Based on the view that the early childhood care and education environment can have a tremendous influence on infant and toddler development, this book will assist early childhood teachers/caregivers in meeting the challenge of creating an effective learning environment for infants and toddlers. The book includes ideas for planning, using, and…

All parents want the best school experience for their children. This booklet, presented in both English and Spanish, offers parents specific strategies to provide their children a good foundation for beginning reading. The guide first answers the question, "How Can I Help My Child Be Ready To Read and Ready To Learn?" with emergent literacy…

This document is comprised of a training package to help practitioners strengthen relationships with parents. Designed for use with direct service staff and their supervisors from various programs, the package can be used for group training or in individual training and supervision. The package has three components: (1) a 22-minute videotape with…

The Illinois Early Learning Project (IEL) is funded by the Illinois State Board of Education to provide information resources on early learning and training related to implementing the Illinois Early Learning Standards for parents and for early childhood personnel in all settings. The IEL tip sheets offer suggestions to parents and early childhood…

This final report presents findings of a Wyoming research project designed to test the possibility of using interactive technology in the assessment, at a distance, of infants and toddlers in rural or frontier areas. The project compared the quality of reports developed when a transdisciplinary assessment team conducted assessments either in…

Developed by the Connecticut Birth to Three Natural Environments Task Force, this guidebook is intended to assist the early childhood community to strengthen and support families whose children have disabilities by meeting their children's needs in everyday typical routines and environments in the home and the community. It begins by providing a…

The apparently simple question of whether there are commonly accepted "best practices" for infant and toddler care leads to further questions regarding the nature of childhood and the impact of cultural values. This report reviews recent theory, training, and practice in the care of children outside their homes. Section 1 of the report…

This final report discusses the activities and outcomes of a project that developed, field-tested, and disseminated eight 3-hour training modules to be used by preservice and inservice faculty in preparing early interventionists to work with young children with disabilities. The modules were designed to teach a special model of early intervention,…

Noting the important role that parents can play in preparing their child to learn to read, the Read, Educate and Develop Youth (READY) Reading Plan for Michigan provides kits to parents of infants, toddlers, and preschoolers. The kits contain suggestions for age-appropriate activities parents can do with their children to help them learn. In…

Examined the effect of homonymity on children's use of semantic context to derive word meaning. The study presented participants (preschoolers, second graders, and college students) with stories including nonsense words, familiar words used accurately, and homonymous words. Results suggest that homonymity inhibits children's tendency to derive…

This study evaluated the usefulness of perinatal medical status, environmental risk, and infant developmental status as predictors of low IQ at age 4 among 70 4-year-olds who had been in a neonatal intensive care unit at birth. It found family environment the most predictive, 18-month developmental assessments somewhat useful, and perinatal health…

Investigates whether children ages 1;6 just beginning to learn words can learn new words in a variety of nonostensive contexts. The results of two studies involving adults interacting with children in games of searching for objects suggest that from very early in language acquisition, children learn words through active attempts to understand…

Investigates the color term knowledge of two-year olds and the influence of schooling on their color term acquisition. Findings reveal considerable knowledge in these children. Conclusions are that contemporary children's early and frequent experience with color terms may account for this cohort's improved performance over previous generations of…

Observed home interaction between parents and 2- and 4-year-olds at Time 1 and 2 years later. Found that parent mental state talk to children varied by child's age, context of talk, and parent gender. Four-year-olds with older siblings produced and heard more cognitive talk and less desire talk than children without older siblings. Time 1 family…

Examined the relationship between high risk mothers' teaching interactions with their 20- and 36-month-olds, and their children's behavior in first grade. Found that maternal teaching scores were correlated with children's social behaviors as assessed by their teacher, and with children's cognitive ability as measured on a standardized…