Compared 28- to 53-month-olds' writing and drawing. Scores on a writing scale composed of graphic, "writing-like," and symbolic schemes improved with age. Recognition of drawings as drawings preceded recognition of writings as writings. Writing and drawing scores were substantially correlated, even with age partialed out, suggesting that…

Describes purpose of private speech and stages of development of private speech from birth to age 8. Details ways teachers can support children's gradual internalization of private speech. Outlines procedures for assessing private speech progress. Notes classroom implications related to anticipating children's thinking, asking children to answer…

Offers strategies for preparing children for literacy in the early Montessori classroom through emphasis on phonemic awareness. Specifically addresses activities to develop phonological and phonemic awareness including song, the alphabet, rhyming activities, "I spy" games, word games, and word segmentation. Presents a case study in…

Compared coupling characteristics of clapping simultaneous with walking or galloping, consistency across trials, and phasing variability among 4-, 6-, 8-, and 10-year-olds. Found that for walk/clap tasks, children adopted adult-like coupling patterns by age 8 and with the same consistency by age 10. Across age, children became less variable in…

Two experiments investigated kindergarten through fourth-graders' and adults' ability to evaluate the certainty of deductive inferences, inductive inferences, and guesses, and explain the origins of inferential knowledge. Findings indicated that children rated their own deductions as more certain than guesses, but when judging another person's…

Explains the I-Search model for student research, focusing on allowing students to pick their own topics; application in elementary and secondary education; helpful elements for school library media specialists to consider in selecting an information literacy model for use in schools, including adaptability and flexibility; and developmental…

Describes typical transitions during Montessori's third plane of development, focusing on how the educational environment can offer a curriculum consonant with development. Describes how contemporary Erdkinder models at middle and high school levels have incorporated work on the land and apprentice learning to meet adolescents' needs/interests.…

Notes that many researchers have asserted maternal "sensitivity" as the key feature of interactions promoting "secure" attachment relationships. Reviews literature addressing the construct of sensitivity, highlighting the problem of definition and identifying the range of behaviors typically used as indicators of sensitivity.…

Tests Pine & Lieven's (1993) suggestion that a lexically-based positional analysis can account for the structure of a considerable proportion of children's early multiword corpora. Results reveal that the positional analysis accounts for 60% of the children's multiword utterances and that most other utterances are defined as frozen. (33…

Examined longitudinally the handshape aspect of American Sign Language signs in young children of deaf parents. Parents demonstrated on videotape how the children formed the different signs. Findings reveal that four basic handshapes predominated in early sign production, and that the part of the hand involved in contacting a sign's location often…

Evaluates two developmental models incorporating innovations in prosodic theory using the phonological forms of one child's vocabulary documented for the first nine months of language production. Results indicate the relevance of the prosodic hierarchy in the early grammar as well as considerable early knowledge of prosodic structure below the…

Constructive-developmental theory, with its emphasis on epistemology and cognitive complexity, explicitly links learning and developmental growth. One model, which identifies five shifts in perception throughout the life span, describes some of higher education's values and objectives. The theory offers a promising direction for student evaluation…

Describes negative contributors to young children's pretend play development and how early childhood educators can support both play development and foundational skills. Identifies ways that play influences development and contributes to children's ability to profit from academic activities. Offers suggestions for helping children create an…

Discusses stages of movement in the first 3 years of life with a philosophical dimension regarding evolutionary aspects of movement as first manifestation of "will." Describes how the early childhood environment is prepared to allow for movement and the connection between movement and brain development. Discusses the contribution of…

Provides an introduction to a series of articles that will review nine information literacy models for library media specialists. Topics will include integrating information literacy into the K-12 curriculum; whether the model has been tested in a controlled research environment and in the actual schools; developmental levels; and advice to media…