Part of the responsibility of early childhood educators is to help the children in their care develop into thoughtful, kind, contributing members of society. This includes being accepting and welcoming of those who are "different." Staff should be prepared to answer questions from young children regarding differences in race, ethnicity,…

The three-fold purpose of this mixed methods study was to (a) analyze how preservice teachers' perceptions of teacher preparation program variables affect preservice teachers self-efficacy for literacy instruction, (b) determine how preservice teachers describe their teacher preparation program with regard to self-efficacy beliefs for…

Finland recently adopted two national core curricula that apply to kindergartens (ages one through six). An early childhood education and care curriculum outlines expectations for children under seven (when school starts), while a preschool curriculum establishes guidelines specifically for six-year-olds. Both curricula describe broad principles,…

This article describes collaboration between preschool and university educators focused on adapting the Center for Research on Education, Diversity, and Excellence (CREDE) standards for Effective Pedagogy for use in early childhood (EC) settings. The CREDE standards are strategies of best practices for culturally diverse K-12 students. Teachers…

With the rising number of Latino and dual language learner (DLL) children attending pre-k and the importance of assessing the quality of their experiences in those settings, this study examined the extent to which a commonly used assessment of teacher-child interactions, the Classroom Assessment Scoring System (CLASS), demonstrated similar…

The Office of Special Education Programs funded Center to Inform Personnel Preparation Policy and Practice in Early Intervention and Preschool Education conducted a study to obtain current information about state certification requirements for early childhood special educators who work with preschool children with developmental delays and…

This article analyzes the interaction between teachers and children in kindergarten classrooms in order to identify and describe the discursive strategies of teachers that retrieve children's previous expressions to clarify and specify concepts represented in them. Data analyzed include 90 situations of teacher-children exchanges in 7 kindergarten…

As the United States moves toward expanding programs for pre-kindergarten children, leaders in higher education are asking themselves some how-to questions about implementation. This article summarizes nine facts about higher education. One of these facts is the growing demand for teachers qualified with a bachelor's degree in Early Care and…

The researchers studied humour among Chinese and Greek preschool children in relation to cognitive development. The sample included 55 Chinese children and 50 Greek children ages 4½ to 5½ years. Results showed that both Chinese and Greek children's humour recognition were significantly and positively correlated to their cognitive development, but…

This captivating book illuminates our understanding of how young children develop gender identities. A two year longitudinal research project on children's own understandings of gender casts new light on how 3 and 4 year old newcomers in early years classes learn rules for gendered behaviour from older children, in their imaginative and…

The Community Connections preschool program (herein referred to as Community Connections) was developed to help prepare children in home-based child care for success in school and in life. It has three goals: (1) to make state prekindergarten classroom experiences available to children in home-based care, (2) to extend classroom learning…

Though pre-school education is not compulsory in Turkey, having foreign language education in kindergarten has been an upward trend lately. Besides, as there has been an increasing demand on language education in kindergartens, a large number of kindergartens have begun to give English language education so as to meet the demand. However, most of…

Children need sound language and literacy skills to communicate with others and actively participate in a classroom learning community. When an early childhood classroom offers a language- and literacy-rich environment, children have numerous opportunities to practice language and literacy in a social setting. A language-rich classroom includes an…

This study used data drawn from a large, national sample to describe transition practices provided to 1989 children with disabilities as they entered their kindergarten year, obtained through a survey administered to kindergarten teachers. Using path modeling, we examined the child and family, school, and district factors that predict which…

This study examined 1 tool for evaluating Head Start teachers' knowledge about early language and literacy. Results indicated that teachers varied in their knowledge. Teachers with more knowledge had more education, as did teachers who received language and literacy professional development. Teachers with greater knowledge also demonstrated higher…