Association for Public Policy Analysis & Management

One in four children in the United States is a first-or second-generation immigrant (Waters & Pineau, 2015). In fact, younger children are the most likely to have immigrant parents: 24 percent of children ages 0 to 5 have immigrant parents, compared to 21 percent of children age 6 to 17 (Fortuny, Capps, Simms & Chaudry, 2009). Dual language learners (DLLs) begin school at an academic disadvantage relative to their peers with US-born parents (Crosnoe, 2006; Han, 2008). With immigration approaching its historic high of a century ago, the number of DLL children eligible for early childhood education (ECE) programs continues to increase in the United States. Researchers and policymakers recognize the importance of ECE in promoting healthy development before children enter school and in shaping their success once they begin school. Thus, there has been a push for increasing ECE enrollment for DLL children as a mechanism for improving immigration-based school readiness gaps. But do ECE programs hold the same promise of reducing these school readiness gaps?

There is evidence to believe that high-quality ECE experiences can have positive effects on DLL children’s early development and learning (Gormley, 2008; Magnuson, Lahaie & Waldfogel, 2006). However, most of the research has only explored the impacts of ECE on Spanish-speaking DLLs, despite the ethnic and linguistic diversity of the young DLL population. From the evidence that we do have, even among those who attend ECE programs, DLLs begin kindergarten at an academic disadvantage relative to their peers with US-born parents and the gap widens as children grow older (Reardon & Galindo, 2006; West, Denton, & Reaney, 2000; Crosnoe, 2006). This suggests that evaluating programs that serve DLL children using the current definition of high-quality in ECE programs may not be enough to eliminate school readiness gaps for many DLL children.

High quality in the ECE literature has never been conceptualized in a way that is specific to the experiences of DLL children and early education practices have not been designed to address the cultural, linguistic and broader developmental needs of DLL children. What is universal to all children and what is specific to the needs of DLL children should be taken into account when defining what a high quality classroom is. Most of the literature assumes that a common definition of what constitutes a “high-quality” classroom is sufficient for all children without acknowledging that children have different needs or that a unidimensional definition program “quality”, likely privileges Eurocentric cultural norms and disclaims alternative practices (Tobin, 2005; Rogoff, 2003).

The development of observational tools for bilingual and diverse classrooms that measures the additional supports needed is essential to further the fields understanding and knowledge of specific teaching practices that prepare immigrant-origin children for kindergarten. This presentation will describe the theory and the preliminary steps being made to develop a measure to assess the degree to which preschool teachers are providing different levels of social, cognitive and linguistic support and the extent to which immigrant specific supports are being provided in classrooms.