This study examined the effects of maternal and children's resources on school readiness, literacy achievements, and reading motivation in children. The participants included children (N = 180) (124 girls; 56 boys) from 19 kindergartens, their mothers, and their kindergarten teachers. Mothers reported on their working hours, interaction quality,…

Research Findings: This study focused on kindergartens serving low SES families and examined the associations between teachers' perceptions of their teaching experiences in their classroom and observed global classroom quality. Forty teachers and their classrooms participated. Teachers' perceptions of their teaching experiences in the classroom…

This study aims to examine the effects of an intervention model, "Change Nutrition by Doing," in which children act as agents of change -- by 'doing' -- in taking responsibility for the contents of the lunch box they bring from home to consume at an early childhood centre. This quasi-randomised case-control trial consisted of 35 Israeli…

This article describes preschool teachers' espoused mental models (EMMs) or, in other words, their naive understanding of young children's learning. Our research goal was to examine differences within the teachers' EMMs regarding the minds and learning of young children from different cultural backgrounds. The subjects included 18 preschool…

Poor nutrition is a major risk factor affecting proper development of children. However, there is limited knowledge about the way in which this subject is being integrated into professionals' work in early childhood education programs dealing with situations of children-at-risk. A study on this subject was conducted with 60 professionals who…

Societies can examine themselves and their values through examining their literature and the way they use literature in values education. This research investigated the values embodied in children's literature used by early childhood teachers in Israeli state schools. On the basis of questionnaires completed by 14 early childhood educators, and…