Previous research indicates that the Child Observation in Preschool (COP) and Teacher Observation in Preschool (TOP), a companion set of observational tools used to assess the quality of preschool classrooms, capture important aspects of the preschool environment that are associated with children's growth (Farran et al., 2017; Nesbitt et al., 2015; Spivak & Farran, 2016). This study is the first to

This study investigates the impact of the timing of initial exposure to maternal depression on a comprehensive measure of children's school readiness that incorporates multidimensional developmental domains underlying school adaptation and later success. The Early Development Instrument scores of 59,413 children were linked to their mothers, who were observed from five years before the child's birth

This study aims at examining whether children's adjustment, social play behavior and Early Childhood Education and Care (ECEC) program-liking in universal ECEC are associated with the quality of student–teacher relationships and structural quality features of the classrooms they attend. The sample includes 7,436 5-year-old children (50% girls) and 195 sibling pairs (48% girls) participating in the

To examine the roles of self-regulation, negative affectivity, and the home environment in the development of procrastination, the current study investigated children's procrastination in relation to conscientiousness, effortful control, negative affectivity, parenting, and socioeconomic status. Parents of 3- to 6-year-olds (N = 396; 81.8% White) completed questionnaires assessing the above-mentioned

In the current study we investigated performance on the how many (how many?) and give-N tasks. We first investigated the relative performance of three-to-five-year-old children (N = 393; M = 4.75 years, SD = .75 years) on these tasks. Replicating prior work, we found that children performed worse on give-N compared to how many? and this performance gap increased as the set size increased. This performance

This study examined the effects of a content-based shared book reading (SBR) intervention on receptive and expressive vocabulary outcomes of dual language learner (DLL) preschool children enrolled in two school districts in south Texas. Using SBR as the target of instruction, 50 preschool teachers and 298 preschoolers were randomly assigned at the class level to either a well-specified and scripted

Exclusionary discipline practices differentially harm young children of color. As early childhood education systems seek to close these gaps to ensure all young children have access to high quality early learning experiences, the field requires more evidence-based approaches that can be scaled and replicated. Infant and early childhood mental health consultation (IECMHC) has been associated with lower

In the United States, families whose infants or toddlers have a diagnosis that results in a high likelihood of developmental delay or disability are automatically eligible for early intervention (EI). When families know prenatally of this diagnosis, they are not eligible for EI until their baby is born despite other developmental programs starting during pregnancy. Seventeen families who had a prenatal

In low- and middle-income countries, rural children rank below their urban counterparts on academic achievement. Given the importance of early childhood education (ECE) in promoting early learning, the urbanicity disparities may be partially explained by limited ECE availability in rural areas and the proliferation of private centers in urban areas. Using data from 6,000 economically disadvantaged

Multiple factors including the child's non-linguistic characteristics and caregiving environment can affect language development. Since preterm birth (<37 weeks’ gestation) can negatively affect language development, this study used path analysis to investigate whether the influence of preterm birth on expressive language development at 3 and 5 years of age is mediated by a child's non-linguistic characteristics

Young children in the United States, particularly Black boys, are being suspended and expelled from early childhood education programs and primary schools at alarming rates. Teachers describe children's “disruptive” or “challenging” behavior as the most common reason for suspending or expelling a child. For this reason, common efforts to reduce exclusionary discipline target teacher behavior to change

Recent research illustrates several gaps in understanding about teacher experiences of professional well-being, as well as how teachers understand and define their well-being. Given the limited understanding of the construct and correlates of teacher well-being and the omission of theoretical models in the development of prevention efforts and supports for teachers' mental health, it is valuable to

Motivated by an increasingly globalized and technological world, countries around the world are rewriting their education policies in favor of play-based learning. South Korea, a country that recently reformed its early childhood curriculum to reflect an emphasis on a whole-child, active play pedagogy, is an important case of how child- and play-centered curriculum may translate into implementable

This paper reports results of an experimental study that assessed the efficacy and teachers’ perception of feasibility of a set of structured games for promoting curriculum learning goals in 12 prekindergarten and kindergarten classrooms in Chile. We developed four structured games aligned with the Chilean curriculum learning goals, and that were adequate to the material and human conditions of low-income

In the context of family homelessness, children experience acute adversities related to loss of housing and residential mobility compounded with more chronic, poverty-related adversities and stressors. Among children in families experiencing homelessness, variability in experiences and outcomes warrant person-centered approaches to better delineate patterns of risk and resilience. Using latent profile

The number of early care and education centers that accept child care subsidies has declined, limiting access for children and families from low-income backgrounds. This statewide mixed methods study explores how centers make decisions about accepting subsidies in Arkansas. Quantitative results suggest that provider and community characteristics are important, while qualitative results help to enhance

Young children are exposed to new digital technologies, such as social robots. Limited research exists on how children engage with social robots and their role in the preschool classroom. This study observed 35 English-speaking children (M age = 4.60 years) participating in two tasks (Simon Says and iPad drawing) under the guidance of a social robot or human instructor. Children's engagement was measured

Using three waves of data from the Panel Study of Korean Children (family N = 1,723), this study investigated whether and how the longitudinal effects of marital relationships on children's social-emotional development are mediated through parenting and the moderating role of social support in the mediating processes. Results showed that fathers’ coparenting and warmth and mothers’ parenting stress

Taking a person-centered approach, this study examined stability and change in profiles of parenting qualities observed at two times in early childhood in a sample of 146 mothers of African American children living in households experiencing poverty. Latent Profile Analysis (LPA) of six qualities of parenting rated from mother-child interactions at ages 2.5 and 3.6 years revealed four distinct parenting

Manipulatives are often used to help children master mathematical concepts. The present study investigated whether concreteness of the object and concreteness of the language used to describe it mattered for effectiveness. Two hundred and twenty-five kindergarten children were taught how to solve equal sharing problems with one of the four methods: concrete-object-concrete-language, concrete-object-generic-language

Mechanisms translating initial impacts of early childhood education (ECE) programs into longer-term effects are poorly understood. This article posits that the temporality of unobserved mediated effects are integral to our understanding of the pathways underlying ECE programs’ long-term impacts. Leveraging panel data, we examined the patterns of indirect effects from two ECE programs on educational

Although the performance of number comparison and number line estimation are correlated with symbolic approximate arithmetic ability, it is unclear whether they contribute differently to it. We conducted a training study with 96 preschoolers using pre- and post-tests measuring number comparison, number line estimation, and symbolic approximate arithmetic tasks. Participants were randomly divided into

There is high turnover among child care teachers in the United States. Center directors could play an important role in reducing this turnover, but to date, research on how leaders in child care support workforce stability typically has not been conducted beyond small, selected samples. This study links survey responses from 1,114 teachers working in 152 publicly funded child care centers to examine

This study aims to explore participation in the Effective Classroom Interactions for Toddler Educators (ECI-TE) course and if doing so was associated with changes in their noticing and implementing effective educator-child interactions. Sixty-one center-based toddler educators were randomly assigned to control or participation in ECI-TE, an online content and coaching professional development course

Grade retention is a commonly used intervention for children who struggle in school. However, empirical research does not unequivocally support its efficacy. Of particular interest are the prevalence, predictors, and outcomes of students who are retained more than once in elementary school. To date, limited research examines students who are held back multiple times in school. We examined multiple

Children from underserved, minoritized, and immigrant families have less access to early out-of-school STEM learning opportunities. Playful Learning Landscapes increase the accessibility of early STEM learning in everyday public spaces (e.g., bus stops, grocery stores) by merging principles of guided play and STEM learning goals with local community's values. We used community-based design research

This study of a large sample of classroom teaching staff at 23 early childhood schools across the U.S. serving children birth to age 5 used survival analysis to investigate both the timing of staff turnover and the characteristics associated with turnover. The data were collected from over 2,000 teachers, assistant teachers and aides between 2007 and 2019. Survival analysis allowed for investigation

SES- and ethnicity-related disparities in teacher-child relationships are prevalent. An important cause may be that children of color and children from low-SES backgrounds are often perceived by their teachers to have lower social-emotional behavioral (SEB) competence. Besides the impact of poverty on SEB development, likely explanations for such gaps are cultural mismatch theory and teacher bias theory

Behavioural self-regulation is a key developmental task that improves, on average, across early childhood. Yet there is variation in the early developmental trajectories of behavioural self-regulation. The current study examines (1) heterogeneity in the trajectories of behavioural self-regulation across preschool and kindergarten, (2) peer relations in preschool (acceptance, sociability, victimization

Children's social-emotional and cognitive development is enhanced when early childhood educators display positive affect and respond appropriately to children's needs. However, there is little research on factors that influence teachers’ positive affect in the classroom, such as past adversity exposure and promoting teachers’ well-being. The current study examined the interactive effect of teacher

The present study investigates the debugging process of 526 children in preschool (4–6 aged) when programming a tangible robot. When a child is involved in programming, it is needed to identify and correct errors, or in other words, debug a program. Debugging is a high-level thinking skill and is an essential component closely related to developing Computational Thinking in early childhood education

With growing interest in supporting the development of computational thinking (CT) in early childhood, there is also need for new assessments that serve multiple purposes and uses. In particular, there is a need to understand the design of formative assessments that can be used during classroom instruction to provide feedback to teachers and children in real-time. In this paper, we report on an empirical

Self-regulation skills are an important predictor of school readiness and early school achievement. Research identifies that experiences of early stress in disadvantaged households can affect young children's brain architecture, often manifested in poor self-regulatory functioning. While there are documented benefits of coordinated movement activities and music education to improve self-regulation

Guided by social capital and diffusion of innovation theories and K-12 social network research, we describe instrumental advice network ties among diverse staff (n = 374) in a representative sample of early childhood education (ECE) programs (n = 43) in one large urban school district. We investigate across-time links between advice network ties and teachers’ job satisfaction, orientation to innovation

This paper describes a study designed to investigate the promise of resources that support the development of computational thinking (CT) in preschool children. This study was the culmination of a collaborative research process between researchers and media developers of a home-based intervention that included media and hands-on activities created to support the development of young children's CT.

In this work, we argue for expanding the scope of K-12 computational thinking (CT) integration contexts to include everyday scenarios involving moral reasoning. Epistemic overlap between computational thinking practices and moral reasoning suggest that these contexts are potentially rich sites to see “seeds of CT” in children's reasoning and can provide rich educational pathways for children into CT

Although studies have shown that computational thinking (CT) can enhance learning processes and outcomes across traditional subjects, they have not shown how teachers might scaffold children's CT processes in a technology-mediated learning context. This exploratory study examined how teacher talk and technologies impacted the CT of three children (6 to 8 years old). Seven videotaped 90-minute sessions

Collecting and organizing data to understand and answer real-world questions is an increasingly important skill in our current world. Fostering data collection and analysis (DCA) skills in young children leverages key mathematics skills as well as the data representation, visualization, and interpretation skills of computational thinking (CT), culminating in a problem-solving approach with data. As

This study aimed to better understand the construct of classroom chaos in relation to child care program quality and examine its association with child externalizing problems and social competence. Towards this end, two studies were conducted at child care programs in Turkey. Study 1 was qualitiative and relied on eight focus group interviews with 24 Turkish teachers to gain a deeper understanding

Most early care and education (ECE) programs serve 3-5 year olds, but enrolling children at younger ages has the potential to multiply the benefits of ECE enrollment. This study examined characteristics of children and family who enrolled as toddlers (18-35 months; n=450) versus preschoolers (36-48 months; n=2,356), then tested the impact of toddler enrollment in high-quality ECE on fall and spring

Practical wisdom and empirical evidence indicate that teachers’ commitment to learn and enact a practice (i.e., their commitment to implement) is a critical but overlooked mechanism for supporting changes in teacher practice. Shortcomings in this area of scholarship stem from research gaps regarding: (1) how to operationalize teachers’ commitment to implementing new practices and (2) which factors

This paper describes the iterative research and evaluation of the Coding as Another Language (CAL) curriculum that utilizes the free ScratchJr programming language in kindergarten to second grade. CAL was designed using principles of three theoretical frameworks: Curriculum Research Framework (CRF), which proposes different phases in the creation of research-based curriculum; Constructionism, which

The specific mechanisms by which teachers and parents can provide culturally relevant opportunities for computational thinking for racially/ethnically and linguistically diverse groups of preschoolers remain unknown. Accordingly, the purpose of this research is to examine how PreK parent and teacher voice directed efforts to realize a culturally relevant computing program. We drew data sources from

As many as 48% of children in prekindergarten (pre-K) miss a month or more of the pre-K year (i.e., 10% or more of the school year), and high levels of absenteeism are associated with adverse academic and social-emotional outcomes in pre-K and in K-12. To date, no studies have examined absenteeism specifically among children receiving child care subsidies, a population of children who may be at greater

Three dimensions of child–teacher relationships (derived from the Student-Teacher Relationship Scale) closeness, conflict and dependency have been conceptualized and investigated. In individualistic cultures a close relationship has been associated with children's academic performance and behavioural adjustment, conflictual relationships have been associated with maladjustment and externalising behaviours

This cross-sectional study examines associations between PreK classroom-level teacher-child interaction quality and individual children's peer engagement quantity and quality. The study utilizes a sample of 714 children from 214 classrooms collected as part of the National Center for Research on Early Childhood Education Professional Development (NCRECE) study. Multilevel regression models using a

We investigated whether school climate, specifically effective school leadership, strong family ties, and trusting relationships, moderates the well-documented disparities in pre-kindergarten quality for Black and Latine students relative to their peers. In a sample of 615 public schools in a large, urban school district serving a minoritized student population (the average school in the sample served

Children learn words through recruiting cues from verbal and nonverbal input, yet research in early childhood classrooms has focused almost exclusively on linguistic input. Nonverbal input, such as gestures, supports word learning for young children, particularly those with less linguistic knowledge, through capturing children's attention and enhancing semantic input. The present study investigates

This study examined the links between classroom skill compositions and preschoolers’ early learning and development in the nationally representative Head Start Family and Child Experiences Survey 2014 (FACES, n = 1,711 children/207 classrooms) and public pre-K programs in a county in Virginia (n = 1,467 children/123 classrooms). Results from a series of covariate-adjusted multilevel regression models

Learning coding during early childhood is an effective way for children to practice computational thinking. Aspects of children's motivation can increase the likelihood that children approach computational thinking activities with enthusiasm and deep engagement. Gender inequities may interfere with children's readiness to take advantage of opportunities to build computational thinking skills through

In the United States (U.S.), quality rating and improvement systems (QRIS) are used by many states to incentivize quality in ECE and may be a viable lever for promoting early childhood development and mental health on a population level. We conducted a qualitative review of publicly available data on state QRIS indicators to better understand how states incorporate evidence-informed early childhood

Public investments in professional development (PD) as a key strategy to improve the quality of early care and education (ECE) are large and growing, yet little is known about whether PD for early educators is linked to quality, either outside of experimental contexts or across the various sectors in which children are served. We use data from a community sample of early educators working in state

Previous empirical evidence is mixed regarding the impact of universal preschool on cognitive skills. We show that preschool enrollment can impact test scores positively if it does not lead to earlier school enrollment. We examine rich student data and use different enrollment cutoff dates in Hungary to separate the beneficial direct effect of earlier preschool enrollment from a negative indirect effect

This study utilized latent class analysis to identify classes of family ecological resources and risks among low-income families with infants, examine differences in child and parent outcomes two years later, and explore Early Head Start (EHS) program quality and dosage from ages to 1 to 3 years as moderators of these associations. Data from a longitudinal study of families enrolled in EHS, the EHS

The COVID-19 pandemic's impact on preschool children's school readiness skills remains understudied. This research investigates Head Start preschool children's early numeracy, literacy, and executive function outcomes during a pandemic-affected school year. Study children (N = 336 assessed at fall baseline; N = 237-250 assessed in spring depending on outcome; fall baseline sample: mean age = 51 months;

Teacher-child racial match has been shown to benefit young Black children, but less is known about the degree to which the match is with the lead teacher or the assistant, and if the preschool racial context moderates this association. This study utilized existing data collected during the 2014–15 through 2018–19 school years in 20 high-quality preschools that enrolled children from households/families

Children's behavioral engagement in preschool is a strong predictor of their academic achievement both concurrently and into the later school years across socioeconomic and ethnic groups (Chien et al., 2010; Fuhs et al., 2013; Hamre & Pianta, 2001; Kim & Suarez-Orozco, 2015; Ladd & Dinella, 2009). The present measurement development study was conducted within the context of a larger intervention research

Abstract not available

This study used multilevel modeling to examine the dynamics between the layers of influence associated with literacy, cognitive, and socioemotional outcomes of 3- to 4-year-old children in Nigeria. The study used data from the fifth round of the Multiple Indicator Cluster Survey (MICS), and adapted the social-ecological model of child development and the social determinants of health framework to investigate

This research explores the physically performative behaviors demonstrated by mothers and fathers during shared book reading (SBR) activities with their young children. Separate observations of fathers and mothers reading with their preschool-aged child (Mage = 46 months) were conducted with 40 families. Video-recorded observations were coded and analyzed for the physically performative behaviors demonstrated