The Japanese pedagogical strategy of mimamoru (watch and protect) has been identified by cross-culture researchers as an implicit component of early childhood education in Japan. However, little is known about the types of advice given by experts to parents regarding mimamoru. Accordingly, this study examined expert advice related to the mimamoru…

Early intervention (EI) practitioners are expected to coach families in embedding intervention strategies for their infant or toddler within their everyday routines. EI practitioners use authentic assessment approaches (i.e., observation and discussion) to gain a real-life picture of what the child is good at and what can be difficult to identify…

Developing a cultural formulation during a diagnostic assessment with a young child is the foundation for work with diverse families. It requires critical reflection on the part of the clinician about the socio-cultural, historical, and political influences and consequently aspects of privilege and oppression in their own lives and professional…

The child's emerging sense of identity is deeply informed by their culture. Teachers who are called to work with children 0-3 know and understand that their role in the children's lives is to create a kind of second womb for them in the Infant & Toddler years; this second womb is created with the carefully prepared environment. After the…

This research develops a context-sensitive understanding of infant toilet training that takes account of a diversity of influences on the phenomenon. Data are drawn from a qualitative study of everyday life in families with young children. Parents in 54 families living in Norway were interviewed about the everyday life of the family during their…

Through observations and interviews and guided by Socio-cultural Theory, this article seeks to describe how dominant approaches to parenting shape child-caregiver interactions within childcare settings. The research question that guided this study is; how do commonly held cultural assumptions about gender, discipline and the purposes of early…

This paper discusses findings from online surveys completed by parents of 0-3-year-old children in Norway, Portugal and Japan concerning their young children's use of touchscreen technology. The study investigated parental practices, views and perspectives related to children's digital practices and explored these in relation to wider cultural…

Purpose: This study investigates how the variables of culture and hearing status might influence the amount of parent-child talk families engage in throughout an average day. Method: Seventeen Vietnamese and 8 Canadian families of children with hearing loss and 17 Vietnamese and 13 Canadian families with typically hearing children between the ages…

Infants and toddlers (birth to age 3) learn what it means to be members of, and to belong to and be accepted by, their societies by adopting behaviors, attitudes, manners, and ways of thinking that are deeply rooted in what is valued in their culture. Infant and toddler teachers play a pivotal role as transmitters and maintainers of culture when…

This paper provides an overview of the features of caregiver input that facilitate language learning across early childhood. We discuss three dimensions of input quality: interactive, linguistic, and conceptual. All three types of input features have been shown to predict children's language learning, though perhaps through somewhat different…

How do very young children develop a sense of identity and belonging culturally, and how can this sense be supported by early care and education teachers and programs? This article examines literature associated with identity and belonging in early childhood and how those who work closely with children and families can incorporate best practices…

Certain social context features (e.g., maternal presence) are known to increase young children's exploration, a key process by which they learn. Yet limited research investigates the role of social context, especially peer presence, in exploration across development. We investigate whether the effect of peer presence on exploration is mediated by…

This study examines the relationship between the psychological states of Korean mothers and early childhood development. In the study, 480 mothers were classified into three groups: cluster A mothers were happy and competent, cluster C were depressed and stressed, and cluster B were neither depressed nor happy. The tendency of infant developmental…

In some areas of rural Africa, long-standing cultural traditions and beliefs may discourage parents from verbally engaging with their young children. This study assessed the effectiveness of a parenting program designed to encourage verbal engagement between caregivers and infants in Wolof-speaking villages in rural Senegal. Caregivers (n = 443)…

Although child-rearing beliefs and practices vary widely across cultures, a dominant discourse on how to teach and care for young children undergirds most early childhood teacher education programs. In this qualitative multicase study, the authors explored the ways that immigrant preservice teachers negotiated their emerging teacher identities…