Project Schulreifes Kind

The project aimed to recognise delays in the development of pre-school children at an early stage, and compensating for them by means of targeted measures so that all children can begin school on the basis of the same conditions, thus deferrals of enrolment can be avoided. The Ministry for Culture, Youth and Sports of the federal state of Baden-Wuerttemberg has developed a concept for promoting children that integrates pre-school and primary school stages, which is now implemented in 200 model-type locations in Baden-Wuerttemberg. From 24 to 15 months prior to school enrolment, the pre-school care professionals determine whether a child is in need of support or not.  For this purpose, they can also refer to findings from the pre-school examination that is carried out by the Ministry of Social Affairs of the state of Baden-Wuerttemberg in currently 12 model districts. If a child is in need of additional support, it is reported to a „round table“, situated with the local authority. Here, the pre-school and primary school authorities, the health centre and early learning specialists join the pertinent parents in deciding what measures are appropriate for promoting the child in question.  These measures include, for instance, language promotion, training motor skills, and practicing mental concentration. Depending on the respective model, this kind of promotion varies as regards its duration, scope, location and the pedagogical professional who carries out the promotive measure.

The scientific study accompanying this model project intends to find answers to the following questions:

• Does the early school enrolment examination help to identify all the children who are in need of support, and thus at risk with regard to their school achievement? What skills need to be assessed?
• How is a particular need for compensatory education diagnosed, and how is it assigned to a particular measure by the “round table”?
• Are the measures themselves effective, and do they remedy the children’s developmental deficiencies? How do the children who have received support, and those who have not, develop throughout the course of the first school year?

Selected Publications

Ehm, J.-H., Kerner auch Koerner, J., Gawrilow, C., Hasselhorn, M. & Schmiedek, F. (2016). The association of ADHD symptoms and reading acquisition during elementary school years. Developmental Psychology, 52(9), 1445–1456. doi:10.1037/dev0000186

Hasselhorn, M., Ehm, J.-H., Wagner, H., Schneider, W., & Schöler, H. (2014). Zusatzförderung von Risikokindern: Handreichung für pädagogische Fachkräfte im Übergang vom Elementar- zum Primarbereich. Göttingen: Hogrefe.

Hasselhorn, M., Schöler, H., Schneider, W., Ehm, J.-H., Johnson, M., Keppler, I., … Wagner, H. (2012). Gezielte Zusatzförderung im Modellprojekt “Schulreifes Kind”: Auswirkungen auf Schulbereitschaft und schulischen Lernerfolg. Frühe Bildung, 1, 3–10.

Wagner, H., Ehm, J.-H., & Hasselhorn, M. (2010). „Schulreifes Kind“. Individuelle Voraussetzungen für den Schulstart optimieren. Lehren & Lernen, 36, 8–10.