"Make Early Learning Standards Come Alive" provides help, support, and explanations of how to make early learning standards come alive in classrooms and programs. Easy-to-read charts show how different states define standards in each of the major content areas and how these standards can be addressed in the classroom. The book discusses how to:…

Purpose and Methods: This report is the second benchmark study to assess the system of supports for school readiness. The data for this study was collected in the fall of 2006 on 537 entering kindergarten children and their families in eight representative schools across the County. The ecological model and methods from the first study, which was…

Examining problems and questions related to full-day kindergarten, this book deals broadly with early childhood curriculum design and development. It suggests specific step-by-step ways to plan an emergent curriculum based upon integrated, dynamic themes that grow out of children's diverse personal and cultural experiences. Addressed to teachers,…

In order to promote critical thinking in young children, particularly children ages 5-8, teachers need to understand skills and dispositions of critical thinkers. This paper discusses these skills, dispositions, and the appropriate classroom climate, within the context of pedagogy, along with learning activities for kindergarten and primary…

Following the introduction of the middle school in the 1960s with its advocacy of a 5-8 or 6-8 grade configuration, no comprehensive statement appeared to crystallize the educational beliefs inherent in this emerging educational reform effort. This paper is not just a revision of the 1982 position statement, but a "re-vision" of middle…

Noting that young adolescents--around 10 to 15 years of age--undergo significant emotional, social, intellectual, and physical changes, this book serves as a reference for parents, educators, and policymakers concerned with education that meets the unique needs of the student population. The five sections of the book cover the historical and…

The High/Scope Curriculum is a developmentally based approach to early childhood education. The curriculum's "Extensions" newsletter, in which the articles in this collection first appeared, informs curriculum users about new development, relating to the High/Scope "open framework" curriculum. This collection divides the…

Changes in our world have made it more difficult for children to find protected, exciting places to play and interesting, satisfactory things to play with. This edited volume, resulting from the collaboration of Bank Street College (New York, New York), Erikson Institute (Chicago, Illinois), Pacific Oaks College (Pasadena, California), and…

This monograph is intended to provide a rationale for multicultural education and to serve as a manual for teachers. It includes activities and strategies for teaching preschool and primary-age children from a multicultural perspective. The document is organized into six chapters, four of which include sample lessons. Chapter 1 provides the basis…

One of the many positive consequences of the transition to a postmodern society is the increased recognition of the range of individual differences among children of the same age. This book provides a comprehensive overview of the postmodern reinvention of childhood, focusing on ages 4 through 8 years. The book's introductory chapter describes the…

This teaching guide provides teachers of young children with a philosophy and guidelines for teaching that address children's social, emotional, cognitive, and physical development. The guide describes a curriculum that offers teachers guidance, support, and freedom to be creative and responsive with children, and provides children, including…

The Task Force on Early Childhood and Elementary Education, created by the Texas State Board of Education in January 1993, found that the current system of early childhood and elementary education is struggling to meet the challenges of childhood in today's Texas. This report summarizes the task force's call for schools to reconfigure themselves…

The primary purpose of this policy study was to identify and examine early intervention policies for young children at risk of academic failure in selected state education agencies (SEAs) in the North Central Region of the United States. The secondary purpose was to document the processes by which the selected states in the north central…

Noting that understanding the contexts, continuities, and controversies of early childhood education is especially challenging because of the diversity in the field, this book provides a critical examination of the issues and controversies surrounding early childhood practices, policies, and professional development. Following an introduction…

This document is comprised of four publications of the early childhood section of the Missouri Department of Elementary and Secondary Education: (1) prekindergarten standards related to social and emotional development and approaches to learning; (2) a teacher's guide to early social and emotional development and approaches to learning; (3) a…