Over a period of 9 months, a certified Child Development Associate (CDA) trainer and charter member of the National Association of Migrant Educators implemented and evaluated a practicum intervention designed to improve the learning environments of migrant preschool children through in-service training of migrant teachers, aides, parents, and…

This practicum was designed to increase the literacy growth of kindergarten students through the use of developmentally appropriate emergent literacy practices. The kindergarten language arts curriculum did not meet the diverse literacy needs of the kindergarten students. The goal of the practicum was to meet the diverse literacy needs of the…

This practicum aimed to improve the way staff communicated with young children through in-service training in a university early childhood laboratory school setting. Eight in-service training sessions, combined with discussion groups, classroom/recorded observations, and practical applications, were provided. The program focused on appropriate…

A practicum designed to strengthen and expand day care staff members' knowledge about working with preschool children from crisis families had the following goals: (1) to provide staff with information about children in stressful situations; (2) to help staff recognize child behaviors that call for special attention; (3) to help staff implement…

This practicum identified the problem of inconsistent use of developmentally appropriate practices by staff in an early childhood center and implemented an inservice program to increase the use of activities based on individual appropriateness rather than on age alone. The solution strategy utilized a self-assessment survey of classroom practices…

As a practicum project, a developmentally appropriate training model was designed and implemented in a day care facility with 6 staff members, serving 40 children. Following documentation of the problem areas that inhibited application of developmentally appropriate practices in the particular day care setting, appropriate actions were…

A training program was implemented for teachers to increase the quality and quantity of developmentally appropriate multicultural education for 2-year-olds at a child care center in which the children and teachers were predominantly Euro-American. The 10-week training program used readings, videos, discussions, and guided imagery to: (1) raise…

Noting that many early childhood practitioners have difficulty understanding and articulating how developmentally appropriate practices in their programs contribute to students' kindergarten readiness, this report details the implementation and evaluation of practicum experiences designed to improve preschool teachers' developmentally appropriate…

This practicum study sought to increase child care staff's ability to transfer what they learned from training to the classroom and thereby to increase developmentally appropriate educational practice. Specifically, the project sought to increase positive interactions in the child care setting, increase the use of the outdoors as a learning…

This practicum project sought to facilitate change in preschool teacher classroom behavior from teacher-directed practice to child-initiated practice. The goals of the practicum focused on changes that would foster child-initiated activities in order to promote healthy and holistic development, positive self-esteem, and resiliency skills in young…

Concerns about the quality of a before- and after-school program on an overseas military installation arose due to low staff morale, caregivers' lack of training and experience, and child behavior problems. This practicum project devised and implemented a 10-week training program to increase staff knowledge of developmentally appropriate practices…