ABSTRACT

Research Findings: The present study examined patterns of executive function (EF) development among socio-demographically diverse children in kindergarten, first grade, and second grade. Using nationally representative data from the Early Childhood Longitudinal Study Kindergarten Cohort: 2011, we estimated children’s growth in working memory and cognitive flexibility across four socio-demographic profiles of children, which we identified using cluster analysis. We then explored the extent to which child, family, and classroom characteristics explained heterogeneity in EF development across the child profiles. Results indicate that low-SES and Hispanic dual-language learning children with immigrant parents entered kindergarten with the lowest average EF skills but then made remarkable EF gains. This catch-up was largely explained by a negative association between initial EF skills and subsequent EF gains. However, low-SES, non-DLL Black and Hispanic children had similarly low initial EF skills, but did not exhibit the same pattern of catch-up, in part due to their reduced likelihood of enjoying positive relationships with their teachers. Practice or Policy: The findings add to the growing literature on heterogeneity in EF development and demonstrate the need to assist teachers in forming positive relationships with all children in socio-demographically diverse classrooms.

摘要

研究成果: 本研究检查了幼儿园、一年级和二年级社会人口多样化儿童的执行功能 (EF) 发展模式。使用来自幼儿纵向研究幼儿园队列的具有全国代表性的数据：2011 年，我们通过聚类分析确定了四个儿童社会人口特征的儿童工作记忆和认知灵活性的增长。然后，我们探讨了儿童、家庭和课堂特征在多大程度上解释了儿童档案中 EF 发展的异质性。结果表明，具有移民父母的低 SES 和西班牙裔双语学习儿童进入幼儿园时的平均 EF 技能最低，但随后取得了显着的 EF 增益。这种追赶很大程度上是由最初的 EF 技能和随后的 EF 增益之间的负相关来解释的。然而，低 SES、非 DLL 黑人和西班牙裔儿童的初始 EF 技能同样低，但没有表现出相同的追赶模式，部分原因是他们与老师建立积极关系的可能性降低。实践或政策：研究结果增加了关于 EF 发展异质性的越来越多的文献，并表明需要帮助教师与社会人口多样化教室中的所有儿童建立积极的关系。