How much do children's early experiences affect their cognitive and social development? How important is the parent's role in child development? Is it possible to ameliorate or reverse the ...consequences of early developmental deficits? This vitally important book draws on the latest research from the social sciences and studies on the brain to answer these questions and to explore what they mean for social policy and child and family development.The authors affirm that sound social policy providing for safe and appropriate early care, education, health care, and parent support is critical not only for the optimal development of children, but also for strengthening families, communities, and the nation as a whole. Offering a wealth of advice and recommendations, they explain:• the benefits of family leave, child care, and home visitation programs;• the damage that child abuse inflicts;• the vital importance of nutrition (and breast feeding) for pregnant women and young children;• the adverse effects that occur in misguided efforts to disseminate research too early;• and more.Written by experts in the field of early child development, care, and education, the book is essential reading for parents and policymakers alike.
Background Teacher reports of disobedient behaviours in children with intellectual disability noted in previous investigations represent a mismatch with the typical personality profile associated ...with intellectual disability. We hypothesise that this contradiction arises from the frustration experienced by children with intellectual disability when faced with tasks inappropriate for their mental age.
Method Children with mild to moderate intellectual disability attempted two tasks, one level-appropriate and the other level-inappropriate for their mental age. Results were scored on a Disobedient Behaviour Checklist.
Results Compared to both the mental age and chronological age comparison groups, children with intellectual disability showed increased disobedient behaviours when faced with the level-inappropriate task, but showed no significant differences on the level-appropriate task.
Conclusions Children with intellectual disability may be no more likely to misbehave in classroom settings than children without disability, provided children with intellectual disability receive instruction that is sensitive and appropriate to their ability level.
Passage of the No Child Left Behind (NCLB) Act of 2001 ushered in a new era of accountability for educational institutions and social programs in the United States. Federal funding became tied to ...demonstrated results on the basis of scientifically based research. In this paper we recount the science-to-policy translation process for one of the first studies considered under this new mantra, namely, the national evaluation of the 21st-Century Community Learning Centers after-school programs. The recount highlights a range of challenges, problems, and debates in the process, and discusses several lessons learned from this example that may be useful for the science-to-policy translation process in general, and for future studies under the NCLB Act specifically.
The number of state-funded preschool programs for low-income children has increased dramatically over the past few decades, and recent research has indicated that these programs vary considerably ...along a variety of dimensions. By 1998 only 13 of the current 33 state preschool programs (which serve children 3 to 5, provide some form of classroom-based educational service, and are primarily funded and administered at the state level) had completed a formal evaluation of the program’s impact on child outcomes. This paper presents a critical meta-analytic review of these evaluations, providing measures of standardized effects for all significant impacts to facilitate comparisons across differing domains of outcome and evaluative methods. Although several methodological flaws in these studies are identified, the pattern of overall findings may offer modest support for positive impacts in improving children’s developmental competence in a variety of domains, improving later school attendance and performance, and reducing subsequent grade retention. Significant impacts were mostly limited to kindergarten and first grade; however, some impacts were sustained several years beyond preschool. The results of these studies were similar to evaluations of other large-scale preschool programs for low-income children, such as Head Start. Modest outcome goals are warranted for preschool programs serving low-income children, for example, the promotion of school readiness. Suggestions are presented for improved preschool and early intervention program evaluation.
From its inception, Head Start has maintained children's social and emotional adjustment as a primary goal of intervention, but researchers have yet to settle on a consensus definition of social ...competence that can be used in developmental research and program evaluation. To address this gap in our knowledge base, we offer a comprehensive review of the extant research on children's social skills, including their ability to modulate their feelings, their social cognitions, and their behaviors within the context of peer interaction, as measures of social competence. We then examine definitions of social competence in light of assessments of children's performance, as assessed by parents, teachers and peers. Based upon this review, we offer a comprehensive set of concrete policy recommendations for the assessment of social competence as a key indicator of programmatic success, when evaluating early childhood intervention.
A self-report measure of attitudes about seeking help from adults for psychosocial problems was administered to approximately 200 children and adolescents. More negative help-seeking attitudes were ...associated with male gender, adolescence, depressive symptomatology, and lower self-efficacy. Implications for effective delivery of mental health services to at-risk youth are discussed.
The Comprehensive Child Development Program (CCDP) was a demonstration project designed to test a specific model of service delivery for young children and families in poverty. Following the ...evaluation’s failure to show strong impacts, early intervention has come under fire from opponents in the popular literature and in Congress. We conclude that shortcomings in both implementation and evaluation contributed to the failure to demonstrate effectiveness. Lessons learned from the CCDP are articulated, addressing the roles of demonstration projects and their evaluations, the problems associated with evaluating programs early in their implementation, the importance of assuring appropriate treatment quantity and quality, and the judicious use and interpretation of large-scale randomized evaluations.
Since its founding in 1965, Head Start's goal has been to help children who live in poverty prepare for school. Here, Raver and Zigler discuss issues relating to the assessment of young children and ...the new assessment requirements for children in Head Start programs.
This article examines the recent movement toward enrolling four-year-olds in academic programs The research base and political forces that guided the direction of the movement are considered remedial ...intervention programs for economically disadvantaged children, the need for change in decaying school programs, and the urgent need for increased day-care services It is determined that the research base does not demonstrate that early schooling will be beneficial to middle-class children who constitute the majority of four-year-olds It is suggested that early schooling may be an inappropriate solution to the current crisis in child care for working parents and that children's development may suffer if limitted educational funds are expended on nonfunctional programs. Developmentally appropriate care programs carried out in school buildings by specialists in early childhood development are suggested as an alternative
