In this article, Jeffrey Wood reflects on his teacher research project in his kindergarten classroom. Wood focuses on the value of critical literacy as seen through his work with Moses, a student in his classroom. Wood shows us how much we need to consider children’s points of views in early childhood literacy teaching. Wood describes how an important idea such as critical literacy—which involves creating literacy teaching that speaks to children’s identities and empowers them—brings us closer to the worlds of our children and to those moments of insight and learning for ourselves as teachers.

This thesis analyzes the effects of portfolio assessment on preschool teachers, preschool children and their parents. In addition, the effects on school education system of portfolio assessment were examined. This study was conducted in a private preschool in Ankara and the participants included 6 preschool teachers, 10 6 year-old children and their parents. The study had been applied in this school for one year by the researcher. Observations, interviews and questionnaires were used during data collection. Participants were interviewed and questionnaires were used during and at the end of the study. Given the focus of the study to examine and describe the use of portfolio assessment in a preschool, qualitative procedure were used. An interpretive case study was selected to be the method of research design. In order to analyze the data coding system was developed and was used to organize and clarify data gathered from teachers, parents and children. Results of the study were examined based on the research questions. It was found that, preschool teachers had positive attitudes toward portfolio assessment. In addition, this study showed that portfolio assessment supported preschool children&rsquo / s self-expression skills, self-confidence and their self-responsibilities. Parents also thought that portfolio assessment helped them to investigate their children&rsquo / s attitudes, interests and capabilities. Lastly, portfolio assessment application affected the preschool education system.

The aim of this study is to compare the narrative skills of first grade elementary students who had early childhood education and the narrative skills of first grade elementary students who did not have early childhood education and investigate their parents&rsquo / reading-related activities with them. In order to achieve this aim, the present study focuses on narratives produced by students who had early childhood education and students who did not have early childhood education using Mercer Mayer&rsquo / s (1969) wordless picture-book &ldquo / Frog, where are you?&rdquo / . This study compares those narratives with special attention to how emergence of story structure, the narrative length and inclusion of evaluative devices differ depending on their educational background in their orally collected narratives. Participants are 28 children who had early childhood education and 28 children who did not have early childhood education. Moreover, 27 parents whose child had early childhood education and 25 parents whose child did not have early childhood education participated in the study to get better understanding of their children&rsquo / s narrative skills. The results of the study indicate that narratives of students who had early childhood education include more structural elements and evaluative devices compared to the narratives of students who did not have early childhood education. Moreover, most of the parents participated in this study do not conduct reading-related activities with their children at home.

This research aimed at investigating pre-service and in-service preschool teachers&rsquo / views regarding creativity in early childhood education by determining similarities and/or differences among their views. The data of the study was gathered from 10 pre-service and 11 in-service teachers by asking their views about creativity in early childhood education. This study has been realized by the qualitative research method and the data was gathered through a type of interview, namely focus group technique. The seven basic interview questions developed by Aslan &amp / Cansever (2009) for primary school teachers were rephrased considering early childhood education context. In the data analysis procedure, four basic themes were constituted: &ldquo / teachers&#039 / views on creativity&rdquo / , &ldquo / teachers&#039 / views on creative people&rdquo / , &ldquo / teachers&rsquo / views on the importance of creativity in early childhood education&rdquo / , and &ldquo / teachers&rsquo / views on the obstacles to creativity in early childhood education&rdquo / . The results demonstrated that although every participant had their own creativity definitions, they agreed on some common ideas about creativity. The participants were aware of the value of creativity in preschool education and they stated that they prepare and implement creative activities to nurture children&rsquo / s creativity as well as stating that there are many obstacles to achieve this goal. They indicated that these obstacles are mostly based on school administrators, teachers, and parents. Moreover, it was concluded that the most striking difference between pre-service and in-service early childhood teachers&rsquo / views was the fact that unlike in-service teachers, only the pre-service teachers gave some recommendations to tackle with the obstacles to children&rsquo / s creativity.

The aim of the study is to investigate early childhood teachers&rsquo / perceptions and self-reported practices towards instructional arrangement for classroom management. In the light of literature review components of instructional arrangement were evaluated and the most common elements used by researchers were selected to be investigated within this study. Materials, daily schedules, and curriculum planning are the three components that are included in the study. More specifically, the present study aimed to examine perceptions and self-reported practices of early childhood teachers on how to select materials, design daily schedule, and plan curriculum / and to investigate their perceptions on those three components for classroom management. Early childhood teachers participated in the study were involved in an interview which was developed and conducted by the researcher. There were twenty questions in the interview including three sections. The aim of the first part was to get demographic information from participants. Questions in the second part were designed to see the perceptions and self-reported practices of participants on classroom management. The third part was designed to see perceptions and self-reported practices of teachers towards materials, scheduling, and planning for classroom management. 17 early childhood teachers from different schools participated in the study working with children between the ages of three to six. 16 female and one male early childhood teachers invited to be participated in the study. Five of the teachers were working in public schools and 12 of the teachers were working in private schools. The findings of the study indicated that early childhood teachers believe on the importance of materials, daily schedules, and curriculum planning on classroom management. They consider classroom management while selecting materials, designing daily schedules, and preparing curriculum plans. Their criteria for materials, daily schedule, and curriculum planning indicate differences based on their educational backgrounds and experience levels. As opportunities of public and private schools have differences, applications indicate differences, too. Teachers stated the influence of families and school administrations on their classroom management applications.

Thesis (Ph. D.)--Florida State University, 2004. / Advisors: Dr. Amy Wetherby, Dr. Lisa Scott-Trautman, Florida State University, College of Communication, Dept. of Communication Disorders. Title and description from dissertation home page (viewed June 16, 2004). Includes bibliographical references.

This qualitative dissertation explores the beliefs of 15 pre-service teachers who completed their apprentice teaching semester in diverse early childhood classrooms. The pre-service teachers' beliefs about teaching in diverse early childhood classrooms and the experiences the pre-service teachers attributed to having influenced and/or challenged their prior beliefs are of particular interest in this study. An analysis of interview data resulted in four themes. The first theme explores the participants' focus on their beliefs about how students learn, the role of the teacher in students' learning, and the importance of building a classroom community when asked to describe teaching in diverse early childhood classrooms. The ways in which the participants marginalized multicultural education by limiting what it included and by reserving it for particular subject areas, grade levels, and groups of children is described in the second theme. The third theme details the experiences that altered the participants' prior beliefs about teaching in diverse early childhood classrooms, including seeing difference, confronting prejudices, observing teachers, and refining beliefs. In the final theme, I examine the instability found in the participants' beliefs with regard to language, difference, families, and holidays. A second phase of research, including interview, observation, and document data, resulted in two themes: adopting pedagogical approaches and reflecting on practice. These findings lead to three conclusions for this study. First, pre-service teachers' beliefs about teaching in diverse classrooms are more complex than previous research has suggested. Second, reflecting on beliefs and practice is essential to the development of multicultural education practices. However, reflection about diversity, by itself, does not help pre-service teachers with their practice during field placements. Pre-service teachers need opportunities to observe multicultural education practices to connect beliefs and theory to practice. Finally, teacher educators need to understand the prior experiences and beliefs of the pre-service teachers in their courses in order to plan a range of activities that meet pre-service teachers where they are and then take them where they need to go with regards to their beliefs about teaching in diverse classrooms, so that these activities are effective for providing an interruption of prior beliefs. / text

This study examined the early reading development of native English speaking (L1) and children who speak English as a second language (ESL) who are receiving instruction in English. The study addressed whether there are original differences in pre-reading and language skills between L1 and ESL-speaking children, and whether similar patterns of reading development in English from kindergarten to grade 2 exist across language groups. As well, the study examined which skills in kindergarten identify those children at-risk for reading failure from all language backgrounds. The participants of the study were 978 grade 2 children who were seen as part of a longitudinal study that began in their kindergarten year. Within the sample, there were 790 children who are L1 speakers and 188 children who have a first language other than English and who spoke little or no English upon entry to kindergarten (ESL). In kindergarten, participants were administered standardized tasks of reading and memory as well as experimental tasks of language, phonological awareness, letter identification, rapid naming, and phonological memory. At the end of grade 2, children were administered various tasks of reading, spelling, language, arithmetic, and memory. All children received phonological awareness instruction in kindergarten and systematic phonics instruction in grade 1 in the context of a balanced early literacy program. In kindergarten, 23.8% of L1 speakers were identified as at-risk for reading failure and 37.2% of ESL speakers were identified as at-risk for reading failure. In grade 2, 4.2% of L1 speakers were identified as reading disabled and 3.72% of ESL speakers were identified as reading disabled. By the end of grade 2, the majority of the ESL speakers had attained reading skills that were similar to the L1 group. Although there were differences on each of the measures of reading, reading comprehension, spelling, phonological processing and arithmetic between average and disabled readers in grade 2, the ESL and L1 speakers had similar scores on all these tasks.

The first study examined the development of reading, spelling and syntactic skills in English speakers (L1) and children with English as a Second language (ESL) from kindergarten to grade 3. This longitudinal study also investigated procedures for identifying reading difficulties in the early grades of elementary school for both English speakers and children with ESL. Reading, spelling, phonological processing, syntax, lexical access and working memory skills were assessed in kindergarten. Additional tasks were incorporated into the battery to assess cognitive and reading processes in grade 3. By the end of grade 3, the L1 and ESL normally achieving readers performed in similar ways on all tasks except on the spelling, arithmetic and syntactic awareness tasks. The ESL normally achieving readers performed better than the L1 on spelling and arithmetic tasks, however the L1 normally achieving readers performed better than the ESL on the syntactic awareness task. Similar cognitive and reading components predicted word reading and reading comprehension in grade 3 for both language groups. The results show that learning English as a second language is not an impediment to successful literacy learning, and may even be an advantage. In the second part of this study we examine whether the first language of children with ESL affected the reading, spelling and syntactic awareness in English. Seven language groups, Chinese, Farsi, Slavic, Japanese, Romance, Tagalog, and native English speakers groups, were compared in a cross sectional study. This study included all the children with ESL in kindergarten and grades 1, 2 and 3. The results demonstrated positive as well as negative effects in spelling and syntactic skills, resulting from the transfer to English for members of different language groups. Differences across language groups reflect the nature of the native language. Specifically, a positive transfer occurred when the L1 grammar system was more complex than the L2 grammar system. When investigating second language it is necessary to consider the native language and effect on the acquisition of a second language.

Many children in the foundation phase in rural schools in KwaZulu-Natal, South Africa struggle to acquire early literacy skills. A review of the literature demonstrates the link between early communication development and academic achievement, including literacy skills (Rossetti, 2001). This study explored the beliefs and practices of caregivers regarding early communication development as a means to providing culturally appropriate early communication intervention. The study drew on phenomenological and interpretive viewpoints to inform the qualitative design. Fifteen caregivers with healthy infants in the age range of 0-12 months were recruited from a post-natal clinic in Inanda, a rural community in KwaZulu-Natal. The study took place in three phases. Phase 1) Nine of the participants were divided between two focus groups. Focus groups used photo elicitation as a method of stimulating discussion on subjects relevant to the topic. Phase 2) Data from the focus groups was used to inform the development of an individual guided interview schedule. One participant took part in a pilot study of an individual interview. Phase 3) The remaining five caregivers participated in individual guided interviews. Data obtained through both focus groups and individual interviews was analyzed for themes using Creswell’s Data Analysis Spiral (1998). Five themes were identified as falling within the two study objectives: Parenting beliefs and parenting practices. The themes under parenting beliefs included: the role of the parent; needs and abilities of the infant and communication. Themes included under parenting practices were: daily activities and language stimulation. The results show that caregivers’ beliefs are guided by the desire for their infants to be accepted by community members, thus prioritizing issues of respect and observable health as their parenting goals. Caregivers’ daily activities facilitate the development of the maternal bond which serves as the foundation for the development of communication and provides language stimulation. These practices are however noted to be intuitive and lack a formal knowledge base. Practice and research implications for these findings are discussed. / Thesis (M.Sc.)-University of KwaZulu-Natal, Westville, 2011.