1st Edition

Self-Regulation and Early School Success

Edited By Megan M. McClelland, Shauna L. Tominey Copyright 2013
    216 Pages
    by Routledge

    216 Pages
    by Routledge

    Self-regulation has been identified as an important predictor of school readiness and academic achievement in young children. Children who struggle with self-regulation are at risk of experiencing peer rejection and academic difficulties. Teachers report that there is high variability in children’s self-regulatory abilities at school entry and that children with an accumulation of risk factors are especially likely to enter school without adequate self-regulation skills. Moreover, early academic skills are often cumulative, so children who fail to acquire early skills are at risk of falling behind their peers academically and facing achievement gaps that widen over time.

    Although the relation between self-regulation and school-related outcomes has been clearly documented, our understanding of the pathways through which self-regulation influences early achievement and school success remains unclear. This special issue considers previously neglected areas in the current understanding of self-regulation. The seven articles focus on issues including (a) the complex relations between self-regulation and school readiness, (b) predictors of self-regulation and academic achievement, and (c) advances in measurement of self-regulation and related skills.

    Research that continues to investigate the complex relations and mechanisms that influence early self-regulation and related outcomes will inform policy and practice in ways that help all children develop the self-regulation skills they need. The volume will be of interest to researchers in the field of child development or education, and educators and policy makers who are interested in promoting school readiness and academic success.

    This book was originally published as a special issue of Early Education and Development. 

    1. Introduction Megan M. McClelland and Shauna L. Tominey

    2. The Role of Effortful Control in Mediating the Association Between Maternal Sensitivity and Children’s Social and Relational Competence and Problems in First Grade Tamar M. Mintz, Bridget K. Hamre, and Bridget E. Hatfield

    3. Cognitive Flexibility, Approaches to Learning, and Academic School Readiness in Head Start Preschool Children Virginia E. Vitiello, Daryl B. Greenfield, Pelin Munis, and J’Lene George

    4. Children’s Effortful Control and Academic Achievement: Mediation Through Social Functioning Carlos Valiente, Nancy Eisenberg, Rg Haugen, Tracy L. Spinrad, Claire Hofer, Jeffrey Liew, and Anne Kupfer

    5. Relations of Children’s Effortful Control and Teacher–Child Relationship Quality to School Attitudes in a Low-Income Sample Kassondra M. Silva, Tracy L. Spinrad, Nancy Eisenberg, Michael J. Sulik, Carlos Valiente, Snjezana Huerta, Alison Edwards, Natalie D. Eggum, Anne S. Kupfer, Christopher J. Lonigan, Beth M. Phillips, Shauna B. Wilson, Jeanine Clancy-Menchetti, Susan H. Landry, Paul R. Swank, Michael A. Assel, Heather B. Taylor, and School Readiness Consortium

    6. The Influence of Demographic Risk Factors on Children’s Behavioral Regulation in Prekindergarten and Kindergarten Shannon B. Wanless, Megan M. McClelland, Shauna L. Tominey, and Alan C. Acock

    7. Red Light, Purple Light: Findings From a Randomized Trial Using Circle Time Games to Improve Behavioral Self-Regulation in Preschool Shauna L. Tominey and Megan M. McClelland

    8. Parent–Teacher Agreement and Reliability on the Devereux Early Childhood Assessment (DECA) in English and Spanish for Ethnically Diverse Children Living in Poverty Jennifer Crane, Melissa S. Mincic, and Adam Winsler

    Biography

    Megan McClelland is an Associate Professor in Human Development and Family Sciences at Oregon State University, USA, where she serves as Director of the Healthy Development in Early Childhood Research Core at the Hallie Ford Center for Healthy Children and Families. Her research focuses on school readiness including links between self-regulation and academic achievement from early childhood to adulthood, recent advances in measuring self-regulation, and intervention efforts to improve these skills in young children.

    Shauna Tominey is a Postdoctoral Associate at Yale University, USA, in the Department of Psychology and at the Yale Child Study Center in the School of Medicine. Her current research is focused on the development of an intervention aimed at promoting preschoolers’ social-emotional skills as well as the development of programs for children and families targeting the development of social competence and social support as a means of fostering resilience.