Although most teachers are familiar with growth mindsets, many conflate it with other terms or concepts or have difficulties understanding how to best foster growth mindsets in their students. Shelby Clark and Madora Soutter describe how growth mindsets are related to, yet distinct from, intellectual risk-taking and share strategies for fostering…

Many global settings lack indigenous measures of child development, making the adaptation of available instruments necessary. The aim of this study was to reliably adapt the core subtests of the Wechsler Preschool and Primary Scale of Intelligence-III (WPPSI-III) to assess cognitive abilities in young children in rural Pakistan. A systematic…

The purpose of the Early Childhood Essentials Framework is to synthesize and communicate the essential skills and competencies children should be acquiring before they enter kindergarten and the related skills and competencies early childhood educators must cultivate in order to provide high-quality early learning experiences that will set all…

This qualitative study examines the variance in the ways that four student teachers made meaning of the experience of being observed by their cooperating teachers and university supervisors. Using Kegan's (1994) theory of cognitive development, the study focuses on the differences in the ways the teacher candidates constructed the prospect of…

Learning to teach is a complex intellectual and adaptive performance act. Student engagement is the cornerstone of effective instruction. Current education reform policies, such as Common Core State Standards (National Governors Association Center for Best Practices & Council of Chief State School Officers, 2010) and Teacher Effectiveness…

Studies using Magnetic Resonance Imaging (MRI) to observe the adolescent brain have shown that during adolescence multiple changes are occurring. This can provide a potential explanation for the sporadic and seemingly unpredictable behaviors that appear. It is believed that the brain of an adolescent goes through a profound neurological…

Blocks are one of the most popular playthings for children. The purpose of this article is to describe the use of block play in developing parent-child relations. This paper has two major parts. First, a brief historical overview highlights the critical roles of child's block play in learning and development. Block play contributes to children's…

Every day, schools and communities across the U.S. identify millions of young children as "at risk"--especially those with a minority background, who live in poor neighborhoods or are learning English as a second language. FPG's Project U-STARS-PLUS (Using Science, Talents, and Abilities to Recognize Students-Promoting Learning for…

The concept of intersubjectivity may be used to illuminate the way in which we observe and describe many of the interpersonal processes that begin in infancy. The more traditional psychoanalytic ideas of holding and containment, as well as relatively recent concepts such as attunement and reflective function, can be seen as belonging within this…

Observing young children at play is a very common and useful method for identifying the presence or absence of certain developmentally appropriate skills. Such observations can vary from general overviews of typical classroom activities to extensive and highly detailed data-collection systems. Although educators should use a series of…

This report is part of a long-term research on the construction of mathematical meanings through the interaction with various technologies. The research involved a set of teaching experiments based on body motion with sensors and calculators at different school levels, from kindergarten to secondary school. Here I refer to the one developed in a…

Spring is the traditional time in Maplewood Elementary School Kindergarten when science instruction receives particular emphasis. It is also a time of promoting greater safety awareness as children increase their outdoor activities on the longer, warmer days. In May 2003, the authors planned to make a link between neuroscience and safety in a…

This policy brief explores kindergarten readiness observation and its benefits to local and state level stakeholders; highlights efforts by California counties and other states to measure school readiness; and makes recommendations for moving toward statewide use of kindergarten readiness observation tools. Key points include: (1) Early efforts to…

Describes a cognitive intervention that offered novice student teachers access to the thinking underlying an expert teacher's practice, examining the implementation and impact of the cognitive intervention, which involved two 2-hour workshops held between participants' first and second practicum experiences. Workshop transcripts indicated that…

Research on restructuring domain-specific knowledge suggests that inferences made by a learner are based more on what and how concepts are structured and organized in particular domains than on the age of the learner. In this view, it is possible for children to operate more expertly in a particular area than could be explained by global stage or…