Lecture 1: Introduction to Atmospheric Chemistry

Full-day and Half-day
Kindergarten in the
United States
Findings from the Early
Childhood Longitudinal
Study, Kindergarten
Class of 1998–99
U.S. Department of Education
Institute of Education Sciences
NCES 2004–078Full-day and Half-day
Kindergarten in the
United States
Findings from the Early
Childhood Longitudinal
Study, Kindergarten
Class of 1998–99
U.S. Department of Education
Institute of Education Sciences
NCES 2004–078
June 2004
Jill Walston
Education Statistics
Services Institute
Jerry West
National Center for
Education StatisticsU.S. Department of Education
Rod Paige
Secretary
Institute of Education Sciences
Grover J. Whitehurst
Director
National Center for Education Statistics
Robert Lerner
Commissioner
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Suggested Citation
Walston, J.T., and West, J. (2004). Full-day and Half-day Kindergarten in the United States: Findings from the
Early Childhood Longitudinal Study, Kindergarten Class of 1998–99 (NCES 2004–078). U.S. Department of
Education, National Center for Education Statistics. Washington, DC: U.S. Government Printing Office.
For ordering information on this report, write:
U.S. Department of Education
ED Pubs
P .O. Box 1398
Jessup, MD 20794–1398
Call toll free 1–877–4ED–Pubs; or order online at http://www.edpubs.org
Content Contact:
Jerry West
(202) 502–7335
jerry.west@ed.govAcknowledgments
The authors wish to recognize the 20,000 par- Westat, Incorporated—in affiliation with the
ents and children and the more than 3,000 kinder- Institute for Social Research and the School of Edu-
garten teachers who participated during the first cation at the University of Michigan, and the Edu-
year of the study. We would like to thank the ad- cational Testing Service, under the direction of the
ministrators of the more than 1,000 schools we vis- National Center for Education Statistics (NCES)—
ited across the United States for allowing us to work conducted the base-year study. We would like to
with their children, teachers and parents, and for express our appreciation for the efforts of the staff
providing us with information about their schools. from each of these organizations, and especially to
We are especially appreciative of the assistance we the more than 400 field staff who conducted the
received from the Chief State School Officers, dis- child assessments and parent interviews in fall 1998
trict superintendents and staff, and private school and spring 1999.
officials.
We also thank Elvie Germino Hausken of the We wish to acknowledge the support that we
National Center for Education Statistics (NCES); have received from the Head Start Bureau of the
Jonaki Bose formerly with NCES, Amy Rathbun, Administration on Children, Youth and Families;
Kristin Denton Flanagan, Sandy Eyster, Emily the Economic Research Service of the U.S. Depart-
Rosenthal, Frank Avenilla, Nikkita Willis, and ment of Agriculture; the National Institute for Child
DeeAnn Brimhall of the Education Statistics Ser- Health and Human Development; and the U.S.
vices Institute (ESSI), and Lizabeth Reaney formerly Department of Education’s Office of Special Edu-
with ESSI for their hard work and dedication in cation Programs, Office of English Language Ac-
supporting all aspects of the ECLS-K program. We quisition, and Policy and Program Studies Service.
also appreciate the comments we received from Bill A special thank you to Kendra Chandler Webb,
Hussar at NCES, Leslie Scott at ESSI, Karen age 9 (1994), for designing the ECLS logo and to
O’Conor at the Institute of Education Sciences, and Mariel Escudero at ESSI for the design of the re-
from two anonymous reviewers. port.
iiiTable of Contents
Acknowledgments .................................................................... iii
Executive Summary .................................................................. xv
Chapter 1. Introduction ..............................................................1
Full-day and half-day kindergarten ............................................................. 1
Data source ............................................................................................ 3
Organization of findings ........................................................................... 8
Chapter 2. Schools offering full-day and half-day
kindergarten programs 11
Chapter 3. Children enrolled in full-day and half-day
kindergarten programs …… ...................................................... 17
School characteristics..............................................................................18
Race/ethnicity .......................................................................................20
Poverty status and home language ............................................................21
Chapter 4. Full-day and half-day public school
kindergarten classes ................................................................. 25
4.1 Composition and structure of public kindergarten classes ......................25
Minority and LEP enrollment.............................................................25
Teacher characteristics.....................................................................27
Class size and classroom aides ..........................................................29
4.2 Instructional practices and curricular focus .........................................31
Classroom organization ....................................................................31
Grouping strategies.........................................................................34
Subject areas .................................................................................36
Reading/language arts activities and skills ..........................................39
Mathematics activities and skills .......................................................42
Chapter 5. Cognitive gains of public school children in full-day
and half-day kindergarten classes ............................................... 45
Key findings: Reading gains ......................................................................47
Key findings: Mathematics gains ...............................................................49
HLM analyses .........................................................................................50
Variables in the analyses ..........................................................................51
Sample..................................................................................................54
Findings: Reading score gains ...................................................................54
Findings: Mathematics score gains.............................................................60
Chapter 6. Summary and discussion ........................................... 65
References .............................................................................. 69
vAppendix A: Tables of estimates ................................................. 71
Appendix B: Supplemental figures: Reading and mathematics
activities and skills ................................................................. 91
Appendix C: Standard error tables ............................................. 103
Appendix D: Methodology and technical notes............................ 123
Survey methodology .............................................................................. 123
Statistical procedures ............................................................................ 123
Weights and standard errors ................................................................... 126
Variable definitions ............................................................................... 1