The Impact of Early Childcare on School Readiness - Assignment Example

By Name Course Instructor Institution Location Date Question No 1. Parameters under Research The issue of the early caretaking to a child and the resultant readiness to start schooling keeps raising several questions over the decades (Olweus 1991). According to research, the academic success of a child is significantly dependent on the initial triggering of desire to learn by the initial caregivers. The pre-kindergarten life is influential in attitude development to the kid. Pre-kindergarten lives and experiences, though periodic and uneven makes children to capture skills knowledge and have a particular level of preparedness to enter the school. Discussion of the readiness matter is relevant in harmonising the different expectations that the parents and teachers have with respect to the level of information that kids require before joining the nursery school. The study of the readiness is important because it acts as a guide towards orientation of children to studies and minimise the possible academic complications in later life among the Australian kids. The Australian policy-makers can use the findings of the research to makes laws that can enhance proper nurture of young children so that they develop mindsets of high achievements academically in later life. Question No 2. The Research Question The research aims to answer the following question: ''Why is it necessary that some level of preparation before joining a kindergarten? What are the essential skills that children quire before joining School? And ‘who is responsible for ensuring the kids undergo preparation to go to school early enough?''. The three questions are the roots for the formulation of the following general hypothesis: ‘'Is there need for the early childcare on the future education of the child?'' The difference in age when joining school will be a guide on whether the child chosen as a subject was prepared to enter kindergarten at a standard age of five years or not. The choice of whether they went through initial preparation or did not will be used critically for understanding the background of the child before entering school. The approach for the study is social in nature, and the questions that require answers are ‘'who?'' and' "how?" One of the limitations of the study is that there is no enquiry about the social classes of the subjects in terms of poverty before researching on the age of joining a school. However, the assumption has an impact to the study because there can be a tendency of children to start schooling late because of poverty. Children can also join kindergarten at the standard age because of peer pressure, lack of company and search for fun. The research design The research involves a examining a sample of 200 pupils from five schools. The selection of the pupils is random. The age of the pupil to be a subject will range from five to ten years. There is a creation of a scenario of comparison of overall academic performance between the children that are subjected to early childhood preparation for school with those that are not. To enhance the study, the selection of the first category of children comes from the ones that join school after five years with those that join at the age below or exactly five years. Those that join after five years are the control group whereas those that join before five years are the treatment group. The study involves aptitude test comparison. There is setting of five math problems for the different subjects groups, with each group doing calculation for a fixed period of five minutes. There is recording of the overall score of each pupil. After the math, the kids are to read from a paragraph containing ten sentences with ten words each loudly to establish the average number of reading mistakes they commit. Each of the students must agree to fill a ten-question likertive scale questionnaire which bears information related to pupils' level of preference of kindergarten education. Question No 3. Epistemological Position and Theoretical Framework The epistemological assumptions for the study are positivism and quantitative inquiry to generalize to future cases of relating the level of preparedness with the future academic performance of the children (Chinn & Malhotra 2002). The research makes an assumption of strict adherence to math and some level of understanding and forecasting validate the findings of the research. Science is the superior way of learning and prediction. There is an assumption that the only factor for the lateness in school entry is as a result of lack of preparedness. The lack of preparedness is assumed to be a contribution of the school and the society at large. It is essential for children to receive pre-school education in order to prepare them for the educational experiences they are likely to encounter in the future. The technique of learn-and- play gives the children ability to identify and solve problems by themselves without or with minimal intervention. Because they like to play, it is easier teach them by incorporating learning with plays. The degree of social and educational integration determines the schooling identity of the student. Social integration relates to how often they participate in co-curricular activities. The probability of possession of the characteristics is dependent on the level of parental education. The first-generation students require academic guidance than the non-first generation counterparts, failure to which there is a detrimental effect on the student's academic success rate(Beal 2007).Kids requiring literacy in mathematics proficiency is a fundamental requirement for kids joining a kindergarten in USA to prevent problems associated with reading, especially for low-income children ( BRASSARD & BOEHM 2008). Question No. 4 Ethical issues to consider during the research The research establishes measures to ensure the subjects (the students) do not get hurt during the research (Eysenbach & Till 2001). The harm that can occur is the discrimination amongst the students on the basis of age-academic performance matching or age-social status matching. It can also occur when parents of the interviewees realize that there is disclosure of their minimal contributions toward preparing the kids for school. To enhance this, the research assures of non- disclosure of the subjects. The research also guarantees confidentiality of the responses to the pupils (Eysenbach & Till 2001). The complete assurance of data confidentiality will make the subjects give adequate information for the study without fear. Question No 5. Research design and methodology For there to be satisfactory results from the study, it is necessary to adopt both cross-sectional research design and longitudinal research design (Marczyk 2005). With cross-sectional research design, there is an analysis on the basis of the performance of various students at their elementary level of education and relate it to their perceptions about preparedness before joining school. With longitudinal study design will be able to determine the pattern of performance of the student over a particular period to avoid generalising from a single case of performance. The reason for adoption of cross-sectional design is to obtain a variety of sample subjects. Longitudinal design is chosen to harmonise/even out the effect of the trend. The research methodologies to employ will be survey and questionnaires, interviews and documented records. Question 6. Methods of Data Collection The methods for data collection will be questionnaires, surveys and documented records. Surveys are necessary because the subjects are readily available. In order to avoid problems associated with analysis of secondary data (Neuman & Neuman 2006). The questionnaires also guarantee obtaining of responses from only relevant willing respondents without leaving any of them out. The questionnaires are flexible hence their remote administration and can allow for search of information from different categories of respondents who in this case are elementary school pupils. With their flexibility, Questionnaires can permit application of statistical techniques to the data obtained to establish if the results are valid, reliable and statistically significant. Drawing of patterns of responses from the surveys is possible for quick interpretation. If there is an opportunity, adoption of contemporary methods to relate the academic performance with the level of preparedness prior to joining school will be determined. Personal interview is the most appropriate method of data collection will give the most reliable data. Data collection by questionnaires will be preferable because the method is not expensive, and its administration is possible to school-going children. The presence of the interviewee to convince the subjects about confidentiality of their responses will facilitate high rates of responses. It is easier to plan with reviews in order to extract the data required as much as possible. The ease is because most of the pupils will find it possible to answer the questions because they will be few and short. With intense effort in search of responses from different schools, there is a possibility of having had a reasonable amount of quality data to infer from Question 7. Data analysis Keenness about the data to include in statistical computation in the analysis is mandatory. All information that shows incompleteness must be discarded to avoid unnecessary errors. Incompleteness involves failure of the subject to participate in any of the three tests. Failure to write the school admission number in any of the three scripts is a mistake that calls for exclusion of the respondent's results. The information that the interviewee will get is somewhat descriptive and partially inferential. In the qualitative point of view, interpretation of the findings from the research is possible. The research inferential can take an inferential course, meaning that the judgements will come from the information from the sample. There will also be a chance of comparison between the two categories to determine their differences. The basis of the responses must relate to subject the matter in question. The responses from the questionnaires are the basis for making judgements on whether or not the pre-school education is essential for proper performance of a child in the future. The result can be a tool for forecasting about the differences in future academic performance of those who undergo pre-school preparation. The statistical instruments to employ to need to make inferences about the matter in question (Longnecker & Ott 2001). The data analysis involves re-stating the research objectives and determining whether the research can attain the goals by answering the research questions. The strengths and weaknesses of study design need a description. Defence for the research methodology, design and primary school children as a source of information is necessary for population representativeness approval. Stating the issue of bias in the results is essential. Proper description of the application of randomisation is necessary. Response rate of the pool of subjects requires an inclusion. There is a transfer of responses from the questionnaires to a spreadsheet accurately, putting each response in its class. Tabular and graphical data representation can be possible. There is a need to infer how the responses of the two categories of students differ. Other statistical computations will consider the expectations of the research. According to Aryl et al. (2009), analysis of research from primary such as the data from this research can go through a series of stages as follows: 1. Data reducing. Reducing of data occurs through analysing through the analysis of thematic coding and analyzing quantitative data by use of descriptive statistics. 2. Data displaying. Displaying is by use of tables and graphs for quantitative data and matrices, rubric and lists for qualitative data. 3. Data transformation in which qualitative data is transformed to quantitative data from names to numbers. It can also involve transforming quantitative data to qualitative 4. Correlating the data. Correlating data involves a comparing the two data sets after analysing them differently in order to determine whether the sets display the same findings. 5 Data consolidating. Consolidation is a mathematical operation that involves assembling to particular sets of data to make a new data or variable that can be of statistical importance. 6-Comparison of the data-comparing the data with the ones in other sources helps to show whether the earlier research display similar results. 7. Data integrating-integrating the data and interpretations are integrated or reported into two different sets of either qualitative or quantitative of coherent wholes. References ARY, D., JACOBS, L. & ARY, D. (2009). Research in education: An introduction. Belmont, CA, Wadsworth. Chinn, C. A., & Malhotra, B. A. (2002). Epistemologically inquiry in schools: A theoretical framework for evaluating inquiry tasks. Science Education, 86(2), 175-218. Eysenbach, G., & Till, J. E. (2001). Ethical issues in qualitative research on communities. Bmj, 323(7321), 1103-1105. Longnecker, M., & Ott, R. (2001). An introduction to statistical methods and data analysis. ISBN-13, 854576151. Marczyk, G., DeMatteo, D., & Festinger, D. (2005). Essentials of research design and methodology. John Wiley & Sons Inc. .Neuman, W. L., & Neuman, W. L. (2006). Social research methods: Qualitative and quantitative approaches Olweus, D. (1991). Bullying problems among schoolchildren: Basic facts and effects of a school based intervention program. The development and treatment of childhood aggression. 17, 411-448. Read More

Children can also join kindergarten at the standard age because of peer pressure, lack of company and search for fun. The research design The research involves a examining a sample of 200 pupils from five schools. The selection of the pupils is random. The age of the pupil to be a subject will range from five to ten years. There is a creation of a scenario of comparison of overall academic performance between the children that are subjected to early childhood preparation for school with those that are not.

To enhance the study, the selection of the first category of children comes from the ones that join school after five years with those that join at the age below or exactly five years. Those that join after five years are the control group whereas those that join before five years are the treatment group. The study involves aptitude test comparison. There is setting of five math problems for the different subjects groups, with each group doing calculation for a fixed period of five minutes.

There is recording of the overall score of each pupil. After the math, the kids are to read from a paragraph containing ten sentences with ten words each loudly to establish the average number of reading mistakes they commit. Each of the students must agree to fill a ten-question likertive scale questionnaire which bears information related to pupils' level of preference of kindergarten education. Question No 3. Epistemological Position and Theoretical Framework The epistemological assumptions for the study are positivism and quantitative inquiry to generalize to future cases of relating the level of preparedness with the future academic performance of the children (Chinn & Malhotra 2002).

The research makes an assumption of strict adherence to math and some level of understanding and forecasting validate the findings of the research. Science is the superior way of learning and prediction. There is an assumption that the only factor for the lateness in school entry is as a result of lack of preparedness. The lack of preparedness is assumed to be a contribution of the school and the society at large. It is essential for children to receive pre-school education in order to prepare them for the educational experiences they are likely to encounter in the future.

The technique of learn-and- play gives the children ability to identify and solve problems by themselves without or with minimal intervention. Because they like to play, it is easier teach them by incorporating learning with plays. The degree of social and educational integration determines the schooling identity of the student. Social integration relates to how often they participate in co-curricular activities. The probability of possession of the characteristics is dependent on the level of parental education.

The first-generation students require academic guidance than the non-first generation counterparts, failure to which there is a detrimental effect on the student's academic success rate(Beal 2007).Kids requiring literacy in mathematics proficiency is a fundamental requirement for kids joining a kindergarten in USA to prevent problems associated with reading, especially for low-income children ( BRASSARD & BOEHM 2008). Question No. 4 Ethical issues to consider during the research The research establishes measures to ensure the subjects (the students) do not get hurt during the research (Eysenbach & Till 2001).

The harm that can occur is the discrimination amongst the students on the basis of age-academic performance matching or age-social status matching. It can also occur when parents of the interviewees realize that there is disclosure of their minimal contributions toward preparing the kids for school. To enhance this, the research assures of non- disclosure of the subjects. The research also guarantees confidentiality of the responses to the pupils (Eysenbach & Till 2001). The complete assurance of data confidentiality will make the subjects give adequate information for the study without fear.

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