The present study reports on longitudinal comparisons, through grade three, drawn between students who attended a full-day kindergarten program and a half-day kindergarten program both offered in Edmonton Public Schools in Edmonton, Alberta. Additional funding enabling schools to offer full-day kindergarten programming came through the generosity of anonymous benefactors, shifting of resources from other programs and grades, and the use of "one-time" grants obtained from Alberta Learning. The present study addresses the question: What are the longitudinal reading and writing effects of full-day kindergarten on students at the end of kindergarten, grade one, and grade two levels?

The study makes use of approximately 1200 students. Of these approximately half had experienced full-day kindergarten with a literacy focus. The other half had attended half-day kindergarten programming in the same school jurisdiction also with a literacy focus. The children attending full-day kindergarten programming were also predominantly from educationally impoverished and of low socio-economic backgrounds.

Data were collected using Clay's Observation Survey and Highest Level of Achievement Tests (HLAT). In their kindergarten year, pre-test and post-test data had been collected, using Clay's Observation Survey (Clay, 1993) from all full-day and half-day kindergarten children by district reading specialists. HLAT reading (based on the Reading Comprehension sub-test of the Canadian Test of Basic Skills) and writing data were also collected by the school jurisdiction for the cohorts at the end of grades one, two, and three.

Data collected in this study were be analyzed using one of two approaches, depending on the type of data being analyzed. Interval data collected using the Clay's observation survey sub-tests and the raw scores from the HLAT reading sub-test were analyzed using ANOVA comparisons (alpha was set to .05 level). Ordinal data collected representing students' HLAT reading grades and writing grades were analyzed using Chi-square Goodness-of-fit tests.

Analysis of the data set was conducted with the purpose of exploring the longitudinal reading and writing effects of full-day kindergarten on students through to the end of their grade one, grade two, and grade three experiences. On the basis of these findings, conclusions and recommendations are made for policy (at both macro and micro levels) and practice.