Excessive exposure to sunlight during early childhood increases the risk of developing skin cancer. Self-administered questionnaires exploring sun-protection knowledge, practices and policy were mailed to the directors/co-ordinators/senior teachers of all known early childhood services in Queensland, Australia, in 2002 (n = 1383; 56.5% response).…

A Child Development Associate (CDA) training project director in north New Jersey initiated a practicum to create in-service training conditions and supervisory teacher attitudes that supported the teaching efforts of assistant teachers who were working toward CDA certification in a college-based program. Specific goals of the 3-month intervention…

The aim of this research was to find out what kindergarten teachers, parents and kindergarten student teachers think about education and about themselves as educators. The basic question was: what kind of similarities and differences are there between these groups of educators? The sample consisted of 21 parents, 28 kindergarten teachers and 37…

This exploratory study examined the relations among characteristics of children's home environments and two school readiness skills: their oral language and social functioning. Low SES Latino mothers of 122 (65 girls; 57 boys) preschoolers (39-49 months (M=45.00; S.D.=5.40) completed questionnaires about their family demography, their home…

Problem Based Learning (PBL) has been used with increased frequency in Higher Education settings since first introduced by Barrows and Tamblyn during the 1980's. Since this time PBL has been used in medical, engineering and education faculties to support pre-service students in the acquisition of skills and content knowledge relevant to their…

This paper describes the procedures, instrumentation, data analysis and results of a pilot study of the extent of teachers' knowledge of (1) toy safety and (2) teachers' and children's preferences for toys. The survey was conducted in the form of a 22-item questionnaire administered during a training workshop for Head Start teachers. Teachers were…

This study investigated the management approaches employed by nursery teachers in Greece to deal with children's behavior problems. In particular, the extent, frequency of use, and effectiveness of behavioral, cognitive, and punitive approaches were investigated with regard to conduct, emotional, and developmentally related problems. Participating…

Examines basic attitudes of the teacher toward teaching reading. (RK)

The aim of this study is to introduce a goal programming based on a holistic approach for the evaluation of "early childhood development support project", which was applied in some cities in Turkey. Like in many other areas, statistical methods are widely used in research on pre-school education. According to the literature, very few…

This practicum report describes a 12-week intervention designed to help parent volunteers in six kindergarten classrooms better perform their volunteer work, which included such tasks as grading papers, decorating bulletin boards, and listening to children read. Objectives of the intervention were that: (1) a total of 90 percent of volunteers…

A practicum project was designed to retrain preschool personnel on the importance of indoor play and on their role during play sessions. Workshops and training sessions were developed to examine the physical environment of the classroom, discuss play theories, and review skills that children can develop during play sessions. Pre- and posttests,…

For the two past two decades, a child-centered view and integration of curriculum have become critical to developing literacy. Also, the emphasis on the importance of the teacher's role in teaching literacy has increased. Thus, teachers have been provided with the opportunity to reflect on their beliefs about children literacy and to increase…

The aim of this study was to investigate the relationship between pre-school teachers' discipline beliefs and normative-humanistic orientations. The sample consisted of 156 female pre-school teachers from public (89%) and private (12%) pre-schools in the western Anatolian region of Turkey. A Polarity Scale consisting of 45 items related to…

This practicum was designed to heighten preschool teachers' awareness of gender bias in the classroom and provide information on gender equity issues and the pursuit of the study of mathematics by girls. Its goal was to enable 20 preschool teachers in 3 preschool programs to increase their knowledge of gender equity and to use this knowledge in…

In the European context the continuing training of early childhood educators in terms of information and communications technology (ICT) remains limited and is in need of development. The KINDERET project has been funded through the European Commission's "Leonardo da Vinci" programme aimed to identify and understand the theoretical and…