Family engagement is a key component of preschool program quality with the potential to benefit children's early learning skills. Yet, there is limited research on what practices teachers and programs use to engage families and whether these practices are associated with improved child outcomes. This study links administrative data on children's…

The aim of this study was to explore how the Coding as Another Language (CAL) curriculum, developed by Boston College's DevTech Research Group and utilizing the ScratchJr app, impacted students' computational thinking, coding skills, and reading comprehension. To accomplish this, the research team randomly assigned thirteen schools in a…

Research Findings: The current study examined whether collective small-group behavioral engagement and teacher behavior management during small-group instruction predicted print knowledge, phonological awareness, letter writing, and expressive vocabulary gains for preschoolers at-risk for literacy difficulties. This study, part of a larger…

Early childhood education programs (ECE) invest in assessments of classroom quality to enable accountability and to enact efforts towards quality improvement. The "Early Childhood Environment Rating System -- Revised" (ECERS-R) and "Classroom Assessment Scoring System" (CLASS) are two widely used classroom quality assessments…

A gap exists in the information needed to make intervention decisions with preschool children who are unresponsive to instructional intervention. "Multi-Tiered System of Supports/Response to Intervention" (MTSS/RTI) progress monitoring is helpful in indicating when an intervention change is needed but provides little information on what…

Media use could be detrimental to children's language and literacy skills because it may displace other language-enhancing activities like shared reading and caregiver-child interactions. Furthermore, the extent to which children use media with adults (joint media engagement), the extent to which they use interactive media (apps/games), and the…

Professional development (PD) can enhance educators' knowledge and beliefs, but research has yet to determine the nature and extent of such change. This study examined the patterns and predictors of change in knowledge and beliefs for early childhood educators participating in state-implemented PD. Results from a longitudinal piecewise growth…

The current study investigated the predictive utility among teacher-rated, observed, and directly assessed behavioral self-regulation skills to academic achievement in preschoolers. Specifically, this study compared how a teacher report, the Child Behavior Rating Scale, an observer report, the Observed Child Engagement Scale, and a direct…

The purposes of this study were to (a) examine the degree to which teachers used linguistically responsive practices to support the language and literacy development of Spanish-speaking Dual Language Learners (DLL) and (b) to investigate the associations between these practices and select teacher-level factors. The sample consisted of 72 preschool…

A socioeconomic status (SES) gap in mathematical knowledge emerges early and widens prior to school entry. To address this gap, a curricular intervention, "Pre-K Mathematics," was developed and found to be effective in prior efficacy research. In the present project, the next step was taken in evaluating this intervention. Specifically,…