Volunteers pose a special area of concern for child care centers. On one hand, they are indispensable as they donate countless hours of time, energy, and resources. On the other hand, there are challenges to coordinating the efforts of volunteering parents. The use of volunteers has incredible potential for benefit from the center, child, and…

Early care and education can prepare children for school, but while some preschool and child care programs do an excellent job, others are inadequate and some may even harm healthy development. This study focuses on child care center directors to better understand why there is so much variation, and how public initiatives can better help…

Of the over 6 million students earning college credit at community colleges, 1.7 million (27 percent) are parents. Of those, about 1 million (16 percent) are single parents, more than twice the proportion at 4-year institutions. Three-quarters of single parents in college are women. One study of student parents attending community college found…

The purpose of this investigation was to evaluate if infants at three developmental ages could respond using graphic symbols during a choice-making task. An alternating treatment design was used to illustrate infants' response when presented with two types of graphic symbols. A total of nine items were presented to each infant and were randomly…

For 20 years, Advocates for Children of New Jersey has published the Newark Kids Count Data Book, a one-stop source for child well-being data on our state's largest city. Newark Kids Count includes the latest statistics, along with five-year trend data, in the following areas: demographics, family economic security, food insecurity, child health,…

While there has been extensive research exploring quality in childcare programs for children older than three years, less attention has been directed to the nature of infants' experiences in centre-based childcare programs. In this study, six childcare workers and six centre directors located in centre-based childcare programs in metropolitan…

The purpose of this study was to investigate the impact of participation in a research mentorship team (RMT) on early childhood teachers' professional identities. The participants were seven early childhood teachers engaged in preservice teacher supervision at a university-affiliated child care center who volunteered to be members of the RMT…

Estimates of school-aged English learners are derived from national counts of children enrolled in school. There is no precise analogue for preschool children, and hence there is no exact nationwide count of this population of children. The number of 3- and 4-year old children enrolled in center-based care is rising, and some center-based programs…

Previous work has found that many young children show different patterns of production of the hormone cortisol, which is sensitive to stress and challenge, on days when they are at child care compared with days when they are at home. At home, preschool age children typically show a decreasing pattern of cortisol production across the day which is…

This paper explores the conceptual underpinnings of the routine disrespect shown to young children in everyday life in cultures around the world. General Comment 7 of the Committee on the Rights of the Child urges that the youngest children should be respected as persons in their own right, within an environment of reliable and affectionate…

As Co-Founder of the Alliance for Early Childhood Finance, it is the author's job to think about how they pay for early care and education (ECE) services in the United States. Generating the operating revenue needed to establish and sustain a high-quality ECE program has never been easy--and in a recession economy it is becoming even more…

Skagit/Islands Head Start (SIHS) in Washington State has always taken pride in its high-quality learning program. But in spring 2002, a problem was discovered: the child assessments from 13 centers serving children from birth to age 5 indicated that although Spanish-speaking 3-year-olds entered with language and literacy skills at a level similar…

Grasping both the extent and the actual situation of psychosomatic disorders, neurotic habits and developmental disorders of infancy and childhood is vital for their prevention and for taking appropriate measures to deal with the current situation. The purpose of this study is to explore the current situation of infant mental health in Japanese…

Illustrates how the director and teachers of a child care program and the staff of a residential nursing home facility collaborated to develop, implement, and evaluate an onsite intergenerational program. Describes program goals; recruitment plan; elder, staff, and teacher orientation; options for intergenerational activities; and program…

The idea that classroom social ecologies are shaped by the aggregate effects of peers' prior care experiences is provocative, even though the evidence is weak that this explains the small and diminishing effect of childcare experience in the National Institute of Child Health and Human Development study. Small effects may indeed be small effects,…