TY  - JOUR
A1  - Vock, Miriam
A1  - Penk, Christiane
A1  - Koeller, Olaf
T1  - Who skips a grade? Findings concerning grade acceleration in German schools
JF  - Psychologie in Erziehung und Unterricht : Zeitschrift für Forschung und Praxis
N2  - This study examines how often and in which form students use the option of gradeskipping in Germany and what characterizes those students. The database was derived from a sample of N = 4,103 students (grades 8-10), who were tested within the standardisation process of the national educational standards in mathematics. For these students data existed on their mathematical competence (educational standard items) and intelligence (subtests word analogies and figural analogies of the KFT 4-12 + R). Furthermore, we identified n = 33 (0,8%) students by questionnaire, who had already skipped one grade. Those accelerated students are predominantly boys, had skipped the grade during their first years at school and performed only slightly above-average on two cognitive ability scales. At the time the survey was conducted, 39% did not attend a Gymnasium and 34 % had to repeat one grade after having been accelerated. While they report average grades in relation to their peers, their mathematical competence is well above average.
KW  - Acceleration
KW  - grade-skipping
KW  - whole-grade acceleration
KW  - giftedness
KW  - talent
Y1  - 2014
U6  - https://doi.org/10.2378/peu2013.art22d
SN  - 0342-183X
VL  - 61
IS  - 3
SP  - 153
EP  - 164
PB  - Reinhardt
CY  - München
ER  - 
TY  - JOUR
A1  - Kretschmann, Julia
A1  - Vock, Miriam
A1  - Luedtke, Oliver
T1  - Acceleration in elementary school: using propensity score matching to estimate the effects on academic achievement
JF  - The journal of educational psychology
N2  - Using German data, we examined the effects of one specific type of acceleration-grade skipping-on academic performance. Prior research on the effects of acceleration has suffered from methodological restrictions, especially due to a lack of appropriate comparison groups and a priori measurements. For this reason, propensity score matching was applied in this analysis to minimize selection bias due to observed confounding variables. Various types of matching were attempted, and, in consideration of balancing the covariates, full matching was the final choice. We used data from the Berlin ELEMENT Study, analyzing, after matching, the information of 81 students who had skipped a grade over the course of elementary school and up to 1,668 nonaccelerated students who attended the same grade level as the accelerated students. Measurements took place 3 times between the 4th and 6th grades, including the assessment of reading, spelling, and mathematics performance. After matching, the results of between-group comparisons regarding performance indices showed no significant effects of skipping a grade, other than a small positive effect found on spelling performance. Theoretical implications and methodological limitations are discussed.
KW  - grade skipping
KW  - academic performance
KW  - propensity score matching
KW  - acceleration
KW  - elementary school
Y1  - 2014
U6  - https://doi.org/10.1037/a0036631
SN  - 0022-0663
SN  - 1939-2176
VL  - 106
IS  - 4
SP  - 1080
EP  - 1095
PB  - American Psychological Association
CY  - Washington
ER  -