Research Findings: Better understanding the correlates of teacher stress is critical to develop effective, targeted prevention and intervention efforts to decrease early childhood educator stress and ultimately improve outcomes for educators and young children. Previous studies of early childhood educator stress have mostly focused on teacher…

Early care and education programs like Head Start provide a critical foundation for later achievement for children from vulnerable communities. Notably, recruiting and retaining bilingual teachers is an ongoing struggle for many Head Start agencies. Assistant teachers are more likely to be bilingual than their lead teacher counterparts (Jacoby, in…

Research Findings: The current study explored the patterns of collaboration among early childhood educators in order to understand the extent to which collaborations exist for practitioners, either formally or informally, within and across public preschool, Head Start, and child care sectors in a community and the extent to which work environment…

Research Findings: We examined the amount of preschool lead/assistant teachers' English/Spanish language use and relations between quality of teacher-child interactions, and Dual Language Learners' (DLLs) English/Spanish bilingual vocabulary in 31 English-medium Head Start classrooms. Measures in this study included (a) children's conceptual…

The objective of this project was to develop and pilot a small-scale professional development program that incorporated substantial group and one-on-one mentoring aimed at preparing rurally based preschool teacher assistants to earn the Child Development Associate (CDA) credential. Using a framework that emphasized the relational, developmental,…

Research Findings: The purpose of the present study is to examine the degree to which assistant and lead teachers work together in Head Start classrooms in 3 domains: emotional support, classroom organization, and instructional support. Pairs of lead and assistant teachers from 14 Head Start classrooms were simultaneously observed for 1 morning to…

The purpose of this demonstration was to evaluate a universal intervention during teacher-identified routines that were characterized by significant classwide problem behavior. Six Head Start classrooms (seven groups of children, with one classroom divided into two groups) received two workshops and two coaching sessions on universal Positive…

This exploratory study examined the effectiveness of child teacher relationship training (CTRT) with at-risk preschool children exhibiting disruptive behavior. The participants included a total of 23 Head Start teachers and their aides, and children identified by their teachers as exhibiting clinical or borderline levels of externalizing behavior…

This paper explores the experiences of teaching assistants studying for a Foundation degree programme and the perceived impacts such a programme has on their job role and self-esteem. A review of the related literature gave rise to three research questions that were addressed via focus groups with teaching assistants employed across four different…

Head Start teachers and their aides (n = 24) were assigned to either the experimental or active control treatment in this preliminary investigation on the effects of Child Teacher Relationship Training (CTRT) on 52 disadvantaged preschool children identified with behavioral problems. CTRT is based on the principles and procedures of Child Parent…

Describes what happened to the Head Start teacher aide idea when it was taken over by middle-class schools. (Author)

This report of the Teacher Aide Program in the Minneapolis, Minn., Public Schools, funded under Title I of the Elementary and Secondary Education Act, is divided into four sections. The first section is "An Overview of the Evaluation of the Teacher Aide Program, Academic Year, 1966-67." The next two sections summarize questionnaire…

The Career Opportunities Program (COP) is a nationwide program established under the Education Professions Development Act of 1967 to train and employ low-income community residents and Vietnam-era veterans as educational auxiliaries for poverty area schools. Indiana University at South Bend (IUSB), in cooperation with the South Bend Community…

Describes small-scale volunteer program developed at Barnett Shoals School, Clarke County, Georgia. (DS)