Volume 2 - Issue 1 - DBU Journal of K-12 Educational Research - Page 29

Journal of K-12 Educational Research 27 8.7%, or an estimated 4.1 million students, were enrolled in the 2002-03 school year (National Center for Educational Statistics, 2015). ELLs are the fastest growing segment of the public school population (National Education Association, 2008) and one of every nine public school students faces the challenge of learning English (Flores, Batalova, & Fix, 2012). The challenges ELLs encounter become apparent in academ - ic performance that is substantially below their non-ELL peers in almost every degree of achievement (National Education Associ - ation, 2008). This is why early childhood education is an integral part of preparing young ELLs for later achievement in school. High-Quality Early Childhood Education Research shows learning begins at birth (Sparks, 2015). Children begin learning immediately and they learn from every experi- ence they have (Hart & Risley, 2003) and their experiences will change their knowledge or behavior and lead to learning (Parkay, Hass, & Anctil, 2010). Family environments are reliable predic - tors of cognitive abilities in young children (Permenter, 2013) and the experiences children have will vary greatly depending on the families they are born into and the educational, financial, and social circumstances of their families (Jensen, 2009). Mead (2012) states that research also shows gaps in learning begin early as well, especially between low-income and high-income groups. Many children enter school lacking important language, numeracy, and social-emotional skills, but researchers have found these gaps present themselves when children are as young as nine months old (Mead, 2012). Hart and Risley (2003) found that by age three there was a gap of 30 million words between children whose parents had an education and professional careers and chil- dren whose parents had less education and low incomes. Even if children do participate in some kind of early childhood education program, because no standards exist for factors such as program design, teacher education requirements, curriculum, and funding, some children will benefit from a preschool program while some will not because every program will be different and every expe - rience will be different (Pianta, Barnett, Burchinal, & Thornburg, 2009). What is key to any successful program is the teacher in the classroom. Teacher credentials, professional development, and teacher observations by supervisors play a part in making sure a quality teacher is in every classroom with young children (NAEYC, 2009). How teachers interact with their young students is essential to student success because “…the active ingredient in quality is what a teacher does, and how he or she does it, when interacting with a child” (Pianta et al., 2009, p. 71). Another important factor that impacts the early childhood education experience is attendance. A growing body of research shows that many children in American schools are chronically absent, meaning they miss 10% or more of the school year. The research also shows how these missed days, occurring as early as preschool, translate into weaker reading skills and low reading proficiency (Attendance Works, 2014). Program Fade Out Most long-term pre-kindergarten research centers explore the possibility of the effects of the program fading out over time or producing lasting benefits for the children enrolled. Quality early childhood programs can produce long-term gains for children’s learning and development (Barnett & Carolan, 2014). The HighScope Perry Preschool Project and the Abecedarian Project both showed the positive impact of quality pre-kindergarten on the future lives of the young children who participated (Center for Public Education, 2008). Research on pre-kindergarten shows that programs that produce lasting benefits are the result of hiring teachers who have expertise in early childhood education, having aligned learning goals tied to K–12 standards, providing low child/staff ratios, and providing small class sizes. Results Data analysis from the current study examined whether there was a statistically significant difference in student performance on reading state assessments between two groups of students: (1) Students in grades 3, 4, 5 in the Spring of 2015 who participated in state-funded p re-kindergarten; and, (2) Students in grades 3, 4, 5 in the Spring of 2015 who did not participate in the state-fund - ed pre-kindergarten program, but were eligible to participate, and for one reason or another, did not.  Additional data analysis was performed to determine if students who were either economically disadvantaged (ED) or English Language Learners (ELL) who did participate in pre-kindergarten achieved a mean scale score, as a group, that is statistically different, or at least closer to, the top performing students than those students who did not partici- pate in pre-kindergarten. An independent samples t -test was used to compare the means of the two groups identified for RQ1, to determine if there