Primary education and school entry in the U.S.

Autor/inn/en	Lischka-Schmidt, Richard; Castner, Daniel J.
Titel	Primary education and school entry in the U.S.
Quelle	Aus: Schlesier, Juliane (Hrsg.); Frey, Anne (Hrsg.); Hoya, Fabian (Hrsg.); Parade, Ralf (Hrsg.); Rank, Astrid (Hrsg.): Foundations of learning. Unveiling the mosaic of primary education systems worldwide. Bad Heilbrunn: Verlag Julius Klinkhardt (2026) S. 324-351 PDF als Volltext kostenfreie Datei (1); PDF als Volltext kostenfreie Datei (2); PDF als Volltext kostenfreie Datei (3) Link als defekt meldenVerfügbarkeit
Reihe	Grundschule International / Primary Education International
Sprache	englisch
Dokumenttyp	online; Sammelwerksbeitrag
ISBN	978-3-7815-2777-5; 978-3-7815-6239-4
DOI	10.25656/01:35804 10.35468/6239-12
URN	urn:nbn:de:0111-pedocs-358047
Schlagwörter	Standardisierter Test; Übergang Vorschulstufe - Primarstufe; Schulanfang; Grundschule; Grundschulpädagogik; Primarbereich; Lehrerbildung; Curriculum; Ungleichheit; Beobachtung; USA
Abstract	School entry is considered a significant moment in a child's educational biography. Due to the close organisational links between kindergarten and first grade, U.S. primary schools are a particularly interesting case in this regard. So, this paper describes U.S. primary education focusing on school entry: Fundamental characteristics and research findings on the U.S. elementary school are summarised, and school entry is examined in detail on the basis of an empirical project. In the first part of this article, we outline the main organisational and practical issues of primary education, including the broader context of the U.S. school system and its federal structure, funding, teacher education and curriculum. Moreover, we highlight two central research issues: inequalities and standardised testing. The second part of the paper focuses on school entry and the relationship between kindergarten and first grade. After reviewing extant research, we present findings from an ethnographic research project illustrating the daily practice of this relation in U.S. primary schools. This project involved three months of ethnographic fieldwork at five schools and addresses the question of how school is produced at school entry, that is, from the perspective of socialisation theory, of how students are taught what school makes a school. The qualitative analysis of the observational data shows how similar everyday life is in both classes and how, despite all the similarities, a distinction is made between the first-grade and kindergarten classes. (DIPF/Orig.).
Erfasst von	DIPF \| Leibniz-Institut für Bildungsforschung und Bildungsinformation, Frankfurt am Main
Update	2026/4