Editor's note: A reader wrote to ask whether or not the battery of tests for school readiness he uses is appropriate and adequate. We asked Dr Dworkin to respond with the following commentary.
The pediatrician, as the professional concerned with monitoring the growth and development of children during the preschool years, is well suited to contribute to the assessment of children's readiness to begin the task of academic learning, as well as participate in the early identification of children at risk for school dysfunction. Pediatricians view the early identification of children with potential learning disabilities as an important component of primary care.
The increasing range and number of electronic books (e-books) available in the children's book market has motivated educators and researchers to investigate how well these platforms can contribute to advancing emergent literacy. Such research has nonetheless been conducted on a much smaller scale in the area of self-regulated learning (SRL) with e-books targeted at young children at risk for learning disabilities. The article discusses recent research conducted with kindergartners 4.5 to 7.0 years old. In the research reported, the 78 participants were randomly divided into three groups of equal size: experimental (educational e-book with meta-cognitive guidance), experimental (educational e-book without metacognitive guidance), and control (the regular kindergarten program). The findings indicated that the metacognitive guidance embedded in the educational e-book supported phonological awareness (rhyming) but not vocabulary acquisition.
Early identification of young children at risk for poor academic achievement: preliminary development of a parent-report prediction tool