Annotated Bibliography

Entering kindergarten is one form of accelerating one's path through schooling. The unique needs of young learners require policies for early entrance to kindergarten to be flexible, and options for parents to be accessible and equitable across school districts and communities. In this article, the author discusses state policies for early entrance to kindergarten, issues to consider when making decisions about enrolling one's child into kindergarten early, and emphasizes the need to examine not only the child for indicators of readiness but also more importantly the environment in which the child is entering. Ideally, when considering early entrance to kindergarten, the child's holistic needs would match the placement.

This case study outlines the challenges of eight Australian mothers with intellectually gifted preschoolers. The ideal ways of nurturing children’s giftedness, the parents’ role in early identification and the effect of maternal depression and possible association with twice exceptionality (gifted with a disorder) are discussed. The narratives of case study parents then describe how and whether the needs of their preschoolers were understood or met in early childhood services, and the advice they received about early entry. It was found that early entry met the needs of children whose parents chose this acceleration option and that the preschoolers who missed out because of intervention by their educators did not fare so well. Findings also indicated an urgent need for the inclusion of compulsory early childhood giftedness courses for Australian pre-service educators and an equally urgent need for professional development courses about giftedness for educators already working in early childhood services.

A relatively pervasive “silence” exists concerning giftedness in Australian preservice early childhood teacher courses. There is also a lack of research about educator attitudes to giftedness and programming in Australian early childhood services. This study, consisting of a survey and interviews, is intended to help to fill the research gap. A total of 184 early childhood educators were surveyed in relation to their knowledge and attitudes about giftedness, and 10 of those respondents were also interviewed. A purposive sample of eight parents whose gifted preschoolers had been recommended for early entry by a psychologist were also interviewed. Findings indicate that early childhood educators are at a loss in relation to gifted children’s intellectual, social, and emotional needs that are neither understood nor met according to their parents. Compulsory preservice coursework about giftedness is recommended.

How well do early school entrants adjust socio-affectively when compared to their regularly admitted peers? Despite numerous publications on the subject, much controversy remains, mainly because of methodologically fragile studies. To assess the impact of a new early entrance policy in Quebec, 36 kindergarten and 42 Grade 2 teachers who had at least one early entrant in their class ranked all their students on four bipolar dimensions (conduct, social integration, academic maturity, and academic achievement). Data were collected for 98 early entrants and 1,723 regularly admitted children. The results revealed no substantial differences between the two groups, but a low correlation between age and adjustment among regularly admitted students. A semi-qualitative analysis showed that the teachers judged a significant percentage of early entrants less than well adjusted; perhaps explaining to a large extent the continuing resistance from educators and parents. Still, boys and the youngest among regularly admitted students were the two populations found much more at risk for social-emotional problems than early entrants.

The Lord Selkirk School Division #11 (Selkirk, Manitoba, Canada) had a kindergarten early admission policy in place for well over two decades. Thus, educators there had an opportunity to monitor and rate the progress of early entrants for 24 years. In each four-year block for students admitted from 1970 through 1990, performance improved over time. Specifically, an analysis of the longitudinal data indicates that early entrants received significantly higher ratings after their grade 5 year than they did at the end of kindergarten.

For twenty-four years, the Lord Selkirk School Divison (Selkirk, Manitoba, Canada) has had a policy whereby some students are accepted for early entrance into kindergarten. A longitudinal study was undertaken to evaluate the performance of these early entrance students over the years. Educators’ ratings indicated that 41% fared exceptionally well in school, 39% performed solidly, and 20% did poorly.

Only two of the school administrators and six of the receiving teachers were initially positive about the skipping, but most of them changed their positions with the child's success, at least in regard to the specific accelerated child. There appeared to be a period (between one quarter and a semester) during which teachers expressed concern over the students' adjustment, but students did not perceive themselves as having adjustment difficulties.

Twenty-one studies reporting on early admission of selected children to elementary school are reviewed and discussed in terms of methodological design and findings. Two major kinds of designs were found. Comparisons of early entrants with their unselected classmates found, in general, no negative effects. Comparisons of early entrants with matched samples suggested that early admission may be preferable. Additional research is needed to formulate an ideal policy concerning early admission.