Families with young children are the fastest growing population of the homeless. Homeless young children (under the age of 5) are especially vulnerable as early childhood professionals consider the early years to be the most critical developmental period in all domains (cognitive, social-emotional, physical, and language). The disruptions to a…

Emergent literacy skills are important for children's academic achievement. Many preschool children from low-socioeconomic backgrounds have limited access to experiences that allow them to acquire emergent literacy skills such as letter knowledge, concepts of print, and phonological awareness. This article describes purposeful and age-appropriate…

This article is intended to provide early childhood providers with a concise overview of emerging emotional development in young children (birth-5), the important role of primary caregivers, and the link between parenting, emotional development, and behavior. Specific suggestions that have been shared with urban Head Start mothers are offered,…

Although the Head Start program places great emphasis on family involvement, educators do not currently have a brief but comprehensive measure to collect information from families about the kinds of learning experiences they provide for children at home. The current study explored the utility of the Family Literacy Survey, a parent-report survey…

With the tendency of low-income African American and Latino children identified at-risk for school readiness and school success compared to their early-childhood counterparts, Head Start personnel are challenged to examine the role of family strengths in the promotion of academic success for these populations. This article provides a rationale for…

Early interventionists struggle with supporting parents to prepare their children to be socially successful. Systems of support in which parents matriculate through a series of progressively intensive interventions depending on their need have been identified as a potentially promising framework for delivering family support services (McIntyre &…

This article provides a brief history of interpretations of Head Start's objectives over the last 4 decades. We begin with the founding goal of helping children prepare for school and the later misguided adaptation of increases in IQ scores as an indicator of children's readiness. We then discuss Head Start's more contemporary objectives, social…

In Head Start, family service workers facilitate the process for guiding and assisting families in securing services needed for specific family issues regarding health care, housing, employment, education, and/or crisis management. These services were particularly important to families following Hurricane Charley and the subsequent recovery…

The "new federalism" paradigm offers an explanation why the federal government has devolved much of its administration of the Temporary Assistance for Needy Families (TANF, formerly AFDC) and Medicaid (through managed care) programs. A review of child and family outcomes data resulting from these devolutionary changes in TANF and…