Cultural context

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Childcare effects

• Cultural context
• Daniel Messinger, Ph.D.

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School as a multilevel context

• Classroom Practices
• Curriculum Content
• Instructional Design

• School
• Curriculum Policies
• Demographics
• Organization

• Child
• Classroom Engagement
• Motivation
• Self-Esteem
• Achievement
• Goals

• External Relations
• School, home,
• community linkages

• Teacher Characteristics
• Beliefs
• Instruction Techniques
• Relationships with
• students

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Hypothesized case Heterogeneous grouping and
complex instruction ? increase educational equity
direct and indirect effects on child
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At Success Academy Charter Schools, High Scores
Polarizing Tactics.

• At most schools, if a child is flailing
  academically, it is treated as a private matter.
  But at Success Academy Harlem 4, one boys
  struggles were there for all to see On two
  colored charts in the hallway, where the
  students performance on weekly spelling and math
  quizzes was tracked, his name was at the bottom,
  in a red zone denoting that he was below grade
  level.

KATE TAYLOR. APRIL 6, 2015, NYT
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Aggression

• African-Americans had greatest change in
  aggression if no ethnically matched peer

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Child-care thru 3 peer competencies

• Positive responsive caregiver behavior most
  consistently associated with positive skilled
  peer interaction
• More time in child-care ? observed to be more
  positive and skilled in peer play in child care
• caregivers rated these kids as more negative with
  playmates.
• but observed peer play not related to the
  quantity of care
• Nor associated with peer competence as rated by
  mothers.
• Maternal sensitivity and children's cognitive and
  language competence predicted peer competence
  across all settings and informants.
• NICHD_Early_Child_Care_Research_Network (2001).
  "Child care and children's peer interaction at 24
  and 36 months The NICHD study of early child
  care." Child Development 72(5) 1478-1500

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No child care effects on observed interaction
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Child-Care Effect Sizes Early Child Care and
Youth DevelopmentNICHD Early Child Care Research
Network

• Children (n 1,261) were recruited at birth and
  assessed at 15, 24, 36, and 54 months.
• Exclusive maternal care did not predict child
  outcomes
• Higher quality child care related to advanced
  cognitive, language, and preacademic outcomes at
  every age and better socioemotional and peer
  outcomes at some ages.
• More childcare hours predicted more behavior
  problems and conflict, according to care
  providers.
• More center-care time was related to higher
  cognitive and language scores and more problem
  and fewer prosocial behaviors, according to care
  providers.

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54 Month Outcomes
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Long-Term Effects of Early Child Care?

• Parenting was a stronger and more consistent
  predictor of childrens development than early
  child-care experience.
• But higher quality care predicted higher
  vocabulary scores and more exposure to center
  care predicted more teacher-reported
  externalizing problems. Belsky et al., 2007

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Background Information

• Study Aim To extend previous research by
  examining the links between routine early
  child-care experiences and adolescent functioning
  in a large and economically diverse sample
• Historically early child-care is thought of two
  ways
• Early child-care is associated with poorer social
  outcomes
• Early child-care promotes social and academic
  skills before entry to kindergarten
• Research supports both views
• More time in center-type settings as a young
  child
• Negative social and behavioral outcomes
• Positive academic outcomes

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Background Information

• This study wanted to see if the effects of early
  child-care
• Fade away over time
• Development builds on prior experience
• Low income children in high-quality child care
  show
• Better academic outcomes through high school
• Higher rates of employment
• Less criminal activity as adults

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Research Questions

1. Are early child-care quality, quantity, and type
   related to adolescent functioning at age 15?
2. Are pathways from early child care to adolescent
   functioning mediated through prior functioning?
3. Do child gender or familial risk moderate the
   relationship between early child care and
   adolescent outcomes?

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Method

• 1,364 families were randomly selected from the
  National Institute of Child and Human Development
  Study of Early Child Care and Youth Development
  (NICHD SECCYD)
• Demographics
• 26 of the mothers had no more than a high school
  education
• 21 of families had incomes no greater than 200
  of the poverty level
• 22 were a minority

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Measures
Construct Measure Time Points
Child-care type (type of child care arrangement home-based care, father care, grandparent care) Telephone and personal interviews with the mother Every 3 months until the child reached 36 months and every 4 months until the child was 54 months
Child-care hours Amount of hours per week child was in non-maternal care 6, 15, 24 ,36, and 54 months
Child-care quality Observational Record of Caregiving Environment (ORCE) 6, 15, 24 ,36, and 54 months
Cognitive-academic achievement Woodcock-Johnson Psycho-Educational Battery Revised 54 months, 1st Grade, 3rd Grade, 5th Grade, Age 15
Risk Taking Audio computer-assisted self-interview Age 15
Impulsivity Questionnaire Age 15
Externalizing Problems Teacher Report or Youth Self-Report 54 months, 1st Grade, 3rd Grade, 5th Grade, Age 15 (YSR)
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Quality, Quantity and Type as Predictors
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Problem Behavior as a Mediator
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Results Quality, Quantity and Type as Predictors

• Higher quality care is associated with lower
  externalizing scores at age 15
• Adolescents who experienced more hours of
  nonrelative child care across their first 4.5
  years reported more risk-taking and greater
  impulsivity at age 15
• More hours in nonrelative care predicted poorer
  social adjustment
• Child-care quality showed significant
  associations with childrens cognitive-academic
  achievement at age 15
• Children who experienced higher quality care had
  significantly higher levels of cognitive-academic
  achievement at age 15

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Problem Behavior as a Mediator

• Higher hours spent in childcare significantly
  predicted higher risk taking behaviors and
  impulsivity at 15 years of age
• There were modest levels of mediation when
  examining the association between hours spent in
  childcare and externalizing behavior problems at
  age 15
• May be due to the informant changing
• Higher quality non-relative childcare
  significantly predicted less externalizing
  behaviors at age 15

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Results Familial Risk and Gender as Moderators

• Do child gender or familial risk moderate the
  relationship between early child care and
  adolescent outcomes?
• No evidence emerged supporting the hypothesis
  that familial risk or gender moderates this
  relationship for problem behaviors or
  cognitive-academic outcomes

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Take Home Points

• Early child care quality predicts
  cognitive-academic achievement
• Moderate to high quality child-care produces the
  greatest long term effects
• Quality of early child care experiences have long
  lasting effects on all children despite SES
• Higher quality nonrelative childcare is related
  to less externalizing behavior at age 15
• More hours in child care and more center-type
  care are related to higher levels of behavior
  problems in children
• The link between child care, cognitive-academic
  outcomes, and problem behaviors is consistent
  over a 10 year period

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Background Information

• Higher quality childcare is associated with
  better cognitive and academic outcomes
• Quality of care has been shown to interact with
  maternal sensitivity
• Low quality of care, low maternal sensitivity
• Diathesis-stress highly negative children will
  suffer in low quality environment
• Differential susceptibility - highly negative
  children will be more reactive to the environment

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Study Aim

• Does difficult temperament in infancy continue to
  moderate effects of childcare quality on problem
  behavior in adolescence (15 years)?
• 842 total participants
• High-difficulty vs. Low-difficulty subgroup for
  temperament
• Quality of care observed

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Measures
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Results

• Externalizing behavior problems were greater for
• females, single parent homes
• Greater risk-taking
• Males, non-Caucasian ethnicity, lower family
  income, higher proportion of partner absence
• Greater Impulsivity
• Lower family incomes, greater exposure to any
  non-maternal child care in the early childhood
  years

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Results

• Consistent with diathesis stress model
• Externalizing problems only significant when
  child care quality was less than 2.84
• Higher scores reflect childrens experience with
  caregivers who were more attentive, stimulating,
  positively affectionate, less intrusive and
  negative

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Discussion

• Low quality day care may be associated with lack
  of cognitive and language stimulation
• Stress may mediate adverse effects of low-quality
  childcare
• Low-quality care is physiologically stressful for
  children and may account for some of the adverse
  effects
• Future studies should assess the degree to which
  this is true

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Discussion Questions

1. If early child-care quality predicts greater
   cognitive-academic outcomes and hours spent in
   child-care predicts more externalizing problems
   at age 15, how do you find the right balance of
   child-care that produce the best outcomes?
2. Why do you think time spent in child-care and
   quality of child-care were better predictors of
   adolescent outcomes than type of child-care?

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Effects of child and classroom characteristics on
peer play (Howes et al., 2008)

• Preschoolers particularly sensitive to contextual
  influences on social interaction skills
• Adaptive outcomes depend on goodness-of-fit
  between child characteristics and context

The classroom context (nesting of children within
classroom, diversity, and entry policy) accounted
for more of the variance in both complex play and
peer anxiousness ratings than did child
characteristics.
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Context

• The classroom context (nesting of children within
  classroom, diversity, and entry policy) accounted
  for more of the variance in both complex play and
  peer anxiousness ratings than did child
  characteristics.

Classroom variations accounted for up to 72
percent of the variance in complex play and at
least 50 percent of the variance in peer ratings
(anxiousness ratings).
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Kids in more diverse classes ? more Complex Play
increase, particularly if ethnically matched peer
present
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Child-care History, Classroom Composition, and
Childrens Functioning in Kindergarten. Julia
Dmitrieva, Laurence Steinberg, and Jay Belsky.
2007. http//pss.sagepub.com/content/18/12/1032.ab
stract
Classroom-composition effects

• A childs externalizing behavior is explained by
  the child-care histories of children in their
  classrooms above and beyond their own

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Child-care History, Classroom Composition, and
Childrens Functioning in KindergartenJulia
Dmitrieva, Laurence Steinberg, and Jay Belsky

• Non-parental child care associated with
• Elevated levels of externalizing behavior
• Enhanced linguistic, cognitive, and academic
  functioning
• Classroom-composition effects
• Is a childs externalizing behavior explained by
  the child-care histories of children in their
  classrooms?
• Peer contagion

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Effects of care

• Predictors of poorer achievement
• gt30 hrs/week
• initiation at center
• before 2 years of age
• Used as classroom level predictors
• proportion of children in classroom
• Center care versus any child care

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Classroom-level effects gt individual effects

• Variance in class-level characteristics
• externalizing behavior
• 15 (T1) and 19 (T2) of variance
• achievement
• 35 (T1) and 31(T2) of variance
• Significant classroom level effects

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Conclusions and Discussion

• Effects of early or extensive non-parental care
  affect not only the child, but their classmates
  as well
• Being in a class with high proportion of students
  with child-care histories affects all children,
  independent of personal experience
• Are effects amplified or attenuated over years of
  schooling?

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WHAT MAKES A DIFFERENCE EARLY HEAD START
EVALUATION FINDINGS IN A DEVELOPMENTAL CONTEXT
JOHN M. LOVE, RACHEL CHAZAN-COHEN, HELEN RAIKES,
AND JEANNE BROOKS-GUNN (2013)

• Randomized efficacy trial of 17 EHS programs
• Federal Early Head Start (EHS) began in 1995
• 3,001 low-income families
• 35 African American, 24 Hispanic, and 37 White
• pregnant women or an infant under the age of 12
  months
• Randomly assigned to treatment or control
• 91 of treatment group receiving some services
• (1) impacts of EHS at ages 2 and 3 (when services
  were being offered) and at age 5, and (2)
  contributions of early education experiences
  across first 5 years

DOI 10.1111/j.1540-5834.2012.00699.x
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Developmental effects

• At 2 and 3 years, EHS benefited children and
  families impacts were seen in all domains,
  effect sizes .10 -.20
• At 5, EHS children had better attention,
  approaches toward learning, fewer behavior
  problems
• But no effect on early school achievement
• A higher percentage of EHS than control children
  were enrolled center-based preschool.
• At 5, children and families who experienced EHS
  followed by formal programs fared best overall.

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• Although fewer than half the children enrolled in
  center-based preschool programs between ages 3
  and 4, almost 90 participated in the year
  preceding kindergarten. A higher percentage of
  EHS than control children were enrolled.
• Nonexperimental analyses suggested that formal
  program participation enhanced children's
  readiness for school while also increasing
  parent-reported aggression.
• At 5, children and families who experienced EHS
  followed by formal programs fared best overall.
• Benefits in language, behavior, and parenting
  were associated primarily with EHS benefits in
  early school achievement were associated
  primarily with preschool attendance.

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• Reviews positive influence of peer play on
  academic and social outcomes for African American
  preschool children
• Previous research mostly on white middle-income
  children
• Strengths-based resiliency framework
• Developmental ecological theory
• Within-group variability
• Transactional and bidirectional effects

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Interactive peer play

• Play dimensions Play interaction
• Play disruption
• Play disconnection
• Positive peer interactions mediated relation
  between ext. int. problems and math outcomes
  (Tracy friends)

Play buddies play partners and other
RCTs Other ethnic groups Educational practice
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Adjustment Scales for Preschool Intervention
(ASPI)--Context

• Existing scales consider behaviors to be stable
  deficits within children
• Do not consider whether behaviors vary over
  different settings
• Or when, where and how to intervene
• Development of the (ASPI)
• Specifically developed for low income preschool
  children
• Language of preschool teachers, rather than
  psychiatric terms
• 22 developmentally appropriate preschool
  classroom situations 2 non-situation specific
  unusual behavior problems
• 22 maladaptive behaviors 22 adaptive behaviors
• 5 behavioral dimensions Phenos
• Externalizing aggressive, oppositional
  hyperactive/inattentive
• Internalizing withdrawn/low-energy socially
  reticent
• Limitations
• Didnt measure impact of multiple contexts in
  classroom on outcomes

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• Theoretical Model
• developmental-ecological approach ?
  (bioecological systems theory)

• Goal To examine the individual and interactional
  influence of the types of behavioral problems
  (what) and the situational context(s) in which
  they occur (where) on childrens developmental
  outcomes
• Identified 3 reliable and unique situational
  dimensions Situs
• Structured learning
• Peer Interactions
• Teacher Interactions
• N3,799 Head Start children
• 4 gt 5 year olds
• Boys gt Girls

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EMOTIONAL BEHAVIORAL ADJUSTMENTWithin Routine
Classroom Situations(Situational Needs)
Problems in Teacher Interactions
Problems in Peer Interactions

• Talking to teacher
• General manner with teacher
• Answering teacher questions
• Greeting teacher
• Seeking teacher help
• Helping teacher with jobs

• Getting along with peers
• Behaving in classroom
• Respect for others
• belongings
• Reaction to correction
• Telling the truth
• Standing in line

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• Unique relationship between situtypes and school
  readiness outcomes
• Hypotheses
• Situational dimensions would contribute unique
  variance to the prediction of social and learning
  outcomes
• The combined contribution of both situational and
  behavioral influences would be greater than
  either set alone
• Findings
• Peer Social Competencies
• Play Disconnection, Disruption Interaction
• Classroom Learning Competencies
• Most Importantly
• Contribution of structured learning to peer
  social competency learning outcomes
• Phenos moderate the influence of Situs in the
  prediction of multiple social and learning
  competencies
• N747

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• Implications for Policy Practice
• ASPI guides intervention, rather than creating
  diagnostic labels
• children are assessed within a naturalistic
  context
• Developmental-ecological perspective
• Multiple levels of influence (dynamic
  transaction)
• child behavior (ontogenetic)
• classroom situation (microsystem)
• Interventions
• Goal shiftfixing the child ? broader systemic
  approach
• Identification of high-frequency challenging
  situations and behavior problems (Classroom
  Management Intervention Strategies)
• Professional Development
• Curriculum

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Fall Head Start Situational Needs Predicting
Spring Head Start and Spring Kindergarten Social
Competence

• Problems in peer interactions directly and
  indirectly affected play disruption at the end of
  kindergarten through its effect on play
  disruption at the end of Head Start
• Problems in structured learning situations
  indirectly predicted play disconnection at the
  end of kindergarten through effect on play
  disconnection at the end of Head Start.

Bulotsky-Shearer, Dominguez, Bell, Rouse,
Fantuzzo, 2010
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Teachers Beliefs, Instructional Practices, and
Relationships with Students

• Instructional Practices
• Classroom climate optimal when teacher is high in
• Supportiveness
• Control
• Balance of Control and Autonomy Granting
• Promotes intrinsic motivation styles vs. learned
  helplessness
• Why?
• Middle and high school teachers use of more
  control-oriented strategies
• Counter to the developmental quest for autonomy
• why?
• Goodness-of-fit between student and instructional
  environment
• E.g., boys ? reading girls ? science/math

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Relationships with Students

• Trusting, caring, respectful teachers associated
  with optimal learning
• Why?
• ? Feelings of security
• allow children to approach, take initiative,
  engage, persist and take risk to develop positive
  achievement related self-perceptions
• Parallels to attachment security

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Challenges of School Transitions

• Negative effects upon entry into middle school
• Declines in academic motivation,
• interest in school achievement across early
  adolescent years (11-14)
• Increases in test anxiety
• focus on self-evaluation rather than task mastery
• Increased school truancy and dropout
• Middle school misfit developmental stage
• levels of teacher control and reduced student
  autonomy
• affective relationships between students and
  teachers
• organization of instruction
• whole class instruction between class ability
  groupings
• grading practices (stricter grades)
• motivational goals (emphasis on performance
  rather than mastery goals

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Gender-stereotypes during adolescenceIs age the
key variable?
T children who just transitioned from junior
high school
Alfieri et al., 1996
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A Longitudinal Study of School Belonging and
Academic Motivation Across High School

• Cari Gillen-ONeel and Andrew Fuligni

Hoffman
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Results for School Belonging

• Females higher School Belonging than males in 9th
  grade
• Decline over time (6.92)
• No changes for males in School Belonging over
  time
• No ethnic differences in baseline or slope
• Interaction effect for Latin females
• Greater slope compared to males than in other
  groups

Hoffman
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Methodology

• Tracked kids for 4 years, N 572
• 3 HS in Los Angeles, with focus on Latin, Asian,
  and European children who come from low, middle
  and high SES groups
• Schools differed on achievement
• Data from kids who completed 2 assessment points
  (88 of those enrolled completed 12th grade
  assessment)

Hoffman
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Methodology

• School Belonging measure - Revised institutional
  engagement measure from Tyler Degoey, 1995
• Averaged scores on 5 point Likert scale of 7
  questions, e.g., I feel like I am a part of my
  school
• Academic Achievement GPA measured across
  classes for the year
• Value intrinsic value measured using 2 items
  utility value measured using 3

Hoffman
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Results for School Belonging

• Females higher School Belonging than males in 9th
  grade
• Decline over time (6.92)
• No changes for males in School Belonging over
  time
• No ethnic differences in baseline or slope
• Interaction effect for Latin females
• Greater slope compared to males than in other
  groups

Hoffman
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Emotional Development in Adolescence in a High
School Theater Program

• Limited knowledge about emotion in adolescence
• What they actually learn and how they learn it
• Emotional learning in High School Theater Program
• Why??
• Arc of work
• Create demands for understanding group emotional
  dynamics
• Organizational culture
• Theory-generating analysis to develop
  propositions
• Reed W. Larson and Jane R. Brown (2007)

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Key Players and Data Collection

• Key players in the production of Les Misérables
• Cast included 110 of 840 HS students
• Director ANN
• Head of School Theater Program Ruth
• Data Collection
• 10 students selected for interviews
• Interviews conducted over production period
• The 2 leaders and 10 parents were also
  interviewed
• Follow-up interview conducted 2 years after
• Weekly observational analyses
• All data were recorded and transcribed

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Qualitative Analyses

• Reconnaissance Lay the land
• Separating setting and developmental processes
• Conceptualizing Layers
• Community surround
• Program culture
• Emotional experiences
• From empirical analyses to theoretical
  postulation

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The Experiential Setting of Les Misérables

• The community surround
• Theater productions were a big deal in this
  town!
• The program culture
• Internal culture with its distinctive tools
  cultivated by Ann and Ruth
• Commitment to high standards
• Openness to strong emotional experiences
• Provision of emotional support
• Emotional experiences
• Disappointment with casting
• Satisfaction and elation about doing well
• Anger and stress with interpersonal obstacles
• Anxiety and stage fright

Apparent goal consensus
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What Youth Learned and How

• Emotional knowledge
• Individual differences in peoples emotional
  patterns (differ across context)
• Influence of past experiences
• Contingencies
• How emotions influence the group
• Managing anger and interpersonal stress
• Managing elation and positive emotion
• 2 salient themes emerged in the data
• Youths as agents of change
• Adults credited with facilitating a special type
  of setting