Reflective and collaborative learning can help teachers to better understand their students. Preservice teachers are busy managing initial experiences and often do not have the time nor the depth of experience from which to reflect more on the art of teaching. The University of Toledo in Toledo, Ohio, provides such an opportunity for early…

The proliferation of computer software for young children necessitates that early childhood teachers have the knowledge and skills needed to evaluate and select developmentally appropriate software. This article describes the manner in which one university prepares early childhood teacher candidates to analyze software for the young children in…

A marked difference in the quality of reading lesson plans after early childhood education students were required to use the Unit Builder feature in a web-based productivity tool (TaskStream) prompted the design of a study to measure significant changes. A rubric was created that meshed the qualities of effective teachers of literacy and the…

Changing times and postmodern perspectives have disrupted the taken-for-granted relationship between child development knowledge and the preparation of early childhood teachers. Despite ongoing exchanges about how best to respond to the critique of the developmental knowledge base, few descriptions of how particular teacher educators have gone…

Teacher education programs that want their future teachers to embrace and employee constructivist principles must strive to provide opportunities for teacher candidates to develop an understanding of constructivism. The paper presents a structure for embedding constructivist principles into early childhood and elementary teacher education courses…

Teachers for the twenty-first century for the global world need to be proficient in technology and skilled as reflective practitioners. They need to be able to reflect on diversity in myriad ways: learning styles, special needs, cultural differences, racial differences, developmentally appropriate differences, teaching styles and personality…

How does a university teacher education program stay afloat in a continuous sea of change? The purpose of this paper is to exemplify a university early childhood studies program revision experience. It identifies internal motivational change forces, such as personnel and cultural change, and external forces, such as federal mandates, best…

This article reports findings from a qualitative interview study that examined the provision of integrated kindergarten education for children with disabilities from the perspectives of general education teachers implementing integrated kindergarten programs. Analysis of interviews with eight informants led to the identification of two broad…

This research project sought to develop a measure to examine the family-centered beliefs, skills, work systems, and work practices of early childhood intervention, (ECI) and early childhood education (ECE) graduate students. The study was guided by four research questions: (1) To what extent do graduate students from preservice preparation…

"R&D Alert" covers issues affecting schools in the Western Regional Educational Laboratory's four-state region--Arizona, California, Nevada, and Utah--and throughout the United States. This issue of "R&D Alert" shares what WestEd is learning from a sample of their latest work, focusing on three points in the process:…

The development of the Early Childhood Education and Care (ECEC) sector in the UK and the development of knowledge and skills in the ECEC workforce, involves participants not only in becoming informed about research carried out by others, but in actively being researchers. This is particularly relevant to the increasing number of those reading for…

The preschool years ages 3 and 4 are extremely important for social, emotional, physical, and cognitive development. The purpose of this article is to discuss the importance of preschool to heighten awareness and inform administrators, educators, families, and policymakers about the value of preschool and in particular preschool literacy…

In this self-study we examine our collaborative practice across two undergraduate early childhood education methods courses. Framed by our larger question of how teachers and teacher educators do school, we drew on multiple data sources to investigate how we were modeling teaching, listening, and learning to and with these students in our science…

As more children with disabilities are served in early childhood settings, preservice training programs have a responsibility to provide future early childhood educators with the knowledge, skills, and confidence to actively participate as a team member in meeting the needs of young children with disabilities. This article provides a description…

Over the last decade, research related to personal epistemological beliefs has offered insight into how to promote effective teaching and learning across educational settings. Personal epistemological beliefs reflect an individual's views about what knowledge is, how knowledge is gained, and the degree of certainty with which knowledge can be…