Activity settings and daily routines in preschool classrooms: Diverse experiences in early learning settings for low-income children☆
Highlights
► We identified daily routine profiles among diverse early education programs. ► High Free-Choice programs spent most of the day in child-directed activity. ► Structured-Balanced programs balanced child- and teacher-directed activities. ► Program type and curriculum use predicted activity profiles but quality did not. ► Profiles provided different opportunities for pre-academic engagement and learning.
Section snippets
Conceptualizing quality in early learning programs
Prior studies have typically conceptualized and assessed children's experiences in early learning settings by exploring various aspects of structural and process quality (Phillips & Howes, 1987). Some studies focus on structural quality, which concerns features of program infrastructure or design. In these studies, program quality is assessed in terms of adherence to standards involving teacher education, teacher–child ratio, class size, and other regulatable aspects of care (Barnett, Hustedt,
Research on children's experiences in early learning programs
Some recent research has begun to document time use in preschool programs along with other measures of children's experiences. The National Center for Early Development and Learning (NCEDL) conducted two large studies of publicly funded pre-kindergarten programs and employed a large battery of measures of structural and process quality in these programs (Early et al., 2005). Early et al. (2010) used time sampling observational data to describe the amount of time that children spent in
The current study
The current study builds on the existing body of literature by drawing from a unique sample of early learning programs that captures more of the diversity of early learning settings available to low-income families. In the extant literature, many researchers have limited the focus of their investigations by restricting their sample to public center-based pre-kindergarten programs for 4-year-old. In this study, we cast a wider net by drawing from a rich sample that includes center-based programs
Sample
This analysis uses data from a larger longitudinal study of school readiness among low-income children. A variety of early childhood education programs serving low-income children in Los Angeles County, California was selected to represent a range of diverse learning settings available to low-income children. In the larger study, the sampling procedure involved recruiting programs serving 3-year-old in the first year of the study as well as recruiting a comparison group of children not
Results
Means, standard deviations, and percentages of all analysis variables as used at the child- and classroom-levels are presented in Table 1, Table 2. The classroom quality measures are each positively correlated with each other (CLASS Emotional Support and Instructional Support r = .48; CLASS Emotional Support and ECERS Academic r = .28; CLASS Instructional Support and ECERS Academic r = .34; all ps < .01). The assessor ratings of children's assessment behaviors were also significantly intercorrelated
Discussion
The current outcomes-based educational climate emphasizing teacher-directed and academically oriented instruction is counterbalanced by supporters of early educational approaches arguing that children do their best learning in all domains in play-based settings (e.g. Bodrova and Leong, 2007, Zigler and Bishop-Josef, 2006) and free-play opportunities should not be reduced for the sake of teacher-directed academic activities. Indeed, advocacy organizations concerned about what seems to be the
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The research reported in this paper was supported through the Interagency School Readiness Consortium (NICHD, ACF, ASPE; Grant Number: 5-R01-HD046063). However, the contents do not necessarily represent the positions or policies of the U.S. Department of Education and endorsement by the Federal government should not be assumed.