ABSTRACT

Given the predictive nature of high-quality early childhood programs on children’s social and learning outcomes, effective leadership is critical to facilitate program improvement. Recognizing the need for cohesive conceptual frameworks that undergird research-based practice, a 5-year training institute for early childhood program directors was evaluated to assess training effectiveness. Moreover, we developed a model of early childhood leadership professional development grounded in our iterative analysis of data from this study and guided by theory-building methods. The findings show positive impacts on leaders’ self-reported facilitation and implementation of developmentally appropriate strategies in positive discipline and prosocial skills in early care and education settings. The practice-to-theory training model developed provides a theoretically cohesive framework to guide the professional development of early childhood program leaders that repositions the theory/practice binary by helping leaders problematize issues of practice and infuse theory as necessary tools and pragmatic anchors for solving real-world problems.

摘要

鉴于高质量的幼儿计划对儿童的社会和学习成果具有预测性，有效的领导对于促进计划的改善至关重要。认识到需要有统一的概念框架来支持基于研究的实践，因此对一个为期5年的幼儿计划主任的培训机构进行了评估，以评估培训的有效性。此外，我们基于对本研究数据的迭代分析，并以理论构建方法为指导，建立了幼儿领导力专业发展的模型。研究结果表明，对领导者自我报告的促进和实施早期护理和教育环境中积极的学科和亲社会技能的发展适当策略的积极影响。