | −0.09 (0.12) | −0.07 (0.09) | −1.30 (0.37) |
Parent antisocial behaviour | −0.07 (0.07) | −0.06 (0.07) | 0.01 (0.06) | −0.07 (0.05) | 0.03 (0.04) | 0.01 (0.17) |
Socioeconomic status | −0.01 (0.07) | −0.03 (0.07) | −0.02 (0.06) | −0.05 (0.05) | 0.03 (0.04) | 0.47 (0.17) |
0.19 | 0.21 | 0.22 | 0.13 | 0.13 | 0.21 |
Note: The adaptive readiness profile serves as the omitted category. Models are adjusted for child sex and kindergarten age in months.
For each regression, we compare the group showing the most adaptive pattern of kindergarten readiness to the two at-risk groups. Compared to children showing adaptive school readiness, children in the highest risk group scored worse on fourth-grade teacher-rated reading (β = −1.37,
The first goal of this study was to examine whether children show different profiles of school readiness. We found three types of kindergarten students that differed on the basis of their academic, intellectual and classroom engagement skills. The majority of children in our population-based sample (57%) showed an adaptive pattern of school readiness, characterised by high scores on all of the kindergarten skills. Nevertheless, a substantial proportion of children (43%) appeared less than optimally prepared to learn and demonstrated less than optimal levels of school readiness. Although both of these groups showed low levels of receptive vocabulary and fluid intelligence, the moderate risk group scored higher on kindergarten number knowledge and classroom engagement. To our knowledge, this study is the first to identify two at-risk profiles of kindergarten children based on knowledge-based, intellectual and classroom engagement skills.
Children showing moderate and low levels of readiness differed in measurable ways on classroom engagement and mathematics skills. The relationship between kindergarten number knowledge and classroom engagement observed in our study is consistent with previous research linking both skills to effective cognitive control (Blair & Razza
Kindergarten receptive vocabulary and fluid intelligence appeared to be less closely related to mathematical ability and classroom engagement in our profiles. This may have been the case because receptive vocabulary and fluid intelligence are distinct from cognitive control and may be more highly related to general intelligence or socioeconomic status. Although important for academic achievement, general intelligence may be more resistant to intervention. Consequently, it may be especially efficient to target cognitive control as a means of promoting both classroom engagement and math achievement in at-risk kindergarten students.
The second aim of our study was to examine whether school readiness profiles are prospectively associated with subsequent academic achievement. We compared children with the most adaptive pattern of school readiness to two groups of children showing lower levels of school readiness. Compared to children showing the most adaptive school readiness profile, children in the low and moderate readiness groups had poorer outcomes in the fourth grade. Belonging to the moderate readiness group, characterised by better mathematical and classroom engagement skills, also predicted a significant long-term advantage when compared to children showing the lowest levels of school readiness. Both the moderate and low readiness classes of children had lower levels of intellectual and language skills. Consequently, our findings provide some evidence that in the absence of these skills, adequate classroom engagement and mathematical skills may represent a protective factor in the classroom. These findings provide a more detailed understanding of school readiness and expand on previous research which has mainly used variable-centred approaches to explain the relative importance of school readiness characteristics (Duncan et al.
The findings from this study advance our knowledge of school readiness by suggesting that a combination of productive classroom behaviours reflecting conscious effort and task-orientation, in addition to academic and intellectual skills, may give young students the strongest foundation for later achievement. Children belonging to the lowest readiness group showed the greatest difficulty in both teacher and directly assessed mathematics. This is not surprising as these children also showed the lowest level of early mathematics knowledge. Interestingly, children in this group, which did not differ significantly from the moderate risk group in terms of early language and intellectual skills, also experienced the most difficulty in reading and writing by the fourth grade. Consequently, these results suggest a role for early mathematical and classroom engagement in predicting later verbal performance. Fourth-grade achievement in reading involves highly automatic letter and phoneme identification processes which are knowledge based and are reinforced by opportunities for literacy found outside the formal schooling environment (Hart & Risley
Our findings suggest the potential benefit of targeting classroom engagement and number knowledge with children showing low levels of kindergarten readiness. Classroom engagement skills, in particular, can be routinely and cost-effectively monitored and assessed by elementary school teachers during instructional activities (Lee & Reeve
A promising avenue for increasing both number knowledge and classroom engagement involves strengthening child cognitive control. The development of interventions that strategically combine computerised training, classroom instruction and curriculum, aerobic exercise, mindfulness training, and martial arts, tailored to suit the needs of different learners, are likely to be especially effective in promoting classroom engagement and mathematical skills (Bierman et al.
Our findings should be interpreted in the context of certain limitations. First, although prospective, our results are based on a correlational study of development occurring in a natural context. As a result, despite our attempt to methodologically reduce the competing influence of several child and family confounding variables, it is not possible to infer a causal relationship between our independent and dependent variables. In this study, we preferred to adopt a person-centred approach to observe how features of school readiness co-occur in a population. As a result, this method prevents us from identifying precisely which features of school readiness make a stronger overall contribution to later achievement. Nevertheless, the results of other longitudinal studies of school readiness with the same sample provide evidence that both classroom engagement and intellectual skills measured in kindergarten represent robust and independent predictors of later achievement (Fitzpatrick & Pagani
The possibility of early detection and intervention with children at risk of learning difficulties represents our most promising strategy for circumventing a number of expensive social problems which are associated with high school dropout, such as unemployment, substance abuse and involvement in crime (Cunha et al.
The author declares that she has no financial or personal relationships which may have inappropriately influenced her in writing this article.