Students' level of academic skills at school entry are a strong predictor of later academic success, and focusing on improving these skills during the preschool years has been a priority during the past 10 years. Evidence from two prior nationally representative studies indicated that incoming kindergarteners' math and literacy skills were higher…

This manual provides guidance and documentation for users of the longitudinal kindergarten-second grade (K-2) data file of the Early Childhood Longitudinal Study, Kindergarten Class of 2010-11 (ECLS-K:2011). It mainly provides information specific to the second-grade rounds of data collection. Users should refer to the "Early Childhood…

This study used data from Early Childhood Longitudinal Study -- Birth Cohort (ECLS-B) and examined the relations between children's Head Start exposure and their early academic skills (i.e., language, literacy, and math skills) in the United States. Two groups of children who shared similar socio-economic status and disability status but received…

A half century of research details how segregating racial groups in separate schools corresponds with disparities in funding and quality teachers and culturally narrow curricula. But we know little about whether young Latino children have entered less or more segregated elementary schools over the past generation. This article details the growing…

The current study uses a large, nationally representative data set and a new method for computing teacher expectations to better understand the developmental effect of mathematics teacher expectations on future student achievement. The study utilizes autoregressive cross-lagged models with 5 time points between kindergarten and 8th grade as well…

Because children from low-income families benefit from preschool but are less likely than other children to enroll, identifying factors that promote their enrollment can support research and policy aiming to reduce socioeconomic disparities in education. In this study, we tested an accommodations model with data on 6,250 children in the Early…