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Perhaps not much attention is given to those early learning years that children go through. After all, how much impact can something that we do when we are only about five have anyway?
Surprisingly, a lot.
Students who had learned much more in kindergarten were more likely to go to college than students with otherwise similar backgrounds. Students who learned more were also less likely to become single parents. As adults, they were more likely to be saving for retirement. Perhaps most striking, they were earning more.
All else equal, they were making about an extra $100 a year at age 27 for every percentile they had moved up the test-score distribution over the course of kindergarten. A student who went from average to the 60th percentile — a typical jump for a 5-year-old with a good teacher — could expect to make about $1,000 more a year at age 27 than a student who remained at the average. Over time, the effect seems to grow, too.
(Source)
The results aren’t final yet, as they have been studied but not peer reviewed, but it’s looking as if kindergarten may have a lot more impact than many thought. The children that were studies were part of another study about the effects of early childhood education, and now they are all well on their way in their adult lives (all the participants are in their 30’s)
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