Access to playful experiences outdoors is critical for children's learning and development. With a significant amount of young children attending early childhood education and care (ECEC) settings (OECD, OECD Publishing, 2023), these programs have an important role in furthering children's equitable access to outdoor play. As part of a larger…

The well-being of the early childhood education (ECE) workforce is of great importance to the field, yet existing measures to capture well-being are varied in conceptual and contextual constructs. There is a need to measure well-being among ECE employees holistically and to be able to compare to other industries. The National Institute for…

Physical classroom environments for young children and the quality of those environments have typically been studied by utilizing various rating scales. Research is limited on early childhood educators' perspectives and decision-making processes in striving to create optimal physical classroom environments during the school year. This qualitative…

Similar to countries in Europe and the Americas, risky play is a feature in Japanese early childhood education and care. This study investigated the perceptions and practices of Japanese early childhood education specialists with respect to risky play in order to ascertain whether their childhood experiences influenced their attitudes toward…

Picturebooks can be an effective resource to provide opportunities for classrooms to engage in community building conversations and activities. Community building mantras have been developed from several picturebooks that are used as a means of implementing the National Association for the Education of Young Children (NAEYC) components of creating…

Research on children's risky play and young children's risk taking is a relatively new research area that has drawn the attention of many researchers in the last decades. Nevertheless, to our knowledge, no earlier studies have measured the prevalence of risky play when children can freely choose what to play, with whom, and where. Most research on…

Several aspects of the indoor early childhood education (ECE) environment may be associated with physical activity (PA), including indoor areas. Modifying the indoor physical environment in classrooms could have significant potential to influence PA in young children. However, to our knowledge, PA promotion interventions involving changes to the…

During the preschool years, children develop several inter-related skills including motor skills and communication skills. In this article, we highlight several communication teaching strategies and describe how practitioners can promote communication skills of preschoolers with disabilities by providing them with multiple opportunities to…

A substantial proportion of American, Canadian and English preschoolers regularly participate in family child care making its quality of vital importance for the children concerned, their parents, the school system and the society in which they live. This article discusses the seven key caregiver behaviors and physical space characteristics…

This study explored parents' and preschool personnel's opinions on factors influencing 3-5-year-old children's sedentary behaviors by applying the socioecological model. Four focus group interviews with preschool personnel (N = 14) and six interviews with parents (N = 17) were conducted in autumn 2014. Two researchers independently analyzed the…

Infant brain development is a dynamic process dependent upon endogenous and exogenous stimulation and a supportive environment. A critical period of brain and neurosensory development occurs during the third trimester and into the "fourth" trimester (first three months of life). Disruption, damage, or deprivation in the infant's social and…

The main objective of this study was to examine the job satisfaction levels of Jordanian kindergarten teachers in relation to work-related dimensions and socio-demographic variables. The sample consisted of 264 randomly selected teachers working in private kindergartens in Amman. To meet the study's objectives, a two part questionnaire was…

Argues that goals of early education programs should be environmentally, as well as developmentally, appropriate. Lists guidelines for helping children develop a lifelong attitude of environmental awareness and care. (ET)

Discusses the health-related implications of environmental hazards for children. Argues that low-income, minority communities are disproportionately affected, thus spurring the environmental justice movement which calls for equitable dealing with hazards. Suggests that children are at the greatest physical health risk, and that educators are in a…