This study examined practicum students ' beliefs and experiences abo ut developmentally appropriate practice (DAP) prior to a practicum experience and following it. Another goal was to examine differences between the practicum students' majors and their pre- and posttest DAP beliefs and experiences scores. Finally, this investigation sought to determine the differences between practicum students' DAP beliefs and experiences and the amount of time they spent in a practicum setting. A total of 95 students completing a practicum in the Adele and Dale Young Child Development Laboratory in the infant (Group I) or the 2-year-old classroom (Group 2) participated in the study. The students completed the Teacher Beliefs and Praclices Survey: Infan/s and Toddlers, as well as the Teacher Beliefs and Praclices Survey: Jnfanls if they were in Group I, or the Teacher Beliefs and Praclices Survey: Toddlers, if they worked with Group 2. The questionnaire consisted of two sections. The items on the first part were designed to assess the practicum students' beliefs about DAP. The second part of the questionnaire measured practicum students' experiences and activities in the infant or toddler classroom. Findings from the infants and toddlers measure indicate that the practicum students did show a statistically significant increase from pretest to posttest in their DAP beliefs, and a statistically significant decrease in DAP experiences. This might suggest that the students were able to understand the theories and philosophies of DAP; however, interpreting the guidelines of DAP into classroom practice in the short time associated with the practicum was a difficult task. Results also showed a statistically significant difference between practicum students of different majors and their DAP beliefs and experiences prior to the practicum experience as compared to after. Practicum students with majors in family, consumer, and human development with an emphasis in human development showed the greatest increases in their DAP beliefs over time. Students majoring the early childhood education and related majors showed a statistically significant increase in their DAP experiences between pre- and posttest. Finally, analyses to determine the relationship between practicum students' DAP beliefs and experiences and the amount of time they spent in a practicum setting showed that Group I (infants) had a statistically significant increase in DAP belief scores, even though they spent less time in the practicum setting. Group II (toddlers), who spent a longer time in the practicum selling, had a statistically significant increase in DAP experience scores. Implications of these findings for teacher educators and students are presented. Recommendations for future research are also included.

A great deal of evidence suggests that parental communication and involvement are essential for the development of language in young children. However, hearing parents of deaf children face unique challenges in providing appropriate stimulation and language input to their deaf children. To date, few studies have determined which types of input are best. This study utilized data collected from the largest, youngest, nationally representative sample of deaf children receiving cochlear implants. The purpose of this study was to identify the facilitative language techniques that are most effective in facilitating receptive and expressive language development in young deaf children. Ninety-three deaf children, ages 2 years and under were enrolled at six implant centers. Deaf children were assessed prior to implantation and then followed for three years post-implantation. At each assessment, parent-child interactions were videotaped in an unstructured Free Play and structured Art Gallery task. All parent and child speech, vocalizations, and sign language were transcribed from the 10 minute videotaped parent-child interactions and coded using the Parenting Strategies for Communication coding system. Results revealed that the most frequently used lower-level strategies used by parents were directives, comments, and close-ended questions. The most frequently used higher-level strategies were parallel talk, open-ended questions, and recast. In addition, the Art Gallery task facilitated more parent utterances and longer mean length of utterances compared to Free Play, but the frequency of facilitative language techniques was not different. Using bivariate latent difference score modeling, higher-level strategies predicted growth in expressive language scores across three years post-implantation. Further, higher-level strategies had a delayed effect on receptive language, with techniques used at 24 months post-implantation predicting growth in receptive language at 36 months post-implantation. These results suggested that parent's play an active role in facilitating their child's language development. Interventions for parents should be developed using a coaching model, where parents receive hands-on training and practice using these effective facilitative language techniques. Future studies should evaluate the effectiveness of this intervention, as well as the effectives of these language techniques in children implanted after 2 years of age.

No description available.

The aim of this qualitative research was to gain an in-depth understanding of how teachers of toddlers (aged 25-36 months) described sound and music learning opportunities and experiences provided to children in their learning environments. In this research, teachers were asked how their personal and professional experiences with sound and music influenced their planning of toddlers’ sound and music learning opportunities. The design of this study was in-depth interviews of six toddler lead teachers in three childcare sites. Data were gathered through photographs, planning documents, and in-depth interviews using a university IRB-approved video conferencing program. Findings showed that all participants valued the significance of sound and music and considered them to be sources of enjoyment and appreciation. However, participants provided sound and music learning opportunities based on their individual interpretations of sound and music. These interpretations were informed by their personal experiences with sound and music and their childcare sites' underlying philosophy and curricula. The findings of this study have relevance for various stakeholders, including early childhood educators, music teachers, school administrators, policymakers, and researchers, as they address issues related to sound and music teacher preparation, specifically in terms of providing consistent sound and music experiences for toddlers, designing optimal sound and music learning environments for them, and developing comprehensive curricula to provide a variety of opportunities for sound and music exploration.

No description available.

No description available.

The availability of and access to technology has been steadily increasing in recent years. Especially in light of the COVID-19 pandemic, technology use in some form is almost a daily occurrence in the United States (Vargo et al., 2021). A growing body of work has been examining familial technoference, which include interruptions to family interactions due to technology use, and a sub-focus of this research has specifically focused on parent-child relationships and technological interruptions. Using a comprehensive theoretical approach including an update to the process model of parenting (Belsky, 1984; Taraban and Shaw, 2018) and support from both attachment theory (Ainsworth et al., 1978; Bowlby, 1969) and ecological theory (Bronfenbrenner, 1977; Bronfenbrenner and Ceci, 1994), the current research examined the role of technology in parent-child interactions with parents of two-year-old children. In Study 1, constructs of parental technoference were explored in parents of children between 24-26 months of age to evaluate latent factors of parent technology use from 60 indicators and to identify parent and family characteristics that might predict the factors of technology use. A nationally recruited online sample of 323 parents of two-year-old children completed a set of questionnaires online to examine constructs of parental technology use and predictors of those constructs for Study 1. A CFA was conducted to evaluate the model fit of multiple indicators of parent technology use loading onto four predicted latent factors: Problematic Technology Use, Technoference with Child and Family, Social Support through Technology, and Technology Use as Regulation. The hypothesized model had poor fit, and an Exploratory Factor Analysis was conducted. In the final model, only 35 indicators emerged as significant factors to be included in the final model to map onto five latent constructs: Missing Out due to Technology, Problematic Technology Behaviors, Preoccupation with Technology, Positive Parenting through Technology, and Social Support through Technology. The final latent constructs parsed apart the predicted Problematic Technology Use into distinct constructs of thought (Preoccupation with Technology), behavior (Problematic Technology Behaviors), and consequence (Missing Out due to Technology), while items from the predicted Technoference with Child and Family mapped onto the more general Missing Out due to Technology (in various contexts, not just that within the family). Items from the predicted Technology Use as Regulation and Social Support through Technology mapped closely onto the Positive Parenting through Technology and Social Support through Technology constructs, respectively, albeit with fewer significant factor loadings than predicted. Next, predictors of the latent constructs (perceived stress, social support, parenting satisfaction, parenting self-efficacy, and both parent and child effortful control) were examined. SEM was conducted to determine predictors of these constructs of technology use. Perceived stress was a significant predictor of all five latent constructs. Parenting self-efficacy was a significant predictor of Problematic Technology Behaviors, Positive Parenting through Technology, and Social Support through Technology. Parenting satisfaction was a significant predictor of Problematic Technology Behaviors, Preoccupation with Technology, Positive Parenting through Technology, and Social Support through Technology. Social support was not a significant predictor of any latent constructs. Parent self-regulation was a significant predictor of Missing Out due to Technology and Positive Parenting through Technology. Child self-regulation was a significant predictor of Preoccupation with Technology, Positive Parenting through Technology, and Social Support through Technology. These findings demonstrate that there are distinct patterns of parental technology use that are differentially related to parent and family characteristics. This insight into characteristics that are associated with distinct types of technology use can be helpful in the development of targeted intervention for parents seeking to change their technology use behaviors. In Study 2, the impacts of parent technology use on parent behavior during parent-child interactions were examined through a repeated measures analysis of variance (RMANOVA) and Hierarchical Linear Modeling (HLM). In a randomized experimental design, 57 primary caregivers of 30–36-month-old children participated in three 5-minute free play sessions with their child in these conditions: control (no technology), television, and smartphone. Parent engagement with technology was scored in each condition, as well as parental sensitivity and involvement. First, RMANOVAs were conducted to explore differences in proportions of parent involvement with child play by condition and mean differences in parental sensitivity. There were significant differences in proportions of levels of parent involvement by condition; however, there were no differences in mean levels of parent sensitivity by condition. Due to a significant interaction between proportions of levels of involvement and order of condition, an HLM was conducted to control for change over time and isolate influences of condition on parent behavior. When time was controlled, there was significant negative effect of TV and a significant negative effect of smartphones on parental involvement. Overall, the findings from Study 2 demonstrated that caregivers are less involved with child play when technology is present, and especially so when smartphones are involved. Though there was not an overall effect of technology on caregiver sensitivity, further analysis did reveal that caregivers who attended to technology did have lower sensitivity scores than caregivers who did not attend to technology. The findings from this study replicate prior experimental work examining the role of background TV on caregiver-child interactions and extend findings to include the negative effect of smartphones on caregiver-child interactions. Together, the two studies provide further insight into parental technology use, understanding both antecedents and consequences of parent technology use in contribution to the overall knowledge of the mechanisms through which parent technology use relates to parenting and parent-child interactions. The findings from these studies combined can be used to develop targeted interventions for caregivers who are interested in making decisions about technology use within their families that are aligned with healthy developmental outcomes. / Doctor of Philosophy / Technology, especially personal devices like smartphones, is widely available today in ways that it was not for previous generations of parents. To help families make decisions about how to use technology in their lives and with their families, researchers need to understand the ways caregivers are using technology and how it is related to their parenting. Across two studies, this research investigated technology use among primary caregivers of two-year-old children. The first study looked at how parents are using technology, by asking 323 parents to answer 60 questions from five different surveys about their technology use behaviors through an online questionnaire. Responses to those individual questions were analyzed to see if constructs, or similar behaviors grouped together, emerged. Responses from 36 questions were grouped into five constructs: Missing Out due to Technology, Problematic Technology Behaviors, Preoccupation with Technology, Positive Parenting through Technology, and Social Support through Technology. Parents also filled out questionnaires about their stress, social support, parenting self-efficacy, parenting satisfaction, and their own and their toddler's regulation. These characteristics were analyzed to see if they would predict the different constructs of parent technology use. Ultimately, parent self-regulation predicted four of the constructs. Parents who had more self-regulation rated Missed Out due to Technology lower, rated Problematic Technology Behaviors lower, rated Preoccupation with Technology lower, but also rated Positive Parenting through Technology lower. It is possible that parents who had more self-regulation used less technology overall, regardless of whether the behaviors are helpful or harmful to their parenting. Parents who expressed more satisfaction in their parenting also rated Positive Parenting through Technology lower. One idea is that parents who felt more satisfied with their parenting were more confident and did not use technology to seek out resources or compare themselves to other parents. Parents who reported having more social support used more Social Support through Parenting, possibly because they had more social networks to maintain through digital connection. The second study looked at the impact of technology on caregiver behavior. Fifty-seven caregivers brought their 30-36 month-old children to a research laboratory, where they played together for 15 minutes. For five minutes, there was no technology on, for five minutes, there was a TV on, and for five minutes, the caregiver's cell phone was in the room. Caregivers were less involved in child play when their smartphones were in the room and when the TV was on than when there was no technology on. Specifically, caregivers spent the most amount of time not involved in child play when their smartphones were in the room. When taking into account caregivers' demographic information like age, race, and gender, caregivers who looked at their smartphones were less responsive and warm to their children than caregivers who did not look at their smartphones. These findings suggest that when technology is present, caregivers might be distracted by the technology and be less engaged with their children. In particular, smartphones seem to have more of a negative effect on caregiver behavior than background TV. Together, these two studies demonstrate that caregiver characteristics may play a role in the ways they use technology, and that technology use can affect parenting behaviors. This research is building a foundation to provide specific advice and interventions for parents who are trying to make decisions about how to use technology in their families. Findings like these have the potential to allow parents to make informed decisions for their lifestyles and to support healthy child development.

No description available.

No description available.

Thesis (M.S.)--Boston University / PLEASE NOTE: Boston University Libraries did not receive an Authorization To Manage form for this thesis or dissertation. It is therefore not openly accessible, though it may be available by request. If you are the author or principal advisor of this work and would like to request open access for it, please contact us at open-help@bu.edu. Thank you. / 2999-01-01