Education Week - August 23, 2017 - 20

For New Kindergartners, a Smooth Transition Can Pay Off
CONTINUED FROM PAGE 1

Principal Sherri Milton-Hoffman.
The positive feelings "are kind of
like a bank. You draw on it later,"
Milton-Hoffman said.
In Eugene, Ore., a transition program that gives children a chance
to practice kindergarten-level social
skills has been a boon for 5-year-old
Lyla Hendershot, said her mother,
Lacey Hendershot. Lyla will start
kindergarten in the Bethel district,
where more than 50 percent of the
children are eligible for free-andreduced price lunches, and most
children, like Lyla, did not attend
preschool. The transition activities
help children learn about skills such
as sharing and taking turns. While
the children work with the teachers,
the parents have their own sessions.
"I'd say it's helped me about as
much as it's helped her," Hendershot said. "It's getting me used to
not being in constant control of her
all the time and seeing that she will
excel no matter who's in charge."

Programs to ease children's entry
into school have been around for decades, with varying levels of policy
attention. In 1998, the National Education Goals Panel, made up of governors, congressional members, school
leaders, and researchers, drafted a report called "Ready Schools" with the
ambitious goal of having all children
starting school ready to learn.
In that document, panel members
said that ready schools "smooth the
transition between home and school,"
and they "strive for continuity between early care and education programs and elementary schools."
In 2005, a group of researchers
used a federal longitudinal database
to see if they could connect how well
children performed in kindergarten
to how many transition activities
they had gone through.
The federal database, which followed a sample of kindergartners
who started school in 1998-99, asked
school administrators if they had engaged in one or more of several different types of transition activities,
such as sharing information about
kindergarten with parents in print
or by phone; allowing parents and
children to visit the classroom prior
to the start of the school year; or
hosting orientation sessions for parents before the school year kicks off.
The study found that such practices
were widespread, but that educators
at lower-income schools reported a
higher rate of impersonal "low intensity" practices, such as sending a letter
home, or holding an open house.
Amy B. Schulting, a research scientist at the Center for Child and Family Policy at Duke University and
the lead author of the 2005 report,
launched a home-visiting program
that links kindergarten teachers and
families before the start of the school
year. She was prompted by the findings that suggested at-risk pupils
could benefit from more intensive
outreach early on.
Teachers and parents have reported overwhelmingly that the

Photos by Amanda L. Smith for Education Week

Boosting Readiness

FROM TOP: Autumn Edwards and
her mother, Lindsey Edwards,
walk toward Prairie Mountain
School in Eugene, Ore.
Tyler Johnson, center, is picked
to choose the next lesson. He
and his classmates take part
in the Kids in Transition to School
program, which focuses on
school readiness, social skills,
and literacy.

home-visiting program is worthwhile, Schulting said. In particular,
teachers say that the investment of
time before the school year saves
them time during the school year.
The positive relationships developed during the home visits make
home-school communication and
collaboration easier and more comfortable for parents and teachers.
And, while difficult to quantify, this
is a real benefit for participants,
Schulting said.

20 | EDUCATION WEEK | August 23, 2017 | www.edweek.org

Milton-Hoffman, whose Michigan
school is one of those participating
in the pilot program organized by
Schulting, said that even if the
grant-supported program went
away, she would want to continue
it on her own.
"I think that the big whole-group
transition activities are wonderful,
but they're not personal," she said.
"When you're in their home, it's personal, it's about that one child who
you're sitting there reading with."
Other transition programs help
children prepare for school by teaching them the so-called soft skills
they'll need to be successful when
they start school.
That's the goal behind Kids in
Transition to School, a project of
the Oregon Social Learning Center
in Eugene. During 24 sessions held
during the summer and the first
month of school, both parents and
children learn what's expected of
them. The program operates in five
school districts and operates two to

three days a week, for two hours per
session. The program is financed
through the United Way, as well as
through other grants and the participating districts.
The program is less of a time
commitment than some programs
might be, such as full-time preschool. That's intentional, said
Katherine C. Pears, a senior research scientist at the Oregon Social Learning Center.
"We were thinking, how do we
make it effective and efficient for
families and teachers, and can we do
it with a lighter touch than some of
the other programs, if we're focused
on what we want to do?" Pears said.
That means early literacy and
numeracy, while a part of the program, are not the primary focus,
Pears said, because they will get
that in kindergarten. However, they
may not explicitly be taught socialemotional skills, and the program
homes in on those topics, with a different theme every week.

Applying the Skills
For example, "we work on really
talking about what sharing is and
what it looks like," Pears said. The
teachers talk about how to transition from one activity to another
and how to handle disappointment.
Chris Parra, the superintendent
of the 5,600-student Bethel district,
said she can't just spot a KITS student-she can hear them.
"You can hear them using terms
they use in KITS. If they're not the
line leader, if they didn't get called
on, you hear them saying, 'Oh well.
Maybe next time,' " she said.
Some places have statewide transition programs. West Virginia, for
example, requires prekindergarten
teachers in its state-funded pro-

gram to meet with kindergarten
teachers to share transition reports.
LaDonna Rosencrance, the pre-K
liaison for West Virginia's Randolph
County district, said that the school
system also has events to allow preschoolers to visit the kindergarten
classroom, see the lunchroom, and sit
on a bus.
"It's wonderful to have this backing from the state to make sure
everything is developmentally appropriate," Rosencrance said.
But nationally, new studies suggest that transition activities appear to still be more at the discretion of a school or district leader
than systematic.
Michael H. Little, a doctoral student
at the University of North Carolina at
Chapel Hill, used a federal database
to compare the transition activities
reported for the kindergarten class of
1998-99 with those of the kindergarten class of 2010-11. A moderate increase in activities has been reported
but only on relatively low-intensity
practices: sending information home,
holding parent orientations, and encouraging parent and child visits before the start of the school year.
Little cautioned, however, that the
federal survey may not be capturing
all the activities that may be in place.
And the impact of the Every Student Succeeds Act, which requires
districts receiving Title I funds for
disadvantaged students to increase
coordination with early-childhood
programs, is still to be determined.
"ESSA gives states some opportunities to think creatively about ways
to do this," said Aaron Loewenberg, a
former kindergarten-teacher-turnedprogram-associate for the think tank
New America. "As students and families enter the formal K-12 school
system, it's important to establish
these close connections."

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Education Week - August 23, 2017

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