African American males consistently perform at significantly lower academic levels, than their peers, at every age level and on almost every national assessment (Lewis, Simon, Uzzell, Horwitz, & Casserly, 2010; Harvey, 2010; Tsoi-A-Fatt, 2010; Fergus & Noguera, 2010), and of all racial/ethnic and gender groups, African American males…

This dissertation describes the development of a state-of-the-art immersive media environment and its potential to motivate high school youth with autism to vocally express themselves. Due to the limited availability of media environments in public education settings, studies on the use of such systems in special education contexts are rare. A…

Educational Interventions for Students with Autism offers educators a vital resource for understanding and working with autistic students. Written by nationally acclaimed experts in the field and published in collaboration with the world-renowned UC Davis M.I.N.D. Institute, the book aims to deepen educators' appreciation of the challenges…

The most rapid and significant phase of development occurs in the first three years of a child's life. The "Supporting Children from Birth to Three" series focuses on the care and support of the youngest children. Each book takes a key aspect of working with this age group and gives clear and detailed explanations of relevant theories…

In a study of 5285 8th graders from the Gang Resistance and Education Training (G.R.E.A.T.) research, this study applied Travis Hirschi's social bonding theory to examine the curriculum's efficacy in increasing conventional bonding (friends with positive peers, succeeding at education etc.) and decreasing non-conventional bonding (drug…

In the 1998 reauthorization of Head Start, Congress mandated that the US Department of Health and Human Services (DHHS) determine, on a national level, the impact of Head Start on the children it serves. As noted by the Advisory Committee on Head Start Research, this legislative mandate required that the impact study address two main research…

The purpose of this study was to examine how the infusion of theatre arts into the language arts and social studies curricula in grades 4 and 5 impacted the cognitive and prosocial development of special populations, as well as the students' attitudes toward learning. An experimental/control group design was employed. Various instruments were used…

Taking risks is fairly common in adolescence. Risky behaviors can be associated with serious, long-term, and--in some cases--life-threatening consequences. This is especially the case when adolescents engage in more than one harmful behavior. The tendency for risky behaviors to co-occur has been well-studied. Yet prevention efforts traditionally…

Despite the conceptual link between self-regulation skills and school readiness capacities, questions remain regarding how distinct but related facets of self-regulation (i.e., attention regulation, behavior regulation) differentially impact the development of school readiness capacities during early childhood. Additionally, little is known about…

Some children, for all manner of reasons, struggle to make friends and fit in socially. "What's the Buzz?" is a unique sixteen-lesson social skills enrichment programme designed to explicitly teach children how to think and relate to others in social situations. This lively, highly practical role-play and play-based programme targets everyday…

The present study used a person-centered latent variable approach to classify types of perfectionism among 6th-grade African American children living in an urban setting. In particular, the authors were interested in determining whether an adaptive subtype could be found and validated against external criteria. The authors also attempted to…

This study was designed to evaluate the efficacy of the HealthWise South Africa HIV and substance abuse prevention program at impacting adolescents' polydrug use and sexual risk behaviors. HealthWise is a school-based intervention designed to promote social-emotional skills, increase knowledge and refusal skills relevant to substance use and…

The case study was conducted to examine the feasibility of an early intervention curriculum called Responsive Teaching with two five-year-old children from Turkey who had significant developmental delays. This study determined whether Turkish mothers might be successful in learning to become more responsive to their children, and whether this…

In this article, the authors focus on issues of instruction in classrooms. Initially, a brief definitional and historic section is presented. This is followed by a discussion of four assumptions about the current state of affairs: (a) evidence-based practices should be identified and used, (b) children's phase of performance should dictate…

The pilot investigation evaluated a theatrical intervention program, Social Emotional NeuroScience Endocrinology (SENSE) Theatre, designed to improve socioemotional functioning and reduce stress in children with autism spectrum disorder (ASD). Eight children with ASD were paired with typically developing peers that served as expert models.…