We might call this decade the era of early childhood. In the US, federal and state governments invest in the creation of public pre-kindergarten (preK) programs and create standards that articulate goals for practice and benchmarks that can be used to evaluate success. How have these trends provided a context for the evolution of preK curriculum?…

Background/Context: Early childhood education joined the standards movement in 2002 with the Good Start, Grow Smart initiative (Brown, 2007), with advocates arguing that standards were a tool for creating more continuity and coherence in PreK systems (Bowman, 2006; Kagan 2012). Critics posed concerns about a perceived poor fit between…

The objective of this study was to examine the different development characteristics of gifted children during the preschool period in comparison with normal developing children according to family observation. For this purpose, face-to-face interviews were carried out with the parents of 112 children identified as gifted and data regarding the…

We examined whether African American students differentially responded to dimensions of the observed classroom-learning environment compared with non-African American students. Further, we examined whether these dimensions of the classroom mediated treatment effects of a preschool mathematics intervention targeted at students from low-income…

This study aims to uncover how a particular imported philosophy of early childhood education, Reggio Emilia, is implemented in the context of one public and one private preschool in San Francisco. The philosophy of Reggio Emilia is believed to be progressive and to be developmentally appropriate for children in early childhood. The study involved…

We evaluated an Early Childhood Educator Professional Development (ECEPD) project that provided high-quality, sustained, and intensive professional development designed to support developmentally appropriate instruction for preschool-age children based on the best available research on early childhood pedagogy, child development, and preschool…

Used teacher questionnaires and observations of classroom practices and environment to examine program-quality characteristics in 58 community-based early-childhood settings serving at least one child with disabilities. Found that both segregated and inclusive settings had moderately good quality and were similar across measures of program…

This paper presents Rudolf Steiner's maturational readiness theory of human physiopsychology and comments on education in the Waldorf Schools. Discussion asserts that Steiner's concept of human development is complex and that intensive study is required for even a superficial understanding of "the four members of man": the physical,…

The model presented by the preschools in Reggio Emilia, Italy, is one of cooperation and collaborations among teachers, parents, and children; curriculum based on the "project approach," and constructivist learning philosophy, which states that children construct their knowledge and values as a result of interactions with and action on…

Although there is considerable evidence that kindergartners in child-centered programs have more opportunities to increase prosocial behavior and are more internally motivated than children in basic skills programs, the efficacy of child-centered versus basic skills programs with regard to prosocial behavior has not been examined among preschool…

Ninety children from South Korea and 119 children from the United States were observed in early childhood programs, and differences in classroom environments and teachers' and children's behavior in the two countries were identified. In both countries, there was evidence that preschool education is guided by ideas about "developmentally…

Describes the nature of children's oral language experiences in Head Start and other preschool programs serving low-income families and relates those experiences to broader features of the classrooms' programs. Finds that small class size, teacher education levels, and developmentally appropriate curricula are positively associated with high…

Noting a developmentally inappropriate trend toward earlier instruction in mathematics, a study examined the effects of a systematic, process-based, developmentally appropriate program for the development of number readiness in Indian kindergarten (preschool) children aged 4 and 5. An experimental group of 20 children received the process-based…

Based in the belief that many preschool programs have an orientation toward a developmental philosophy yet are not developmentally appropriate in program practices, this discussion contrasts developmentally and psychometrically oriented approaches, reviews literature on program design and children's needs, and provides guidelines in the areas of…

As follow-up to an in-depth study of the District of Columbia's early learning programs and their impact, this study provided data on the transition of previously studied children from primary education to upper elementary grades. Academic progress of the original group of pre-kindergarten and Head Start children was studied during years 5 and 6…