Allow table to go across left page border

Question

I have a quite wide table which goes beyond the right border of the page, which is okay to me, but I'd like it to be centered so that it oversteps also the left border and it becomes fully visible:

Is there a parameter I can set in the table to position it right? I already used the '\tiny' font size, I don't know how to better improve this.

Here's the table code:

    \documentclass[12pt,a4paper,oneside]{report} 
\usepackage[utf8]{inputenc}
\usepackage{booktabs,amssymb,caption}
    \usepackage{makecell}
    \begin{document}
    \begin{table}[!h]
    \tiny
    \centering
      \begin{tabular}{cccccccccccc}
        \toprule
        \thead{n. children\\in each stage} & \thead{SV\\simple} &  \thead{SV\\unacc.} & \thead{VS\\unacc.} &\thead{Root-WH\\argument} & \thead{WH-adjunct\\\textit{why} excluded} &\thead{Preposed\\Adv} & \thead{Root\\y/n}&\thead{Why}&\thead{Relative\\clauses} &  \thead{Topic} &  \thead{Embedding}\\
        \midrule
        5 &\checkmark &\checkmark&\checkmark&&&&&&&&\\
        12 &\checkmark&\checkmark&\checkmark&\checkmark&\checkmark&\checkmark&\checkmark&&&&\\
        34 &\checkmark&\checkmark&\checkmark&\checkmark&\checkmark&\checkmark&\checkmark&\checkmark&\checkmark&\checkmark&\checkmark\\
            \bottomrule
      \end{tabular}
    \caption*{\small{Number of children displaying specific syntactic structures in a repetition task, adapted from (\cite{Friedmann2021-xf}:16)}}
    \end{table}
    \end{document}

Thanks in advance!

Answer 1

If, for some reason, you don't want to transpose the table and you don't want to rotate the column headers by 90 degrees, you can still make the fit inside the width of the text block by (a) issuing the instruction \renewcommand\theadfont{\tiny}, to match the font size in use in the rest of the table, and (b) employing a tabular* environment (with a target width of \textwidth) instead of a tabular environment.

\documentclass{article}
\usepackage{makecell,booktabs,amssymb,caption}
\let\cm\checkmark % handy shortcut macro

\begin{document}
\begin{table}[!h]
\setlength\tabcolsep{0pt} % make LaTeX figure out intercolumn space
\tiny
\renewcommand\theadfont{\tiny}
\captionsetup{font=footnotesize,justification=raggedright}
%\centering % redundant
  \begin{tabular*}{\textwidth}{@{\extracolsep{\fill}} *{12}{c}}
  \toprule
  \thead{No.\ of children\\in each stage} & \thead{SV\\simple} &  \thead{SV\\unacc.} & 
  \thead{VS\\unacc.} & \thead{Root-WH\\argument} & \thead{WH-adjunct\\ \textit{why} excluded} &
  \thead{Proposed\\Adv} & \thead{Root\\y/n} & \thead{Why} & 
  \thead{Relative\\clauses} & \thead{Topic} & \thead{Embed-\\ding} \\
  \midrule
   5&\cm&\cm&\cm \\
  12&\cm&\cm&\cm&\cm&\cm&\cm&\cm \\
  34&\cm&\cm&\cm&\cm&\cm&\cm&\cm&\cm&\cm&\cm&\cm \\
  \bottomrule
  \end{tabular*}
  \caption*{Number of children displaying specific 
  syntactic structures in a repetition task, adapted 
  from \cite{Friedmann2021-xf}:16.}
\end{table}
\end{document}

Answer 2

I would suggest transposing the table so you don't have to negotiate different font sizes and angles for things to fit.

\documentclass{article} 

\usepackage{booktabs,amssymb}
\usepackage{makecell,array}

\begin{document}

\begin{table}
  \centering
  \begin{tabular}{ l *{3}{w{c}{2em}} }
    \toprule
    & \multicolumn{3}{c}{\makecell{Number of children \\ in each stage}} \\
    \cmidrule(lr){2-4}
    \multicolumn{1}{c}{Syntactic structure} & 5 & 12 & 34 \\
    \midrule
    SV simple                        & \checkmark & \checkmark & \checkmark \\
    SV unacc.                        & \checkmark & \checkmark & \checkmark \\
    VS unacc.                        & \checkmark & \checkmark & \checkmark \\
    Root-WH argument                 &            & \checkmark & \checkmark \\
    WH-adjunct \textit{why} excluded &            & \checkmark & \checkmark \\
    Preposed Adv                     &            & \checkmark & \checkmark \\
    Root y/n                         &            & \checkmark & \checkmark \\
    Why                              & \checkmark &            & \checkmark \\
    Relative clauses                 & \checkmark & \checkmark &            \\
    Topic                            &            &            & \checkmark \\
    Embedding                        & \checkmark &            &            \\
    \bottomrule
  \end{tabular}
  \caption{Number of children displaying specific syntactic structures in a repetition task, adapted from [X]}
\end{table}

\end{document}

Answer 3

Edit (2):
Now considering the edited question. ANd also load last version of table code. Now the first row is correctly spaced. i.e. aligned at bottom of the row.

One way is to rotate the columns' header texts. By this there is no need for the table to cross the text borders and use a smaller font size:

This can be done in many ways, I liked with use tabularraya, \makecell and rotating packages:

\documentclass[12pt,a4paper,oneside]{report} 
%---------------- show page layout. don't use in a real document!
\usepackage{showframe}
\renewcommand\ShowFrameLinethickness{0.15pt}
\renewcommand*\ShowFrameColor{\color{red}}
%---------------------------------------------------------------%
\usepackage{lipsum}% For dummy text. Don't use in a real document

\usepackage[font=small]{caption}
\usepackage{dingbat}
\newcommand\CM{\checkmark} %
\usepackage{rotating}
\usepackage{makecell}
\usepackage{tabularray}
\UseTblrLibrary{booktabs}

\begin{document}
\lipsum[11]

    \begin{table}[ht]
\renewcommand\theadfont{}
\settowidth\rotheadsize{in each stage}    % from makecell
\begin{tblr}{colspec = {@{} *{12}{X[c]} @{}}, 
             colsep  = 3pt,
             row{1}  = {cmd=\rothead, font=\linespread{0.9}\selectfont}, % <---
            }
    \toprule
n. children in each stage
    &   SV simple
        &   SV unacc.
            &   VS unacc.
                &   {Root-WH\\ argument}
                    &   WH-adjunct \textit{why} excluded
                        &   Preposed Adv
                            &   Root y/n
                                &   Why
                                    &   Relative clauses
                                        &   Topic
                                            &   Embedding   \\
    \midrule
5  & \CM & \CM & \CM &     &     &     &     &     &     &     &        \\
12 & \CM & \CM & \CM & \CM & \CM & \CM & \CM &     &     &     &        \\
34 & \CM & \CM & \CM & \CM & \CM & \CM & \CM & \CM & \CM & \CM & \CM    \\
   \bottomrule
\end{tblr}
\caption*{Number of children displaying specific syntactic structures in a repetition task, adapted from (\cite{Friedmann2021-xf}:16)}
    \end{table}
\lipsum[77]
\end{document}