This paper presents a cultural and historical analysis of the continuously increasing number of children and childhoods at risk, using a population perspective framework. Two major claims are presented. First the conditions of children and childhoods in the West, compared to the patterns of child-care in India, Japan and many other non-Western…

Most research on the subject of friendship has concentrated on peer acceptance, dyadic properties, and the contribution that friendship makes to development and adjustment. This book explores the role of friendships in a child's social and emotional growth. The articles, based on presentations made at an SRCD (Society for Research in Child…

The traditional role for teachers in children's play was to structure it, setting rules and interrupting if things got "out of hand." However, for children ages 3 to 5, sociodramatic play is a way to invent and make familiar the rhythms and actions of everyday life. This book describes why play is a fundamentally important part of…

Although school violence is an important topic to the U.S. public, little research has examined issues of violence and bad behavior in schools, particularly among early adolescents. To fill this need, research on the transition from elementary to middle grades, to include the domain of violence, is covered in this paper. Three aspects of violence…

These two 1996 issues of the journal "Offspring," a publication of the Michigan Council of Cooperative Nursery Schools, cover a variety of topics familiar to nursery school and day care providers and pertinent to the mission of the publication. Articles are short pieces useful to parents, teachers, and others and aim to provide a forum…

Why do some adolescents cheat and others do not? To answer this question, the relationship between motivational factors and self-reported cheating beliefs and behaviors was examined in a sample of early adolescents. It was hypothesized that cheating and beliefs in the acceptability of cheating would be more likely to occur when students perceived…

This Michigan Kids Count data book for 1996 describes the condition of children in each of Michigan's 83 counties. The first section of the report explores the status of the children in five areas of child well-being: (1) Economic Security; (2) Child Health; (3) Child Safety; (4) Teen Transition; and (5) Education. The discussion presents an…

Weapons violence is a major public health problem that especially impacts minority youth. Interventions designed to reduce weapon use by youth are categorized as educational/behavioral change, legal, and technological/environmental. Few educational programs currently exist, but those that do largely concern firearm safety courses, public…

This KIDS COUNT statistical report is the second to examine indicators of children's well-being in Hawaii. The bulk of the report is comprised of the indicator results and is divided into four major sections: (1) family composition and resources, including children in poverty, children in single parent families, births to single teens, and…

Noting that observation forms the basis of all developmentally appropriate programming, this videotape helps new and experienced early childhood educators learn about children so they can individualize their program; evaluate programs so adjustments can be made to the environment, the curriculum, or both; and measure children's progress and their…

This training guide is designed to enhance the skills of Head Start education staff in applying knowledge of how children grow and develop to planning, implementing, and evaluating activities and experiences in the center, at home, and during group socialization sessions. Each of the guide's modules details module outcomes, key concepts, and…

This report describes an early intervention program for at-risk kindergartners who show the early signs of antisocial behavior patterns. The "First Steps" program consists of three modules that are designed to be used in concert with each other. These modules are: (1) a universal screening procedure that affords each kindergarten child…

The wars that began in 1991 in the countries of the former Yugoslavia caused widespread child suffering. This workshop report presents the findings from the Workshop on the Impact of War on Child Health held for doctors from Bosnia-Herzegovina, Croatia, Macedonia, Serbia, and Slovenia. The workshop's goal was to address the common interest in the…

This Kids Count factbook reports findings of a 1993 state project conducted as part of a national program designed to promote accountability of children through a nationwide profile of their condition. The data are used to encourage the private and public sectors to target specific problems and groups of children for programming and fund raising…

In an effort to recruit more adults in the 18-25 age group, the Greenville Literacy Council of Greenville, Pennsylvania, developed the Keys for Kids program, which was designed to teach young parents to foster emergent literacy skills in their preschoolers and thereby improve their own literacy skills. An 8-week training program was developed to…