Tested the reliability and validity of a teacher-completed checklist to identify movement difficulties in a sample of 3- to 5-year-olds. Analysis showed that the checklist identified movement difficulties and found significant differences between children who displayed movement difficulties and those who did not. Interrater reliability and…

Presents overview of emerging field of early childhood special education in China. Discusses classification and prevalence of special needs children, service delivery options, and early intervention programs. Examines curricula for special needs preschoolers, preparation of special educators, and parent involvement. Calls for increase in early…

The speech children spontaneously quote was examined in 2 studies involving personal narratives from 96 children aged 4 to 9 and speech in 25 children aged 1 to 5. Findings showed that frequency of reported speech increased with age and direct quotation was more common than indirect or summarized quotations at all ages. (57 references) (Author/LB)

A classroom-wide intervention on direction following, sharing, and problem solving was embedded in a story and song format for 53 Head Start children. Results indicate significant improvements for participants on adaptive behaviors, social interaction, and attentional measures. Children at risk for behavior disorders either significantly improved…

This commentary reviews previous articles that discuss major educational approaches for young children with autism, including applied behavior analysis, pivotal response training, and the developmental, individual-difference, relationship-based model. It emphasizes the need for research on which children do better with which particular…

Background: Family history of mood disorders and stressful life events are both established risk factors for childhood depression. However, the role of mediators in risk trajectories, which are potential targets for intervention, remains understudied. To date, there have been no investigations of mediating relationships between risk factors and…

Resilience is an important trait because it is the human capacity to face, overcome, be strengthened by, and even transformed by the adversities of life. This guide provides ways to promote resilience in children and help them learn to improve many aspects of their own resilience. The guide is centered on three features, or sources, of resilience:…

This report compares the educational experiences of young children and their teachers in England, Sweden, and Spain. Data on which the report is based was derived from two studies of educational quality and teacher training throughout Europe. For each of the three countries reported, a description is presented of early childhood curriculum,…

This study assessed the relationship between cognitive style and reading readiness, and examined effects of age and gender on measures of cognitive style and reading readiness. Subjects were 33 males and 27 females between 4 and 7 years of age. All subjects scored within the average range of intellectual functioning and were not color blind.…

A study examines teacher's and children's interactions with the use of the writing journal in a pre-k classroom (ages 3 to 4). Eight pre-school children and three teachers in a university lab school were observed twice a week for 1-hour sessions over a 6-month period. The use of the writing journal was a part of the total learning environment…

If used carefully and with appropriate developmental expectations, primary source materials can assist children as they construct knowledge related to change and continuity. A study demonstrating this conclusion observed, videotaped, and photographed children at different stages of development as they played with specific primary source materials…

Conducted in Swaziland in 1984 and 1985, this research study explored children's logical thinking skills. One of the primary elements examined was the relationship between previous preschool experience and the child's ability to perform logical thinking tasks. The study consisted of six Piagetian tasks given to 400 children, preschool through…

This paper reports on an investigation of children's ability to accept contrary-to-fact premises as though they were factual and to reason accordingly. A variety of questions requiring this skill were presented in semi-structured interview form to 10 to 12 subjects from each of six age groups ranging from 5 to 9 years, and to a control group of…

This paper discusses several studies related to the interplay of verbal and nonverbal communication in young children and presents educational implications of this research. Two areas of nonverbal communication are considered: kinesics, or the use of body movements as displays of affection and emotion and as regulators of communication, and…

This paper presents a study of the relationship between scores on the Bayley measures of mental and motor development administered at 8 months of age and performance on measures of cognitive development and school achievement administered at ages 4, 5, 6, and 7. Also studied are changes in this relationship which occur when children with extreme…