Early Childhood Education (ECE) programs provide skills needed for successful kindergarten strides, especially for students from low socioeconomic backgrounds. While Florida's Voluntary Pre-Kindergarten (VPK) program currently serves most four-year-olds, some educators have questioned the program's quality. The purpose of this study was to…

This ethnographic research case study of five early childhood classrooms in rural Appalachia explores how the decline of the coal industry and shift to natural gas fracking impact classroom play spaces in the region. Child development orientations influenced educators' approaches to teaching about the natural world. The children's and teachers'…

Public School educational leaders from around the United States are confronted with choices in how to invest resources that can create the greatest impact for students. An often-overlooked area of investment is early childhood education. As defined by the National Association for the Education of Young Children (NAEYC), this is the period of…

Trauma early in life can significantly impair children's development, mental health, and learning, placing them at risk for poor mental and physical health problems throughout life. Young children experience trauma more often, and are more vulnerable to its harmful effects, than older children. Early childhood education (ECE) programs regularly…

Children in developing countries often lack sufficient support for early learning skills prior to beginning school. This research evaluates an educational media intervention using an animated cartoon program, "Akili and Me." The program was originally created in Tanzania to teach early learning skills. This program was adapted in content…

Grade R is the year before learners in South Africa start formal schooling and has been part of the General Education Training Band (GET) since 1998. New efforts are being made to enable all five- to six-year-olds to attend a Grade R class. The nine provinces of South Africa approach this problem in different ways. Some of them, like Gauteng, try…

This paper considers the landscape of early childhood education in England to be dominated by discourses of "readiness-for-school" and "readiness-for-learning" that act to heavily stratify the educational spaces inhabited by young children. The "ready-child" is constructed as a normative identity towards which the…

Created as part of the Every Student Succeeds Act, the Preschool Development Grant Birth Through Five (PDG B-5) program is a competitive, federal grant designed to strengthen states' early childhood systems and improve transitions between programs and services -- such as home visits, early intervention settings, child care and pre-K education --…

Idiom comprehension and production reflect a child's language competence. Research suggests that there is a positive relationship between children's reading comprehension skills and their idiom understanding. This study examines whether adult verbal scaffolding, in conjunction with the deliberate use of iconic gestures, can facilitate young…

This article begins with a review of research providing evidence that social-emotional competence is a key component of school readiness and that the foundations for social-emotional competence are laid down in the earliest years. We go on to review effective practices and specific interventions that have been found to strengthen children's…

Contrary to the concept of school readiness as achieving a particular set of attributes considered essential for educational success, this article is grounded in the assumption that all children are ready to learn, but what they are expected to learn varies widely from one cultural setting and historic period to another. The authors challenge the…

Entering kindergarten ready to learn has become a growing concern in this country. The kindergarten year has important consequences for a child's acquisition of knowledge and skills that are powerful determinants for later school success. Kindergarten teachers report that more than half of children enter school with a number of problems and are…

Growth and development are frequently associated with milestones such as walking, talking in sentences, or successful toilet learning. Parents may not be aware that each milestone requires a complex balance of growth, experience, and other factors to occur--much of it without notice. There are a variety of lists of developmental milestones that…

Given the importance of the early childhood period as a time when the foundation is laid for later language and literacy, it is important to determine what activities and experiences lead to positive language and literacy outcomes in early childhood. This Fact Sheet reviews fifteen experimentally-evaluated programs and intervention strategies that…

Whereas some four year olds could draw a person with five fingers on each hand and a full set of facial features, others could barely hold a pencil. Some sat quietly in a small group, intently listening to and understanding a story, while others wiggled, fidgeted, and couldn't focus their attention. In those days, before the explosion of…