Raising the bar: Teaching kindergartners with emotional and behavioral disabilities and teachers’ readiness expectations

This study examined whether kindergarten teachers’ school readiness expectations differed in classrooms with and without children with emotional and behavioral disabilities (EBD). Using teacher observations from the Early Childhood Longitudinal Study – Kindergarten Class of 2010–11, where observations were selected based on a three stage sampling design to ensure national representation, we relied on a school fixed effects methodology given the large sample of teachers teaching classrooms with (N = 390) and without (N = 3480) students with EBDs. Using readiness expectations scales derived from teacher-reported survey items, we found that academic readiness expectations were no different across teachers but teachers with students with an EBD have higher social readiness expectations. The characteristics of teachers and classrooms did not consistently moderate readiness expectations. These findings indicate that teachers hold similar, and in some cases higher, expectations for students in classrooms with diverse learning differences and behavioral needs.
Source: Early Childhood Research Quarterly - Category: Child Development Source Type: research