Instructional coaching is an innovative approach to professional development that, while challenging, has significant benefits for teachers and children. Using reflective practice strategies--including posing open-ended questions to teachers and videotaping classes--coaches help teachers analyze their teaching and its impact on children. Coaches…

Reflection is essential to the professional development of those working with young children and their parents. It is a deeply personal process that requires a commitment to and assurance of safety for the supervisee. This article recounts the author's personal and professional journey through reflective supervision he received as a teacher…

Gossiping staff in early childhood programs models destructive behavior and harms families' trust in the professionalism of the program. Bruno identifies some of the causes and motives for gossip and examines its occurrence in early care and education settings. She offers step-by-step strategies to help supervisors set and enact policies that…

This is the fourth in a series of four booklets describing the Child Development Associate (CDA) Project at the California State College in Pennsylvania, one of the 13 original CDA pilot programs. Topics covered in this booklet include: a rationale for teacher trainer programs; a review of research on the importance of teacher interpersonal…

This paper reports on the implementation and informal evaluation of Project HEVRA--a cross-cultural inservice education program provided to supervisor/advisers of kindergarten teachers in Israel. Through inservice seminars initiated by an American consultant in conjunction with Israeli counterparts and through a series of monthly meetings,…

Swedish teachers are currently expected to become more involved in school improvement based on the findings of research. One of the main goals of this work is to develop practice in its own contexts. Teachers become involved in action and research or, in other words, the combination of practice and theory. A central issue in this work is whether…

In 1914-15, the Bureau of Education made a study of kindergarten training schools, the results of which were published in Bulletin, 1916, No. 5. Following the publication of this bulletin, a number of supervisors of kindergartens throughout the United States requested the Bureau of Education to make a study of kindergarten supervision similar to…