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State and federal guidelines for implementing programs for the gifted have required that placement into such programs being as early as kindergarten. In order to help determine whether a child was functioning significantly above age level on certain tasks through multiple sources, a checklist for parents was developed and validated.;The parent checklist was analyzed for reliability and validity. Analysis of pre-school scores on the instrument was also conducted to determine whether or not placement into programs for the gifted could be predicted from the results. Parental responses were also investigated in an effort to determine the reliability of parents as a source of information about their children. Correlational studies were conducted on group test data which consisted of the Metropolitan Readiness Test, the second grade administration of the SRA Achievement Series, and the third grade administration of the Otis-Lennon School Ability Test. Additionally, correlational studies were conducted on a small sample of the students as first graders utilizing the Torrance Tests of Creative Thinking (Figural Form A) and the Scales for Rating the Behavioral Characteristics of Superior Students.;Statistical analysis included the use of multiple regression analyses and the determination of correlation coefficients (Cronbach's Alpha and Pearson Product Moment).

This study has been designed to describe how aspects of the behavior setting influence literacy events in kindergartens. A systematic investigation of literacy events in and across all areas of four kindergarten classrooms was undertaken to describe the conditions under which children had opportunities to become engaged in reading and writing activities through transactions with the environment. The framework for the study was the human ecological approach to early childhood education (Day, 1983). Quantitative data were collected using two instruments. A modification of The Behavior Checklist of Child-Environment Interaction (Day et al., 1982) was used in four neighboring inner-city kindergartens in the Western Massachusetts to simultaneously record literacy events, activity/areas, teachers' roles, teacher- or child-choice of activities, group size, materials use, and other behaviors. Precautions were taken to provide a sample which was internally consistent in terms of sites, subjects, and teachers. Children's naturally occurring behavior was recorded by two observers over a four-week period using a time-sampling-by-child methodology. High interobserver reliability was achieved on five days of simultaneous observations. A second instrument, The Survey of Displayed Literacy Stimuli (Loughlin and Cole, 1986), was used to measure the amount of literacy-related materials in each classroom. Qualitative data were collected in fieldnotes when literacy events were observed. Relationships were described between children's reading and writing activities and these three factors: design of physical space, amount and presentation of materials, and teacher-child interactions. Variation was found in the types and frequencies of literacy events in and across classrooms that were related to these environmental factors. The interaction of these factors explained the conditions in kindergartens under which children had opportunities to engage in reading and writing activities through transactions with the environment.

The purpose of this study was to learn how children between the ages of five and nine construct their understanding of conflict and how to resolve it, how their cognitive development both reflects and shapes this understanding, and how their ideas about conflict develop over time. Open-ended interviews were conducted with two children from each of four grades (K-3) in a Boston Public School in order to elicit the children's ideas about conflict, solutions to conflict, and negotiation. Two drawings of conflicts were used, one in each of two separate interviews, one depicting a conflict over an object, the other an interpersonal conflict. Five cognitive dimensions were used to analyze the interview data. Children's understanding of conflict, solutions to conflict, and negotiation, and the gradual changes in children's thinking over time were analyzed. The five dimensions were: concrete to abstract; from one idea to coordination of multiple ideas; static to dynamic thinking; transductive to logical causal reasoning; and, from one to more than one point of view. The results of this analysis show that with age there was a general progression of the eight children's understanding of conflict, solutions to conflict, and negotiation as they advanced along the five cognitive dimensions. Children's understanding of conflict progressed from more concrete to abstract, and from more discrete and momentary to increasingly embedded in a context of time and other events, ideas and feelings. Children's understanding of solutions to conflict also progressed from concrete to more abstract. In addition, there was an increasing capacity to think of greater numbers of possible solutions to conflict, especially positive solutions, as children moved along the cognitive dimensions. Children's understanding of negotiation progressed from concrete to more abstract, including increasingly complex psychological processes. Children showed a progression in their ability to understand negotiation as a complex process related to both conflicts and solutions. Gender and individual differences among children emerged from the data in addition to developmental differences.

The purpose of this dissertation is to examine, explore, and describe the phenomenon of teaching with a focus on self-esteem, or teaching with a focus on the affective or psychological domain of development. This phenomenon is called humanistic education which is rooted in humanistic psychology, an American school of psychology that evolved in the middle of this century. Humanistic education is on the rise in educational institutions across the country because of a positive relationship between self-esteem and constructive learning and because of the growing self-esteem needs of our nation's children. This study sought to gain a grounded understanding of the experience and significance assigned to the experience of teaching with a focus on self-esteem by learning from fifteen teachers who actually do teach with such a focus. The qualitative method of in-depth phenomenological interviewing was employed. The data is presented in the form of narrated profiles of selected participants and in the form of key themes that comprise the phenomenon.

The purpose of the study was to examine beginning preschool teachers' conceptions of teaching young children and their perceptions of the origins of these ideas. The participants were six preschool teachers employed during their first two years after graduating with A.S. degrees in early childhood education from five different two-year colleges. This qualitative multi-case study used observations, videotapes, and in-depth interviews to collect data about the experiences of the six teachers. The Ethnograph (Seidel, 1988) software program was employed to manage the data. An adapted model of pedagogical content knowledge, as described in the literature on teacher knowledge (Shulman, 1986; Grossman 1990), was used to organize the data along a learning-to-teach continuum, as described in the teacher socialization literature (Feiman-Nemser, 1983; Zeichner & Gore, 1990). This continuum begins with early experiences, progresses through formal teacher education, and continues throughout a teacher's career. The major findings of the study indicate earlier experiences provided the teachers with predispositions toward particular curriculum content and interactional styles. Their conceptualization of what and how to teach to young children was developed and enriched during formal teacher education with coursework contributing primarily to curricular knowledge. Practicum experiences, including opportunities to bring on-campus learnings into settings for young children, were a major source of the development of instructional strategies. A combination of coursework and direct experiences with children of varying ages and in various contexts contributed to the teachers' overall understanding of children. The teachers reported learning from colleagues, trying things out, and "just being with children" as rich sources of practical knowledge (Elbaz, 1981) during their early years of professional experience. Both explicit and implicit connections were made between how knowledge was gained during these induction years and the content and process of their formal teacher education programs, as well as with their prior experiences. This study, in contrast to previous studies of preschool teachers, provides descriptive data of the substance and process of five early childhood teacher education programs from the perspectives of their graduates. Insights were thus gained into the aspects of the teacher preparation experiences the teachers found have made valuable contributions to their present work.

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