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Child outcomes vary by family's socioeconomic status (SES). Research on explanatory factors underlying early SES-related disparities has mainly focused on specific child outcomes (e.g., language skills) and selected influencing factors in single countries often with a focus on individual differences but not explicitly on early SES-related gaps. This study uses harmonised data from longitudinal large-scale studies conducted in the United Kingdom, United States, and Germany to examine parental education-related gaps in early child language and social skills. Twelve theoretically proposed family-, child-, and childcare-related factors were systematically evaluated as explanatory factors. In all countries, parental education-related gaps were particularly pronounced for early child language compared to social skills. In the decomposition analyses, the home learning environment was the only measure that significantly explained gaps in all child outcomes across all countries. Early centre-based care attendance, family income, and maternal age at childbirth contributed to gaps in child outcomes with the specific pattern of results varying across outcomes and countries. Maternal depressive feelings significantly contributed only to explaining gaps in children's social skills. Thus, while some mechanisms found to underpin early parental education-related gaps can be generalized from single-country, single-domain studies, others are outcome- and context-specific.

The COVID-19 pandemic has completely changed the need for internet connectivity and technological devices across the population, but especially among school-aged children. For a large proportion of pupils, access to a connected computer nowadays makes the difference between being able to keep up with their educational development and falling badly behind. This paper provides a detailed account of the digitally deprived children in Europe, according to the latest available wave of the European Union - Statistics on Income and Living Conditions (EU-SILC). We find that 5.4% of school-aged children in Europe are digitally deprived and that differences are large across countries. Children that cohabit with low-educated parents, in poverty or in severe material deprivation are those most affected.

The increasing platformization of contemporary education is reshaping schooling in a multitude of ways, including the relationship parents have with their children's education. While a growing number of research is revealing the influential impacts platforms have on various educational professions, few scholars have so far looked at how parents are designed, made visible and normatively regulated (e.g., as being/becoming professional) in/through specific platforms, also because associating parents with educational professionality seems much less self-evident than for groups such as teachers or principals. As we argue in this contribution, drawing on ongoing discussions from the field of parenthood, studies offers fruitful inspiration to not only better understand what parental (educational) professionalization means, but equally how it can be brought together with research on parental platformization. Building on that literature framework, we then illuminate what we see when employing such an approach empirically, using two distinct learning platforms as case studies - ClassDojo, a classroom and behavior management platform used mainly in anglophone countries, and Antolin, a reading enhancement platform used in German schools. Drawing on the initial findings from both case studies, we conclude with a suggested research agenda around 'platformized parents' and offer a framework of questions to guide its advancement. (DIPF/Orig.).

The increasing platformization of contemporary education is reshaping schooling in a multitude of ways, including the relationship parents have with their children's education. While a growing number of research is revealing the influential impacts platforms have on various educational professions, few scholars have so far looked at how parents are designed, made visible and normatively regulated (e.g., as being/becoming professional) in/through specific platforms, also because associating parents with educational professionality seems much less self-evident than for groups such as teachers or principals. As we argue in this contribution, drawing on ongoing discussions from the field of parenthood, studies offers fruitful inspiration to not only better understand what parental (educational) professionalization means, but equally how it can be brought together with research on parental platformization. Building on that literature framework, we then illuminate what we see when employing such an approach empirically, using two distinct learning platforms as case studies - ClassDojo, a classroom and behavior management platform used mainly in anglophone countries, and Antolin, a reading enhancement platform used in German schools. Drawing on the initial findings from both case studies, we conclude with a suggested research agenda around 'platformized parents' and offer a framework of questions to guide its advancement. (DIPF/Orig.).

Although there has been an increasing amount of research conducted on test anxiety in adolescence, little is known about the relation of test anxiety and school engagement. The current study addresses this gap by focusing on the potential gender-specific interplay of test anxiety and school engagement among adolescents, testing the role of parental support and parental pressure as mediators in this association. We performed latent multigroup structural equation modeling on a sample of 7th and 8th graders (N=1088; M AGE=13.7 years; SD=0.53) in secondary schools in Brandenburg, Germany. The results suggest that there are gender differences in the interplay of test anxiety, perceived socio-academic parental support and pressure, and school engagement. Whereas girls' school engagement is more centered on the mother figure, for boys both parents seem to play an essential role concerning their school engagement as well as test anxiety. (Orig.).

This article describes the theoretical reasons and empirical operationalization of a multidimensional social origin measure. It is assumed that different parental resources are linked to social inequality through distinct mechanisms. This social origin variable can be used for the analysis of status inconsistencies as well as cumulating and compensating effects of social origin resources on inequality of opportunity. The proposed measure is easy to operationalize and to apply in cross-sectional, longitudinal or cross-national research. A great methodological advantage of the proposed origin measure is that it avoids the problem of multicollinearity that is prevalent in analyses that include various parental resources as separate covariates into a statistical model. To illustrate this social origin measure, we apply it to the field of educational inequality research and use data from the National Educational Panel Study in Germany. However, the approach can be easily generalized to other sociological or economic studies where social inequality is of interest (such as labor market, demographic, political, migration or ethnic research). The illustrative example combines the information of three family resources (parental education, parental class and parental status), but it can be extended to include further family resources such as income or wealth measures.

Es ist breit dokumentiert, dass Sprachkompetenzen von Kindern bereits im Alter von etwa 3 Jahren in Abhängigkeit vom sozioökonomischen Hintergrund variieren. Gleichzeitig zeigen Befunde, dass die Häufigkeit des sprachanregenden Interaktionsverhaltens als Aspekt der proximalen familiären Lernumgebung bedeutsam mit dem Spracherwerb der Kinder zusammenhängt. Weniger klar ist jedoch, wie entsprechende Unterschiede in den frühen sprachlichen Fähigkeiten und Fertigkeiten von Kindern entstehen und ob bzw. inwieweit sie durch mütterliches sprachanregendes Interaktionsverhalten vermittelt werden. Daher untersuchen wir Unterschiede im kindlichen Wortschatz im Alter von 26 Monaten und analysieren, inwieweit Effekte der mütterlichen Bildung auf den Wortschatz ihrer Kinder durch sprachrelevante Episoden geteilter Aufmerksamkeit (joint attention), als eine Facette sprachfördernden Interaktionsverhaltens, vermittelt werden. Hierzu wurden Daten von N = 778 Kindern der Säuglingskohorte des Nationalen Bildungspanels genutzt. Die Ergebnisse unserer Analysen zeigen sowohl frühe Unterschiede im kindlichen Wortschatzerwerb als auch im sprachstimulierenden Interaktionsverhalten im Zusammenhang mit der mütterlichen Bildung; dabei werden aber nur 9 % der Effekte der mütterlichen Bildung auf den kindlichen Wortschatzerwerb durch das erfasste sprachstimulierende Interaktionsverhalten vermittelt, wenn der kindliche Sprachstand im Alter von 14 resp. 17 Monaten kontrolliert wird. (DIPF/Orig.). It is well documented that children's language skills already vary by socioeconomic status by the time they are about 2-3 years old. In addition, study results demonstrate that the frequency of language-stimulating interaction behavior - as an important aspect of the proximal familial learning environment - significantly predicts children's later language skills. However, it is less clear how early social disparities in children's language emerge and to what extent they are mediated by maternal language-stimulating interaction behavior. Therefore, we investigated disparities in children's vocabulary at 26 months of age and analyzed whether and to what extent the effect of maternal education on vocabulary acquisition is mediated through language-related episodes of joint attention, as a facet of language-stimulating interaction behavior. We used data from N = 778 children of the Infant Cohort Study of the German National Educational Panel Study. The results show early disparities in children's vocabulary development as well as in language stimulating interaction behavior in mother-child interaction according to maternal education; however, only 9 % of the eff ect of maternal education on early vocabulary development is mediated through the assessed language stimulating interaction behavior when controlling for child language skills at 14-17 months of age. (DIPF/Orig.).

This article examines the effects of an intensive life skills education and home visiting program, Building Nebraska Families (BNF), on the employment, earnings, and personal and family well-being of work-mandatory cash welfare recipients. Based on a randomized controlled trial, the analysis used survey and administrative data for more than 600 hard-to-employ Temporary Assistance for Needy Families (TANF) recipients across 11 sites in Nebraska. Statistically significant, robust effects were observed on the employment, earnings, and various measures of personal and family well-being for a subgroup of more disadvantaged, very hard-to-employ TANF recipients. The magnitude of the effects grew over time and was most pronounced during the last 6 months of the 30-month follow-up period. Overall, the findings suggest that BNF's approach, with its focus on developing life skills and improving personal and family functioning, can be an effective strategy for improving the employability and self-sufficiency of the most at-risk TANF recipients.

This paper draws on findings from a study of outcomes for young people leaving care funded by the Department for Education and Skills. It explores the informal support networks available to a sample of 106 young people over a period of 12–15 months after leaving care. It examines patterns of contact with birth families and caregivers, the support that emanated from these links and the strategies of leaving care professionals to strengthen these connections. It also considers the new families created by many young people through relationships with partners and the onset of parenthood and discusses the continuing support needs of young parents. The paper situates the needs and experiences of care leavers in a wider youth transitions framework and highlights the need for continuing professional attention to be given to strengthening family links as one strategy for helping care leavers to negotiate the transition to adulthood.

This article analyzes 41 studies that evaluated K-12 parent involvement programs in order to assess claims that such programs are an effective means of improving student learning. It examines the characteristics of the parent involvement programs, as well as the research design, data, and analytical techniques used in program evaluation. Our examination of evaluations found little empirical support for the widespread claim that parent involvement programs are an effective means of improving student achievement or changing parent, teacher, and student behavior. The authors do not conclude that programs are ineffective. Rather, serious design, methodological, and analytical flaws inherent in studies evaluating the effectiveness of parent involvement programs must be addressed before definite conclusions about program effectiveness can be reached. The findings of this study are particularly significant given the substantial federal support for parent involvement. (DIPF/Orig.).