The Hispanic population within the United States has grown to a considerable amount. The state of Florida’s population is 25% Hispanic, with projected estimates of this population continuing to grow in the coming years (Ortman & Shin, 2011). Statistics show that 28.3% of the state’s population, over the age of five, speak a language other than English at home. With this considerable number of Spanish-speakers comes the responsibility to adjust certain educational practices to best meet their needs. Literacy is an essential part of learning, and therefore assessing early literacy is an essential part to any child’s academic development. Phonological awareness is the ability to manipulate and identify the phonological segments of a word (Blachman, Tangel, Ball, Black & Mcgraw, 1999). It is a strong predictor for early literacy abilities (Bradley & Bryant, 1983, Kozminsky & Kozminsky, 1995, Vandervelden & Siegel 1997). This relationship between phonological awareness and early literacy exists within the English language, and also within many other alphabetic languages such as Spanish (Anthony, Williams, McDonald, Corbitt-Shindler, Carlson, & Francis, 2006). Therefore, phonological awareness shares an important relationship to early literacy abilities for both English and Spanish speakers. There are many morphological, phonological, syntactical, and lexical subtleties that exist between varied dialects of the Spanish language. Vocabulary and lexicon use has been shown to positively influence phonological awareness skills in young children. Dialectical classifications of the participants were determined through use of different dialect specific vocabulary word list in the Linguistic and Cultural Background Survey. This study sought to evaluate whether dialectical differences among young Spanish-English bilinguals were associated with performance on measures of phonological awareness and reading. Twelve participants (children ages 3.17 years to 7.5 years and their parents participated in the study. Children completed a short form of the dynamic assessment of phonological awareness in Spanish (Loreti, 2015), the Letter-Word Identification of the Woodcock-Muñoz Language Survey-Revised (WMLS-R; Woodcock et al., 2005), the Elision, Rapid Automatic Naming, and Letter Name/Letter Sound subtests from the Test of Phonological Sensitivity in Spanish (TOPSS; Brea et al., 2003) and the Preschool Language Scales, Fifth Edition Spanish Screening Test (PLS-5; Zimmerman et al., 2011). Parents completed a Linguistic and Cultural Background Survey designed to identify potential dialectical differences among the children. Results from the Linguistic and Cultural Background Survey indicated that all participants used the dialect consistent with Central America, and six additionally used lexical features of dialects outside of Central America. Consequently, children were categorized into either a Central group or a Central Plus group. The Central group indicated the use of words specific to the Central American dialect of Spanish. The Central Plus group indicated use of Central American dialect specific words, as well as words specific to Standard and Caribbean dialects of Spanish. These two groups were compared on the assessments of phonological awareness and early literacy. The results indicated that there were no statistically significant differences on any of the assessments between the dialect groups. Although the comparisons on the measures of Letter Word Identification Subtest and Letter Name Letter Sound subtest demonstrated medium effect sizes in favor of the Central plus another dialect group, and Rapid Automatic Naming demonstrated a medium effect in favor of the Central only group. Further investigation is needed to demonstrate these medium effects to a greater extent.

This project used data from the School Readiness Survey (SR) of the 2007 National Household Education Surveys Program collected by the National Center for Education Statistics Institute of Education Science. A subsample of 1,712 to 2,622 subjects who participated in the survey was used for this project. The purpose of the study was to examine parent perceptions, behaviors, and reported child ability related to school readiness and the effect ethnicity and socioeconomic status (SES) had on each comparison. Variables from the existing data were matched to one of the five domains of School Readiness: Health and Physical Development, Social and Emotional Development, Approaches to Learning, Communication, and General Knowledge. Data were analyzed by means of Pearson correlations and Moderate Multiple Regression analyses. Findings revealed weak, but significant, correlations among parent perceptions, parent behaviors, and parent reported child ability in specific domains. SES and ethnicity were found to be a moderator of parent perceptions and parent behaviors. SES was also shown to affect the relationship between parent behaviors and parent reported child ability in the domains of communication and general knowledge. Several limitations are presented, including possible reasons for the significant but weak results. Findings from this study suggest much more can be learned regarding parent perceptions across ethnicity and SES and the influence it has on school readiness.

This study examined Early Childhood Special Educators' perceptions of play as a developmentally appropriate practice in special education prekindergarten classrooms in one southeastern school district. Through purposeful sampling, eight prekindergarten special educators were identified because they held multiple teaching certifications and some held National Board certification. The participants had many years of experience in pre-kindergarten special education, and were professional development trainers, teacher mentors and or leaders in the prekindergarten special education community. These eight accomplished pre-kindergarten special education teachers were interviewed using an informal, semi-structured format about their beliefs concerning play, how they implement it in their classrooms as well as their perspectives on barriers to play. The participants identify the supports needed to implement play as a developmentally appropriate practice in special education prekindergarten classrooms. The findings reveal that Early Childhood Special Educators' believe in play as a developmentally appropriate practice and state that play is foundational to their practice in prekindergarten classrooms for children with special needs. Implications for future research and practice are included.

Young parents and their children are considered a high-risk population as they are more likely to lack social support networks, have limited access to opportunities to enhance parenting skills, and are often financially dependent. Young children whose mothers have poor parenting skills are more likely to have persistent problem behavior. Three young mothers living in a transitional housing facility participated in this study. The purpose of this study was to determine if these mothers could implement parenting strategies that are a part of a commercially available parenting book and DVD. This study found that: (1) mothers were able to correctly implement the parenting strategies; (2) child problem behavior decreased from baseline to follow-up; and (3) the mother's perception of child problem behavior shifted positively from baseline to follow-up phases.

This study examined the effects of a parent-led intervention focused on developing children's early literacy skills within the home setting. The lesson plans contain scripted steps for completing activities to teach letter names and phonological awareness skills. Archival data were analyzed from a study conducted with 26 families from three Head Start centers. Thirteen families completed the intervention and thirteen families were enrolled in a control condition which provided information on shared reading strategies. Children in the intervention group performed at statistically significant higher levels on measures of letter naming, phonological awareness, vocabulary/oral language, and comprehension. Parents rated both the intervention and control conditions as highly acceptable. Most parents (n= 10) within the intervention group completed the vast majority of the lesson plans. Changes within the home revealed that parents in both groups engaged in the same types of early learning activities, but that parents in the intervention group reported engaging in these activities more frequently than the control group. This study contributes to the literature by creating a method of parental involvement in preschool targeting phonological awareness and letter naming abilities.

This exploratory study assessed the effectiveness of a cross-age tutoring intervention on adaptive behavior goals of three PreKindergarten/Kindergarten-aged students with labels of autism spectrum disorder. Data were collected in an inclusive environment; the school library. Three fourth grade general education cross-age tutors were trained to use a simple, naturalistic least-to-most prompting strategy to support the young students with individualized adaptive behavior goals while in the library. A mixed method design was utilized in this study; a quantitative single case multiple baseline across participants design to show performance outcomes of the young students as a result of the tutoring intervention, and a constant comparison analysis of qualitative data gathered from observations of students, students' written work, and a research journal. Quantitative results indicated all three young students performed the target behavior in the library with support from their cross-age tutors and this behavior maintained one month after intervention ended as evident through a maintenance probe; all three students made progress on the achievement of adaptive behavior goals in an inclusive environment from this intervention. Qualitative results indicated the cross-age tutoring experience was positive and powerful for all six participants involved as evident through the construction of six themes that emerged from the qualitative data.

The life of a child has completely transitioned from analogue to digital in the past 20 years. The use of digital devices and media has tripled among children between the ages of 0-8 years old since 2011. With the increasing amount of internet access in places that children and families frequent, it is almost impossible to go anywhere without the Wi-Fi access information being made available to consumers to enjoy while they patronize the business. Educators are in a unique position to find creative ways to incorporate technology into their instruction; however, this nuance is not without its challenges. Many early learning programs have not incorporated technology into their programs for a variety of reasons such as, but not limited to: lack of funding, fear, and the belief that it is not developmentally appropriate. The National Association for the Education of Young Children (NAEYC) and The Fred Rogers Center drafted a joint statement that provided a framework for early childhood educators to use as they introduced technology and digital media into their learning environments. The researcher of this study conducted a mixed methods study with three diverse early learning programs in the southeastern part of the United States. After examining the aforementioned variables, the researcher found there to be no difference in the technology usage rate among the three schools. The findings also indicated that two out of the three schools were better equipped than the other with technology and access to digital media. Despite several of the survey participants having said that they had not received training on how to use digital devices for instructional purposes, an overwhelming 92% of them admitted to using technology for daily task completion. The researcher was not able to collect sufficient data to answer the question about parental influence. However, the researcher has identified this variable as an area for future research and believes that further examination will yield thought-provoking results regarding parental influence.

The writer proposes the utilization of a developmentally based outdoor curriculum and playground designed for young children. The curriculum consists of an overview, objectives, curriculum methodology, playground designs and evaluation. Cognitive, affective and psychomotor domains are each included in the objectives. A curriculum methodology focusing upon approaches for individualization and development of the total child is presented. The playground designs are based upon current research. Play value, development appropriateness and safety were considered in developing playground designs and curriculum. Evaluation of the curriculum and playground will be measured through assessments of the individual child, the class, and the staff. Numerous approaches to evaluation are described. This project is intended to assist preschool teachers in establishing and maintaining a program based on current research and literature. Ideas to assist other preschools in adaptation are presented. Included in the ideas are steps in developing a curriculum and playground design as well as a suggested approach to training parents and staff in the rationale and appropriate use of the curriculum.

Teachers are required to manage difficult behaviors within their classrooms with limited support and resources. Additionally, there is not a lot of research that has been completed looking at teacher attitudes or how children’s behavior impacts them personally. The current study looks at teacher outcomes based upon an evidence-based teacher training program. The teacher training was implemented at the Western Kentucky Head Start. Teachers’ job stress and self-efficacy were measured before the training, after the training, in the fall, and in the spring. In addition, standardized observations were completed, looking at classroom climate and management, in the fall and spring following the training. There were no significant differences among Pretest, Post-test, fall, or spring data for measured job stress or self-efficacy. Based upon observation results, Positive Climate significantly increased from fall to spring and Concept Development significantly decreased. Teacher’s attitudes and perspectives are extremely important as they provide the general climate of the classroom. Continued research should be completed to assess teacher outcomes and how these outcomes impact the overfull functioning of the classroom and success of students.

This qualitative case study focused on how school leaders’ understandings of (dis)ability were implicated in decision-making and affected student (dis)enrollment in Florida’s Voluntary Prekindergarten Program (VPK). More specifically it explored how leaders in private VPK programs invoked conceptions of normality, and subsequently abnormality, during decision-making processes for student (dis)enrollment. Combining a critical poststructuralist approach (critical disability studies, critical policy analysis), decision-making on (dis)enrollment was contextualized within the current policy ecology. This policy ecology was framed as an historical development of policies regarding preschool for children with and without disabilities in a marketplace shaped by the convergence of federal, state, and local policy, which tended to be based on deficit-oriented perspectives of disability that functioned to (re)constructed what was understood as (dis)ability. Further, findings focused on how policy, market, and VPK leaders’ understanding of (dis)ability influenced decision-making rationales and outcomes affecting (dis)enrolled students. Findings indicated their sense of identity impacted their interpretation of and reaction to program polices, local market pressures and their construction of the “good consumer”—a parent/child dyad prepared for rigor and the exhibition of self-control. Reciprocity emerged as a theme and suggested good consumers reinforced VPK leaders’ desired identity. In addition, VPK leaders’ justified enrollment and disenrollment decisions within a continuum of exchanges that occurred between consumers and themselves. Leaders who embraced service or spiritual based leadership practices tended to be more inclusive of children with diverse needs. Implications for future research should address 1) how VPK leaders include children with a range of abilities in their (pre)schools, 2) examine parents’ decision-making practices about their child’s (dis)enrollment in VPK centers, 3) policy clarification at the intersection of IDEA, ADA, and VPK, and 4) explore how local education agencies and private preschools can build infrastructure to support the inclusion of children with diverse learning needs in VPK centers. Such research can shed light on the complexity of decision-making with respect to enrollment for publicly-funded voucher programs on the private VPK market and how those decisions function to (re)shape discourses of normality in early childhood.