The digest addresses ways that parents and educators can nurture giftedness in young children. Problems in appropriate school placement for young gifted children with uneven development are discussed and illustrated with examples. In selecting a program, parents need to look for a highly individualized program in which children are encouraged to…

Examined were antecedents and behavioral correlates of parental perceptions of efficacy, using data from a national survey of 3,000 parents and a study of 65 mother-infant dyads. Survey data were used to determine what factors are predictive of parental perceptions of efficacy. Dyadic data were used primarily to examine the relation between…

An examination of the journal writing of 14 second graders during one school year reveals the evolution from egocentricity, with the work of one student serving as a model against which similarities and differences in the growth patterns of the other students are measured. The students' drawings and writings reflect their learning about the world…

To help children develop social competence, teachers ought to understand differences between popular and unpopular children, know how to assess social competence, and employ techniques which aid the development of children's social skills. In general, popular children have developed skills and strategies which allow them to interact with their…

The first of 11 documents on the Hawaii Integration Project (HIP) of severely disabled students presents information on ways to tailor social studies lessons for lower elementary nonhandicapped students (K-3). The curriculum stresses similarities among students and the importance of students learning from each other. Unit I explores similarities…

The manual describes the Special Friends Program, an approach to prepare handicapped and nonhandicapped children for social interactions with one another. The program emphasizes social, play, and leisure interchanges that facilitate social skill development by both severely handicapped and nonhandicapped children. Following a review of the…

This report discusses an empirical investigation of the social networks of German children in their first 5 years of life; particular attention is given to the frequency and the function of the child's social contacts with persons in his or her social environment. Data were collected by means of a questionnaire from 1033 families residing in 18…

This paper presents a perspective from Singapore on the secondary school curriculum and adolescent development. Topics discussed include (1) curricular considerations related to socioeconomic factors in Singapore society, such as rapid industrializaton, problematic procreation and marriage trends, latchkey children, and youth gangs; (2) curriculum…

The article describes language development techniques used with a 5-year-old autistic boy to increase his verbal behavior. Intervention consisted of 1.5 hour sessions four times a week over an 8-month period. The intervention focused on increasing nonvocal imitation, vocal imitation, verbal labeling, and verbal discrimination. Development of…

Illustrated with examples drawn from the experience of one teacher educator, ways of providing prospective teachers at the college level with active learning experiences based on developmental principles are discussed. The discussion draws parallels between three approaches in early childhood education and these same approaches to teacher…

The current study was devised to determine the short-term (1 month) and long-term (4 months) effects of having students generate their own examples of selected concepts. More specifically, focus was on determining how self-generated examples might enhance the learning and retrieval of concepts. Subjects were 55 (54 female and 1 male) undergraduate…

A theory of learning based on recent insights from sociology and semiotics is explicated. Building on the work of Vygotsky, Dewey, Halliday, Barnes, Deely, Eisner, and others, this sociosemiotic model of learning is used as a frame of reference for thinking about the process by which texts are created from sensation. It is argued that the process…

Kindergarten teachers do not view social studies as an important part of the preschool curriculum. This was the finding of a survey of kindergarten teachers in two midwestern states. The questionnaires used in the survey were designed to determine the emphasis teachers placed on specific social studies topics, skills, and values. Teachers…

The two studies described in this article investigated the effectiveness of educational-based programs as crisis intervention strategies for limiting the negative effects of divorce on preschool-age children. In the first study, a pretest posttest control group design was used. Two experimental groups, including seven children from divorced homes…

Findings regarding the functions of schooling from the perspectives of teachers, parents and students in the elementary and secondary schools that participated in "A Study of Schooling" are presented. These functions were classified into four major categories: social, intellectual, personal, and vocational development. Study participants were…