This paper shares reflections and stories from a collaborative design process between the Lifelong Kindergarten group at the MIT Media Lab and a global network of community-based educators to develop a creative coding app called OctoStudio, which supports children and families to create and share interactive projects on mobile devices. The app…

Place-based initiatives, such as the federal Promise Neighborhoods grant, attempt to coordinate interventions, supports, and services with a myriad of organizations to targeted communities. Although Institutions of Higher Education (IHEs), inclusive of academic medical institutions, are among the most overall researched anchor institution,…

In this article, we present the evaluation of a kindergarten teachers' professional development programme, 'Upgrading the quality of the pre-school environment' conducted by the participating teacher--thee programme is aimed at the improvement of the quality of Early Childhood Education and Care. The evaluation, which followed a mixed-method…

Research and theory suggests that children and families are best served by a preschool to third grade approach (PreK-3) to early childhood education that is aligned, integrated, and based on developmentally appropriate practice. Because of the recent expansion of publicly funded preschool programs, principals are becoming increasingly responsible…

This study sought to evaluate the self-learning curricula of a kindergarten in Saudi Arabia by applying the context, input, process, product (CIPP) model. To this end, the study utilized a mixed-method design, where teachers (N = 420) had been randomly selected and surveyed, and school inspectors (N = 15) had been interviewed. Furthermore, a…

Play, of varied type and form, provides opportunities for children to acquire a sense of competence and belonging when engaging in classroom life. The purpose of this study was to investigate ways that the inclusion of play as a curricular component eased academic stressors and supported motivation during the transition to kindergarten. In this…

This guidebook aspires to build a community where learning for sustainable development takes place everywhere for everyone as an ongoing practice. It introduces you to "Reflect-Share-Act," a process to discover and define sustainable development in your own contexts together with others in your community. The guide compiles resources…

Collaborative reflection refers to the process by which members of a community reflect through social interaction, as well as to the outcomes of this process. In this study, we adopted a sociocultural perspective to examine the obstacles a group of Chinese kindergarten teachers faced with collaborative reflection in collectivist cultural contexts.…

This book uses the water crisis in Flint, Michigan, as a touchstone for the importance and value of including place-based education in the social studies curriculum. Whitlock scrutinizes this local environmental issue to not only drive critical inquiry in the classroom, but also to show how the curriculum can propel valuable social change in the…

The purpose of the study was to investigate the extent of community members' involvement in school activities to enhance teacher attendance in the East Mamprusi District of Northern Ghana. The research design was a survey. Stratified sampling method was employed to group the study population into five (5) strata of teaching staff, SMC/PTA…

In this study, we used data from a cohort of 4,033 Tulsa kindergarten students to investigate the relationship between pre-K enrollment and later college enrollment. Specifically, we tested whether participation in the Tulsa Public Schools universal pre-K program and the Tulsa Community Action Project (CAP) Head Start program predicted enrollment…

Bullying-related phenomena are reported as growing problems in early childhood education and care (ECEC), which calls for structures for teachers' handling of these problems. Using an approach that emphasises bullying as a social, socially situated and contextual phenomenon, we investigate how such an approach can facilitate a positive change in…

Using data from a 2-year empirical project in an urban school within the United States, this article describes how educators of preschool, transitional-kindergarten and kindergarten (PreK-TK-K) altered perceptions and practices as a result of participating in a purposefully crafted professional learning community using collaborative enquiry.…

This study examined kindergarten teachers' views about the importance and uses of school, family, and community partnerships (SFCPs) in Riyadh City, Saudi Arabia. We used Epstein's model of SFCPs and explored the roles of teacher, family, and community support for parenting skills, two-way communication, volunteering, learning at home,…

The Lesson Study is a professional development model that places teachers at the center of practice and is used in the professional development of teachers who are currently in teacher training or currently in service. In Turkey, the professional development of teachers from various branches is also supported by using this model. However, no…