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McKenzie Roedig
Dr. Claudia Skutar
English 2089, Section 008
22 January 2013
Making the Transition Reliable
The transition from staying at home with a parent or a babysitter to going to school is a
significant and fragile time for children, and it can affect the rest of the years to come. Every
child is different, thus every transition is different Educational and Child Psychologists, EmmaKate Kennedy, R.J. (Sean) Cameron and Jennifer Greene took this into heavy consideration and
explored a model that could represent the transition from home to school. "Transitions in the
early years: Educational and child psychologists working to reduce the impact of school culture
shock", which is from the journal of Educational & Child Psychology, the authors discuss that
early-childhood transition is represented "as an interactive cultural, ecological and dynamic
process" (Kennedy, Cameron, and Greene 19). The authors' process is formed from the "unique
interaction of cultural characteristics, expectations and goals" (Kennedy, Cameron, and Greene
19). Throughout the article there is a breakdown of certain models and process relating to school
transitioning. Furthermore, there is a clear explanation of transition readiness and how to achieve
it, such as through the Ready Schools framework. The Ready Schools framework has three
elements that help to create interventions that will reduce the culture shock experienced in earlychildhood in a school setting (Kennedy, Cameron, and Greene 24). I am a psychology major and
I want to become a school psychologist so this article is applicable to my studies. One might be
wondering how reliable the facts in the article are so it is important to note that it is of high
quality and very influential. This judgment is based on author credibility, support, structure,
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genre, and purpose.
One would never believe a story if the person he or she heard it from was not reliable and
not related to the subject matter in some way. However, when looking at the professions and
background of the article's authors, anyone can quickly realize that the authors are in everyway
credible. Kennedy, Cameron, and Greene are child and educational psychologists, which seems
only fitting since the article comes from the journal of Child & Education Psychology, and the
subject material is about children being ready for school. The article's authors are employed by
the Southwark Council in London, England to work on the Integrated Child Support Service
team (Kennedy, Cameron, and Greene 28). The Integrated Child Support Service delivers
assistance to children and families who are struggling with various psychological issues in the
school setting ("Child Support Services"). The article being evaluated is one example of how the
team members deliver assistance. The article's authors are some of the team members, and they
are writing about school transitioning with consideration to culture shock in order to inform
psychologists around the world. Kennedy, Greene, and Cameron state in the article that, "The
Integrated Child Support Service provides advice on ways in which the transition process can be
personalized to meet individual need" (26).
To be a credible author one must not only have the right credentials but one must also be
knowledgeable of the subject material he or she writing about. Kennedy, Cameron, and Greene
know what they are talking about throughout their article, and they are not just pulling stuff out
of nowhere. They never introduce anything into the article that does not fit and does not leave
any questions unanswered because those two things would not only change the organized flow of
the structure but also make the reader rather confused and skeptical. For example, the authors of
the article state what the Ready Schools framework, which was created by other psychologists, is
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about with three bulleted points, but they do not leave it at that. They move on to further clarify
each bullet point. This shows that the article's authors cannot just list the ideas from others but
actually can explain them in their own words too, which is what being knowledgeable is all
about. While I am reading, I ask myself what the third bullet point "reaching with an appropriate
level of intensity" (Kennedy, Cameron, and Greene 24) is supposed to mean. However, as I read
on I discover that the authors are answering my question, as if they know that I do not
understand.
A person is never going to believe a story if there are no facts and evidence to back it up.
So, as I read the article, I look to see if the authors use any outside findings to support their
argument, and they do. Kennedy, Cameron, and Greene use forty-four outside sources
throughout their article to support their argument (29-30). The sources are not of little relation to
the subject material or of little credibility either. Most of the outside sources that are used in the
article are scholarly scientific articles that give away to emerging evidence from various studies
that helped to make Kennedy, Cameron, and Greene's ideas that much more persuasive. The
following quote is one of many examples of past findings from articles being used in Kennedy,
Cameron, and Greene's article: "Pelletier and Coter (2005) reported child outcomes to be related
to the quality of interactions between parents, teacher and child during transition, not the child’s
maturational status alone" (Kennedy, Cameron, and Greene 21). The scholarly scientific articles
are taken from reputable Psychology journals, such as Psychology in the Schools, Early
Childhood Research Quarterly, Journal of Applied Developmental Psychology, and Education
Psychology in Practice. However, there is some outside information from books, such as
Successful Kindergarten Transitions: Your guide to connect children, families and schools and
The Ecology of Human Development: Experiments by nature and design (Kennedy, Cameron,
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and Greene 29-30). In the article there is no outside source used that seems unfitting to the
article's argument. Kennedy, Cameron, and Greene are very educated and aware of the advances
and information that is out there in the field of Psychology.
The article's authors frame their claims and the outside sources in a very organized and
clear manner. They start off the article by instantly grabbing the audience's attention with a great
and fitting outside quote "...The first day of school, the transfer to 'big school' are landmarks in
the process of growing up..." (qtd. in Kennedy, Cameron, and Greene 19). The article is framed
into eight sections: "Introduction and Context", "Perspectives on Transition", "Child readiness
versus school readiness", "Psychologists and transition readiness", "Practice issues for
educational and child psychologists", "From theory and research to action", "Future research and
practice development", and "Concluding comments" (Kennedy, Cameron, and Greene 19-28).
These sections allow an easy transition between each point being made. Some ideas within these
sections are broken down into concise bullet points, which clear up any confusion the ideas
might bring. Also, the bullet points give the ideas more detail. Having more detail and being able
to further explain shows the knowledge of the authors and the authors concern for the intended
audience. There are two diagrams in the article, and they allow the authors to add substance
visually to their information. This lets the authors make their work credible while also
simplifying their thoughts for those that learn in a visual manner.
The Educational & Child Psychology journal, which is where "Transitions in the early
years: Educational and child psychologists working to reduce the impact of school culture shock"
is from, incorporates peer-reviewed articles that fit under the scientific genre. Therefore, the
article is written to reach the minds of other psychologists. Psychologists know an article has to
be reliable if it is put into a distinguished psychology journal, such as the Educational & Child
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Psychology. Psychology journals are of the scientific genre, so just by their genre psychologists
flock to the articles hoping to gather beneficial information because they find the psychology
journals to be of credible use to their field of study. The genre in the specific article is of a
scholarly and scientific tone. The tone can be heard through scientific vocabulary, evidence from
past studies, scientific models and processes, and new ideas and innovations. For example,
Kennedy, Cameron, and Greene explain the key terms of article, such as culture, transition, child
readiness, and school readiness, but not in their common denotation. Rather, they explain terms
in their scientific denotation. The term "transition" is quoted in the article from another author as
being "…whenever a person’s position in the ecological environment is altered as a result of
change in role, setting or both…" (qtd. in Kennedy, Cameron, and Greene 20). One more
example is that the authors compare and contrast the Child Effects Model and the Ecological and
Dynamic Model. They explain the Child Effects Model in the terms that the child's maturity
level and specific traits is a predictor of how well he or she is going to do in school (Kennedy,
Cameron, and Greene 22). Whereas, the article's authors explain the Ecological and Dynamic
Model in the terms that transition over time is a complex system where the child experiences
changes in their relationships with their teacher, peers, family and neighbors (Kennedy,
Cameron, and Greene 23). This example shows that the tone corresponds to the scientific genre
of the article.
Furthermore, the tone corresponds to the purpose of the article. "Transitions in the early
years: Educational and child psychologists working to reduce the impact of school culture shock"
is not meant to be written for People's magazine, whose sole purpose is to entertain the audience.
Rather, it is written for psychologists, specifically child and education psychologists, so that they
can utilize the valuable information in their future scientific practices and in their interactions
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with others in the school setting. The specific article is educational because it offers suggestions
to psychologists on how they can apply the findings to their own work and it lays the
groundwork to methods that they can utilize. For example, psychologists can apply the Ready
Schools framework. "Arising from this paper, an obvious piece of research that could be
undertaken by psychologists is an analysis of the Ready Schools framework and the menu of
interventions that relate to the framework" (Kennedy, Cameron, and Greene 27). The general
purpose of any paper is to reach the intended audience through the use of rhetorical thematic
elements in order to form and cultivate an opinion. Kennedy, Cameron, and Greene's paper
succeeded flawlessly in doing just that. They utilize elements like tone, syntax, style, point of
view, mood, diction, and denotation to the best of their ability in order to teach and persuade
fellow psychologists.
Children enter into a school environment not ready and not knowing what to expect.
Their transition process is full of mixed emotions and frightening interactions because of the
culture shock. In their article, "Transitions in the early years: Educational and child psychologists
working to reduce the impact of school culture shock", Kennedy, Cameron, and Greene do a
great job of incorporating and explaining beneficial processes that can be used in achieving
readiness for school in children. Child and educational psychologists should really take the time
to read this article and hopefully even employ some of the ideas into their own practices because
the article is of high quality and of a very influential nature. The article's authors show credibility
through their profession as child and educational psychologists who work on team called
Integrated Child Support Service. They use reputable outside sources to support their claims and
to show how they are knowledgeable and credible. The article is put into a clear and organized
structure, which greatly benefits the intended audience. Education & Child Psychology contains
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Kennedy, Cameron, and Greene's article, so it is of the scientific genre. Through the genre the
purpose of the article arises, which is to provide information for child and education
psychologists. Just as Kennedy, Cameron, and Greene are trying to show how to make school
transitioning reliable, I am trying to show how their article is reliable.
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Works Cited
"Child Support Services." Southwark Council. Southwark Council, 2013. Web. 18 Jan. 2013.
Kennedy, Emma-Kate, R. J. (Sean) Cameron, and Jennifer Greene. "Transitions In The Early
Years: Educational And Child Psychologists Working To Reduce The Impact Of School
Culture Shock." Educational And Child Psychology 29.1 (2012): 19-31. PsycINFO. Web.
16 Jan. 2013.