Children 's Academic And Social Competencies

Based on this policy analysis, the recommended alternative is for the federal government to educate states on recognizing the importance of and participating in the quality early education programs. Some states have already started making progress in modeling and developing early learning systems for children zero to age five. According to the Whitehouse (2011), “The President’s 2012 budget calls upon Congress to establish a new, competitive Early Learning Challenge Fund, administered by the Departments of Education (ED) and Health and Human Services (HHS), for states that are ready to take dramatic steps to improve the quality of their early childhood programs. The Early Learning Challenge Fund will be complemented by investments in Head Start

Healy, C. (2015). Who benefits most from head start programs? Chicago Policy Review (Online), Retrieved from http://search.proquest.com.durhamtech.idm.oclc.org/

Head Start was created in 1965, during Lyndon B. Johnson’s presidential administration, as part of the Great Society plan and the War on Poverty (Currie , 2001). After observing the quality discrepancies between low income and high income educational settings, Johnson realized that “Five and six year old children are inheritors of poverty 's curse…(Johnson, 1965)” As a result, he called for the creation of a program that would allow “…preschool children of poverty [to] get a Head Start on their future (Johnson, 1965).” Soon, Head Start was established, with the goal of “enhance[ing] children’s physical, social, emotional and cognitive development (Mississippi Head Start Association, 2012).”

Early childhood education is crucial for success in the formalized education system. Many children born into lower income communities do not obtain this advantage. According to Kozol, simply based off accident of birth a child will lead completely different educational lives (2005). For example, a white toddler in an upper middle class neighborhood might attend a prestigious educational preliminary kindergarten. These respected early education schools are often referred to as “baby ivies” (Kozol, 2005). The child participates in pre-numeracy skills along with pre-writing skills. Conversely, a child of minority descent living in an underprivileged neighborhood may not initiate school until they are five years old. In the three previous years a

Statement of Issue: Many minority children and children from low-income families enter kindergarten without the academic skills they need to succeed. Math and reading abilities at kindergarten entry are powerful predictors of later school success. Research shows kids who start school already behind are unlikely to ever get caught up to standards. Hispanic and African American children are anywhere from 7 to 12 months behind in reading and 9 to 10 months behind on math when they enter kindergarten. Access remains extremely low to high-quality early education do to a couple of problems. First, rates of access to early education vary widely as a function of children’s socioeconomic backgrounds. Secondly, the quality of most early education programs is not high enough to substantially improve academic readiness. Considering the tremendous potential for high-quality preschool to improve children’s outcomes, this policy brief will consider how a universal publicly funded pre-kindergarten program in the United States could decrease both disparities in access to early learning and achievement gaps at kindergarten entry.

Not long after Johnson took office, an official announcement from the White House launched the Head Start Program opening “the gates of opportunity” . With economic expansion on the rise, Johnson and Democratic Liberals believed “that economic growth made it possible to fund new programs and to improve the quality of life.” With enrollment numbers soaring, the program jumped off in assisting nearly 560,000 children across the country. This eight-week summer program gave children a start in early education that more than likely would not have had provided to them without Johnson’s vision. Based on the level of success, congress authorized the Head Start Program to be fully funded for the first year. Throughout 1965, the program grew and children as young three were being

Early childhood. During the 1990s, the nation was inundated with reports on the importance of the early years on children's brain development and later cognitive achievement. While some of the reports may have overstated the issue and understated the importance of a child's later years on development, evidence suggests that the early years may be a critical period of development in which family poverty has particularly strong effects on young children. As seen in Table 1, poverty occurring early in a child's life (age two to four) is associated with large effects on indices of child school readiness and cognitive outcomes.

The studies found that all pre-school programs have the potential to prepare disadvantaged preschoolers to enter school at the same level, but since the children in this study were so much more disadvantaged and lower intellectually, they had no way to go but up. Since Head Start is designed for economically and intellectually disadvantaged children, these deficits can be specifically corrected. Simple knowledge like colors, street signs, and discipline are taught, but often assumed by other preschoolers who are more privileged they have already mastered those skills. Meeting the children on their own level brings them up to close the gap with other children. However, this gap appears in other

We are grateful for the support of J.B. and M.K. Pritzker Family Foundation and Jeff Schoenberg. Jeff saw our potential early on and encouraged us to adopt a strategic member recruitment approach, which would allow MISSION: READINESS and SHEPHERDING THE NEXT GENERATION to recruit and engage advocates who educate the public and key policy-makers and win investments for early childhood education. In both the number of members recruited and the quality of our response to advocacy efforts, adopting Jeff's strategy allowed us to effect a quality expansion and win significant investments for children across the states. Now, six years later, Jeff is calling it right again in encouraging us to establish our presence in all 50 states to ensure that

number of children start kindergarten already trailing their more privileged peers and rarely, if ever, catch up,”(Layton). This is is an example of how the children that are from families that are considered to be part of the lower class, aren’t able to “catch up” and have all the same experiences that their classmates, who come from families, that are more financially inclined.

Early childhood education has many benefits and there is the potential for many significant outcomes if universal preschools were put into place. Some feel that children who start kindergarten without previously attended preschool sometimes lack certain skills such as social and communication skills and an inability to follow routines. There were also studies done that found attending preschool could help to close the achievement gap in the grade school years. A child’s first few years of life are most important, and they absorb the most during those years. By providing universal preschool, all children would be benefiting, especially those who are in at-risk families or part of the lower class. As a society, we have a responsibility to help the children in our communities and provide them with the education they need in order to help them succeed in life.

The years before kindergarten are among the most crucial time in a young child’s life to learn. School readiness, a multidimensional concept, has the ability to convey advantages in academic success in school. Children who enter school with early skills in math and reading tend to have more academic success, attain higher levels of education, and have a higher chance of securing employment (1). Their ability to recognize letters, read words in a book, write their own name, and count numbers are all factors that display early literacy and cognitive development, and in the past years, the number of young children with these qualities has increased over time. During the beginning years of a child's life, whether it’s from socioeconomics, ethnicity, daycare, or all of them combined, multiple factors influence a child’s readiness for school.

About one in five children in the United States has the misfortune of living in a family whose income is below the official poverty threshold (Borman and Reimers 454). Poverty has harmful effects on a child’s academic outcomes, general health, development, and school readiness. The impact of poverty has on a child depends on many factors for instance community features ( crime rate in neighborhood and school characteristics) and the individuals present in the child’s life like their parents, neighbors, or relatives. It is clear that schools and outside environmental factors contribute to whether a child is successful or not in their academic life. A child’s family, neighborhood, and type of school effects that are related with poverty

The zone of proximal development has implications for assessment, especially concerning children with learning and behavior problems. Two children can

Early childhood education is one of the most important policy topics out there. Research has proven that the early years in childhood is a critical period for opportunity to develop a child’s full potential; as well as form academic, social, and cognitive skills that determine not only success in school but also their entire life (The White House). The right to a free, public education is guaranteed to all children in the United States. Early education is voluntary, and therefore some children are not given the opportunity to reach their full potential.