This transnational comparative study between Costa Rica and the United States provides an in-depth understanding of the similarities and differences of the early literacy practices of educators in the Pre-Kindergarten to Kindergarten classroom settings. Drawing upon Costa Rica's curricular approach to Early Childhood Education, based upon the…

Growing plants is a popular and easy method to facilitate preschoolers' scientific exploration and positive attitude toward the environment, as it creates an awareness that nature is a magical place to be explored. This study examines a year-long garden-based curriculum in South Korea, specifically a cotton project, and its effects on 4- to…

The purpose of this study was to explore the potential influence of childhood financial socialization on financial well-being in adulthood. Using a sample (N = 2,213) from De Nederlandsche Bank Household Survey (DHS) we modeled the likelihood of household debt/asset ratio less than or equal to 40%, and the likelihood of a household reporting a…

Debates on how best to educate young children have been raging over the last 100 years--more often fuelled by ideological preferences rather than empirical evidence. To some extent this is hardly surprising given the difficulty of examining pupil progress in a systematic and comparative way. However, the introduction of a new child-centred…

This case study explores child, parent, teacher, and school-leader perspectives of a play-based learning (Pb-L) approach in one new-entrant classroom. Data were gathered through focus groups, interviews and an online survey. Findings indicate that children valued the opportunity for self-initiated, handson, interest-based exploration and social…

Up to 250 children of different ages can be seen when entering Sekolahku-MySchool (SMS) in Yogyakarta, Indonesia, integrated and happily engaged, indoors or outdoors, in sustainable activities as part of their everyday learning. With ages ranging from 16 months to 13 years, the children engage in learning typical academic skills and techniques…

This paper examines outcomes associated with participation in short-term, international internship experiences. Results suggest short-term international internship experiences contribute to rich personal and professional development outcomes. Findings highlight participant challenges associated with initial internship experiences, professional…

School readiness evaluations are becoming increasingly popular, and their implementation has become compulsory in an increasing number of kindergartens and schools in Hungary. In recent years, Diagnostic System for Evaluating Development (DIFER), developed by Nagy et al. has been used extensively for the diagnostic study of four- to eight-year-old…

This paper investigates forest school practitioners perceptions of learning at forest school to identify the topics covered, the learning styles, and the philosophies underpinning its delivery, based on interviews with experienced forest school practitioners. Practitioners identified the focus of learning at forest school as social development:…

Skills developed through qualitative research and community partnerships can be essential for developing education students' cultural competency and understandings about diverse student populations. Toward this end, we developed a qualitative "service-research" project in a teacher education course focused on child development, whereby…

As young children enter formal schooling, they are at various points along their individual developmental paths toward literacy. Generally, their egocentric speech is becoming more social and they are building their capacity for logical thought and concrete problem-solving. This is a gradual development and teachers can support children's literacy…

This study examined the developing object knowledge of infants through their visual anticipation of action targets during action observation. Infants (6, 8, 12, 14, and 16 months) and adults watched short movies of a person using 3 different everyday objects. Participants were presented with objects being brought either to a correct or to an…

Some features of project work are of value for toddlers, while others are best left until children are older. This article shares the process through which teachers and administrators at a private school in Mexico City gained awareness of the importance of listening, observing, and documenting children's activities to determine how to adapt…

This article is based on a study of the role of play and experiential-learning activities beyond formal schooling in sixteen nations. The study, supported by Unilever PLC, gathered information from the mothers of twenty-four hundred children in countries in North America, South America, Africa, Europe, and Asia who described and rated their…

The ability to understand that goals and other intentional relations are attributes of individual people is of fundamental importance to social life. It enables us to predict and interpret actions on-line by relating a person's prior and current behaviors, and distinguishing them from the behaviors of other persons. In this paper, we consider the…