This study examined the stability and growth over a 3-year period of individual differences in preschool children's social competence, which was assessed in three domains: social ...engagement/motivation, profiles of behavior and personality attributes characteristic of socially competent young children, and peer acceptance. A total of 255 children (126 girls and 129 boys) participated in this study. Growth curve analyses demonstrated both stability and change with regard to social competence over early childhood. Social competence measures and latent variables were invariant over this time period, individual differences in social competence were largely stable from year to year, and significant increases over time were observed for the domain most closely reflective of specific personal attributes skills.
Morocco has undergone significant reforms in the education and training field, including the implementation of preschool education as a compulsory stage in the education system. Several studies have ...shown that attitudes toward science tend to decline between the ages of 11 and 14. Therefore, it is crucial to promote the acquisition of different modes of reasoning and forms of thought from early childhood. The primary objective of preschool education in Morocco should be to promote positive attitudes toward science. This study aims to analyze the preschool program prescribed in the Moroccan curriculum framework with regard to scientific awareness as well as its methodological and practical implications. The analysis was conducted using a designed grid and including the following criteria: construction of school science; axiological and psychological foundations of science learning; objectives and competencies; contents; approaches; activities; teaching strategies; didactic resources; pedagogical design and evaluation. The study's findings revealed that the Moroccan Curriculum Framework for Preschool Education featured a number of dimensions related directly to scientific awareness. However, no explicit statements about scientific awareness or science literacy were made. Moreover, some elements suggested in the program document were out of phase with the current trends of scientific awareness. Therefore, the study offered some suggestions for improving the proposal provided by this pedagogical document. In conclusion, Morocco's focus on preschool education is a positive step towards building a more scientifically literate society. However, to fully benefit from it, the guidance document must be revised to reflect current scientific awareness trends.
•Self-regulation program supports emotion, behavior and attention regulation sub-dimensions.•The self-regulation program develops self-regulation and social skills.•Self-regulation program reduces ...problem behaviors.
The purpose of the research is the development of the Preschool Self-Regulation Program and the examination of the effect of the program on children's self-regulation skills, problem behaviors and social skills. The research designed in the embedded design; the quantitative dimension is quasi-experimental design with pre-test post-test control group, and the qualitative dimension is basic qualitative research. Working group consists of 52 children, 26 of whom are in the experimental group, 26 of which are in the control group, and two teachers in the experimental group. Quantitative data were analyzed by MANOVA and t-test for dependent samples, and qualitative data were analyzed by deduction method. In the study, a program consisting of 21 sessions, 7 weeks and 3 days a week, was applied in the experimental group. In the results of the research; while there was a significant difference in the pre-test post-test scores of the experimental and control groups in self-regulation skills and social skills, there was a significant difference in problem behaviors only in the experimental group. There was a significant difference in favor of the experimental group in the post-test scores of self-regulation skills, social skills and problem behaviors. When the qualitative findings of the study were examined, it was concluded that while there was an increase in self-regulation and social skills, there was a decrease in problem behaviors.
Head Start (HS) is the largest federally funded preschool program for disadvantaged children. Research has shown relatively small impacts on cognitive and social skills; therefore, some have ...questioned its effectiveness. Using data from the Head Start Impact Study (3-year-old cohort; N = 2,449), latent class analysis was used to (a) identify subgroups of children defined by baseline characteristics of their home environment and caregiver and (b) test whether the effects of HS on cognitive, and behavioral and relationship skills over 2 years differed across subgroups. The results suggest that the effectiveness of HS varies quite substantially. For some children there appears to be a significant, and in some cases, long-term, positive impact. For others there is little to no effect.
This research traces the development of symbol-infused joint engagement during mother–child interactions into the preschool years. Forty-nine children, who had been previously observed as toddlers ...(L. B. Adamson, R. Bakeman, & D. F. Deckner, 2004), were systematically observed during interactions with their mothers at ages 3½, 4½, and 5½ during activities related to the past and future, internal states, and graphic systems. Although the amount of symbol-infused joint engagement reached a ceiling by 3½, its focus continued to become more complex and its form more balanced. Individual differences in children's symbol-infused joint engagement were stable across 4 years. These findings highlight both how joint engagement is transformed as conversational skills develop and how it remains rooted in earlier interactions and supported by caregiver's actions.
This study focuses on three main goals: First, 3-year-olds' spatial assembly skills are probed using interlocking block constructions (N = 102). A detailed scoring scheme provides insight into early ...spatial processing and offers information beyond a basic accuracy score. Second, the relation of spatial assembly to early mathematical skills was evaluated. Spatial skill independently predicted a significant amount of the variability in concurrent mathematical performance. Finally, the relation between spatial assembly skill and socioeconomic status (SES), gender, and parent-reported spatial language was examined. While children's performance did not differ by gender, lower SES children were already lagging behind higher SES children in block assembly. Furthermore, lower SES parents reported using significantly fewer spatial words with their children.
Data were analyzed from a population-based, longitudinal sample of 8,650 U.S. children to (a) identify factors associated with or predictive of oral vocabulary size at 24 months of age and (b) ...evaluate whether oral vocabulary size is uniquely predictive of academic and behavioral functioning at kindergarten entry. Children from higher socioeconomic status households, females, and those experiencing higher quality parenting had larger oral vocabularies. Children born with very low birth weight or from households where the mother had health problems had smaller oral vocabularies. Even after extensive covariate adjustment, 24-month-old children with larger oral vocabularies displayed greater reading and mathematics achievement, increased behavioral self-regulation, and fewer externalizing and internalizing problem behaviors at kindergarten entry.
This research synthesis examines whether the association between print exposure and components of reading grows stronger across development. We meta-analyzed 99 studies (N = 7,669) that focused on ...leisure time reading of (a) preschoolers and kindergartners, (b) children attending Grades 1-12, and (c) college and university students. For all measures in the outcome domains of reading comprehension and technical reading and spelling, moderate to strong correlations with print exposure were found. The outcomes support an upward spiral of causality: Children who are more proficient in comprehension and technical reading and spelling skills read more; because of more print exposure, their comprehension and technical reading and spelling skills improved more with each year of education. For example, in preschool and kindergarten print exposure explained 12% of the variance in oral language skills, in primary school 13%, in middle school 19%, in high school 30%, and in college and university 34%. Moderate associations of print exposure with academic achievement indicate that frequent readers are more successful students. Interestingly, poor readers also appear to benefit from independent leisure time reading. We conclude that shared book reading to preconventional readers may be part of a continuum of out-of-school reading experiences that facilitate children's language, reading, and spelling achievement throughout their development.
In this study, it was aimed to examine the effects of using Web 2.0 tools in environmental education on the attitudes of preschool children towards the environment. The research used a combination of ...quantitative and qualitative data. Quantitative data were collected through the “Attitudes Toward the Environment Scale: Children's Attitudes Toward the Environment Scale-Preschool Version (CATES-PV)”, and the qualitative data were collected through the "Interview Form" created by the researcher. A total of 38 children, 18 of them in the experimental group and 20 of them in the control group, aged between 60-72 month old attending a public day care center, participated in the study group of the research. One of the parents (mother or father) of the experimental group, which is the group where qualitative data were collected, participated in the research with 18 participants. Attitude towards the environment constitute dependent variable in the research. Independent variable is environments with and without Web 2.0 tools are used. In this research, two-factor ANOVA analysis for repeated measurements used for independent samples of the quantitative data obtained, descriptive analysis was applied to qualitative data. As a result of the research, a significant difference was determined between the average scores of children's attitudes towards the environment after the experimental procedure in the environment where Web 2.0 tools were used in environmental education. It was determined that the changes in the mean scores of attitudes towards the environment of the two groups before the experimental procedure were significantly higher in favor of the group in the environment where Web 2.0 tools were used in environmental education. In this study, it was concluded that the environment in which Web 2.0 tools are used in environmental education is effective in developing children's attitudes towards the environment. According to the qualitative findings, the parents in the experimental group stated that these tools made learning interesting, memorable and facilitating, provided continuity and permanence in learning, and were effective in developing correct attitudes.
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