Links Between Young Children's Behavior and Achievement: The Role of Social Class and Classroom Composition

A growing number of studies examine the influence of classroom behavior on teaching and individual children's behavior. However, limited work has examined the effects of classroom behavior on academic achievement. The present study used 14,537 children in 2,109 classrooms from the Early Childhood Longitudinal Study -Kindergarten Class of 1998-99 (ECLS -K) to examine the association between attention, aggressive behavior, and achievement at two levels --the child and classroom. Children with low attention, alone or in combination with aggressive behavior, made fewer gains in test scores during kindergarten. The achievement gap between children with low attention and those without was larger than those based on low-income status or race/ethnicity. Additionally, having more children in the classroom with low attention was negatively associated with achievement gains. No similar association was found for the number of children with high aggression. The authors discuss avenues for teacher training and intervention to facilitate attention.