This study explored children's experiences of instructional alignment from prekindergarten through kindergarten. Using cluster analysis to analyze data from over 1300 children in the 2009 Head Start Family and Child Experiences Survey, the study found that children have distinct and definable experiences of prekindergarten-kindergarten alignment,…

The growing diversity in schools in the United States resulting from the rising number of English learners (ELs) has put more pressure on both children and teachers. Teachers are faced with the challenge of meeting the educational needs of culturally and linguistically diverse (CLD) learners, including the unique needs of CLD children with…

Purpose: The purpose of this study was twofold: First, we replicated in a new sample our previous findings that a culturally and linguistically responsive (CLR) bilingual approach for English vocabulary instruction for preschool Latino dual language learners was effective. Subsequently, we investigated whether the positive effect of CLR…

This paper draws on practitioner inquiry and participatory action research methodologies to recount how five K-12 educators, who inhabit a range of positionalities and levels of teaching experience, engage in a collaborative professional development program, called Teaching Out Loud as they draw upon critical literacy theory and practice to…

With only 40% of students proficient in math by 4th grade, the U.S. faces an acute need to scale innovative approaches to help close the math achievement gap. Closing this gap is particularly critical in order to support effective Science, Technology, Engineering, and Mathematics (STEM) learning and prepare the future workforce for…

This longitudinal qualitative study examined the progression in the levels of writing conceptualizations in Spanish and English of 20 simultaneous bilingual children from PreK-K. Using a constructivist framework and a holistic bilingual perspective, we examined children's understandings about writing in their two languages as demonstrated in their…

The present study examined the relations between teacher-child interactions, teachers' Spanish use, classroom linguistic composition, and the school readiness skills of low-income, Latinx, Spanish-speaking dual language learners (DLLs), controlling for home and teacher background characteristics, with a national probability sample of Head Start…

The "school readiness gap" has been attributed to differences in family life, home-school connections, and social inequalities. The current school-parent partnership model fails to acknowledge the ways in which parent roles in education, and the home-school relations in which they are embedded, reflect broader social inequalities that…

Dual language learners are a growing population in early learning and care settings. Young DLLs have the potential to develop proficiency in two languages when provided adequate supports; however, most teachers of young DLLs feel inadequately prepared to support DLLs. Cultivating Oral Language and Literacy Talent in Students (COLLTS) is an…

As pre-kindergarten (pre-k) expands across the country, school districts are making choices about where to place pre-k classrooms and developing policies for how families can apply and who is enrolled. In doing so, districts are pulling policy levers that influence students' access to pre-k. Research shows that some families have less access to…

With the assistance of the National Science Foundation, the Hispanic Association of Colleges and Universities (HACU) convened a STEM Task Force, a diverse panel of scientists and university administrators, to help develop a set of recommendations on both policy changes and high-impact practices to improve the participation and success rates of…

Given the growing numbers of Latino children entering the U.S. educational system, there is a need to understand the ways Latino parents support their children's early education. However, tools used to measure family engagement have been developed primarily with middle-income, English-speaking European American families in the United States. The…

Increasingly, policymakers for federal and state preschool programs have raised credentialing requirements for early childhood education (ECE) teachers. Nationally, about one in five (19%) of all ECE teachers are Latina (NASEM, 2017). Latina teachers bring an incredible amount of experience to the classroom: 27% have between 10 and 15 years in the…

We tested a culturally integrative model examining the associations among economic hardship during infancy and Latino children's later sociobehavioral problems and academic skills prior to kindergarten entry, whether mothers' mental health problems and positive parenting behaviors mediated those associations, and whether they varied by mothers'…

With a qualitative approach drawing from four focus groups, this study explored what aspects of preschool are valued most by 30 low-income Latino/a immigrant parents with children enrolled in a state-funded preschool program in Texas. Beyond the push and pull factors of necessity, convenience, and supply, parents reported valuing the…