This pamphlet is designed to help parents care for their children and themselves in ways that foster good mental health. The subject matter presented, death, may also be useful for relatives, school teachers, and babysitters who play important roles in the lives of children. Emphasis is placed on the following areas: (1) awareness of death; (2)…

Curriculum planning for the future must recognize and accept certain premises: forces at work in society greatly influence the nature and direction of the curriculum; students in our society possess varied backgrounds, capabilities, interests, and aptitudes that must be met; common curriculum designs have many strengths; a curriculum to foster…

From about age four to age eleven, a child's concept of "word" develops from a lack of conceptual differentiation about things and events to an awareness of words as meaningful elements in themselves. Piaget's theory of cognitive development offers a perspective from which this phenomenon can be evaluated. The preoperational and concrete…

Three papers describe parent and staff resources from the Macomb (Illinois) 0-3 Regional Project, a home based program for rural handicapped and high risk infants and toddlers. The development of toy workshops to help parents construct materials for their children is described. Two bibliographies are presented. The first, intended for parents,…

This paper presents an overview of the philosophy, psychology of learning, teaching methods, and curriculum of the Waldorf Schools. Most Waldorf teachers are influenced by the esoteric form of critical idealism propounded by Rudolf Steiner. The child is considered by Steiner to be a spiritual being who has reincarnated on to earth in a physical…

Children aged three to five were the subjects of two studies of the development of ability to classify diverse objects into superordinate categories. In the first experiment, subjects were asked to designate two of three pictorially represented objects as representative of a given category. The second experiment required subjects to choose from a…

The described teacher inservice education program is designed for preschool, elementary and secondary school teachers, teacher aides, and parents who are interested in a study of children's developmental patterns. The scope and sequencing of topics in the program are outlined, and the activities and resources involved are described. Ordering…

Bibliotherapy is a powerful tool for helping children cope with direct and indirect death experiences. Through the process of bibliotherapy, readers may identify with others whose experiences are similar, feel emotional release as a result of this identification, and gain insights into their own experiences. For this process to be helpful, it is…

THE WALDORF SCHOOL NURSERY-KINDERGARTEN PLAN PROPOSES AN UNSTRUCTURED ENVIRONMENT IN WHICH THE YOUNG CHILD IS PERMITTED TO DEVELOP AT HIS NATURAL RATE THROUGHOUT THE DISCOVERY PERIOD OF CHILDHOOD. BECAUSE THE CHILD LEARNS BEST THROUGH IMITATION, ADULT MODELS WHO PROVIDE APPROPRIATE EXPERIENCES FOR SENSORY PERCEPTION AND IMITATION LEARNING OFFER…

THIS STUDY WAS CONDUCTED TO EXPLORE DEVELOPMENTALLY THE FEATURES OF WORDS USED IN THE PROCESS OF ORGANIZING RELATED WORDS TOGETHER. A CONTINUOUS RECOGNITION MEMORY TASK OF 121 WORDS WAS USED IN WHICH SOME OF THE WORDS (EXPERIMENTAL WORDS) PRESENTED ONLY ONCE IN THE LIST WERE SEMANTICALLY OR PHONETICALLY RELATED TO OTHER LIST WORDS. EIGHTY THIRD-…

Two papers in this report deal with early childhood. "Developmental Factors--Early Cognitive Growth" discusses the experimental-analytical and existential-experimental approaches to religious cognitive growth. The second paper, "Developmental Factors--Early Emotional-Social Growth" asserts that emotional and social integrity has to be achieved…

This study attempted to: (1) replicate the density effects found in a previous study; and (2) test the hypothesis that partitioning mediates the effects of high density on children's behavior. Twelve children (5 female, 7 male, ranging in age from 40 to 68 months) were observed under each of four conditions that crossed high and low density with…

The premises of open education and related developmental and social issues are explained as an aid to educational practitioners in choosing the proper measurement and evaluation strategies for this philosophy. In addition, a position statement on evaluation is offered and the present status of educational evaluation is outlined. Some…

This paper stresses the essential role of concrete play experiences in the early childhood curriculum. The paper examines the value of play, shows how to facilitate language arts development through planned play activities, notes that play provides the early sensory experiences that are the foundations for language arts development, points out the…

This report describes a series of studies of how children learn to operate on incoming information as it is transmitted by language or pictorial representations. Specifically, the studies examined (1) the relationship between what is known and the structure of incoming information and (2) the active operations children use in the process of…