CHAPTER 15

LECTURE EXTENSION

Extended-Year Schooling
As discussed in the Cultural Influences box on page 638, in Japan and Taiwan, the school year is over 50 days longer than in the United States. Does this increase in days of schooling enhance children's academic performance or is it some other factor such as the intensity or quality of educational efforts made in extended-year schools that promotes children's achievement?

A study by Frazier and Morrison (1998) addressed these issues by comparing kindergartners in an extended-year program (210 days) to those in a traditional program. Both groups of pupils performed equivalently in tests of mathematics, reading, general knowledge, vocabulary, and perceived cognitive competence at the beginning of the traditional kindergarten year. However, the extended-year students outperformed the traditional students at the beginning of the next traditional year (but not at the end of the traditional kindergarten year) in mathematics, reading, and general knowledge and had higher levels of cognitive competence. Importantly, additional analyses indicated that the mathematics and reading differences were not associated with differences in the quality or intensity of educational efforts made during the traditional school year or with differences between teachers in the extended-year and traditional programs. Because differences were not yet evident at the end of the traditional kindergarten year, these findings supported the authors' "growth rate" hypothesis that extended-year pupils made more progress than their traditional counterparts only during the "summer."

Thus, these results clearly demonstrate that an increase of only 30 days in early elementary school ("when children are still in the steepest part of their learning curves," p. 515) can have a significant impact on math and reading achievement. Further, these findings suggest that providing students with additional instructional time by extending the school year could be a promising educational reform.

Frazier, J. A., & Morrison, F. J. (1998). The influence of extended-year schooling on growth of achievement and perceived competence in early elementary school. Child Development, 69, 495-517.

LEARNING ACTIVITY

Social Skills Interventions
Divide students into groups and, on the basis of research reviewed in the text, ask them to devise a means for enhancing social skills interventions for rejected children involving coaching, modeling, and reinforcement of positive social skills. Have several groups present and justify their intervention strategies to the entire class. Then engage students in discussion of why it is necessary to move beyond social skills training to address academic and social-cognitive deficits of rejected children along with family difficulties.