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The development of literacy skills among young school children is an important factor in achieving academic success, having a direct impact on their ability to understand and use information effectively. In the current educational context, digital storytelling is an innovative and engaging resource that can contribute to young school children’s development of literacy skills. This study analyzed the impact of digital stories use on the emergent literacy of primary school children, highlighting their benefits in the development of reading, comprehension and reflection on a written text skills. The study used a mixed-method research design, combining both quantitative (standardized tests) and qualitative (focus-group) methods to gain a detailed insight into the impact of digital stories on the development of literacy in young school children. The participants were 25 second graders who underwent an educational intervention using digital stories. The assessment of students' progress was carried out through the application of the Learning Strategies Assessment Questionnaire (SMALSI), the Reading Comprehension Strategies scale, the focus being placed on aspects such as reading, monitoring and re-reading texts, as well as self-testing to ensure content comprehension. The quantitative analysis followed the variations in scores obtained in the pre-experimental and post-experimental stages, and the qualitative component included parent and teacher focus groups on students’ literacy level. The results of the study highlighted that exposure to digital stories significantly increases literacy levels in the post-experimental stage compared to the pre-experimental stage.

A cross-sectional qualitative study examined how different pattern types accounted for wide variation in children’s Awareness of Mathematical Pattern and Structure (AMPS), illustrating how spatial and patterning skills are interrelated. An interpretive descriptive analysis of responses was conducted for two interview-based Growing Square Array (GA) and Spatial-Repeating Pattern (SP) tasks with 405 children from Grade 1 (n = 189) and Grade 2 (n = 216). Analysis of developmental levels of AMPS indicated that advanced multiplicative spatial structures were employed in GA patterns for 20% of Grade 1 and 35% of Grade 2 children, respectively. Responses to SP tasks extended beyond the ‘unit of repeat’ to the use of dynamic visualization, and orientation and transformation skills for 60% of children. Responses showing advanced structural features moderately increased at Grade 2 for both tasks. Micro-level analyses of illustrations of interview responses and from a Pattern Construction task, drawn from five case studies, revealed how multiplicative and transformation skills were utilized in forming repetitions and growing patterns in complex and novel ways. While the ‘unit of repeat’ is fundamental, the integration of more complex multi-dimensional patterning with spatial concepts can re-focus learning and pedagogy on establishing interrelationships between patterning and spatial concepts, and broader mathematical knowledge.

In this qualitative study of a year-long educator inquiry workshop, nine early childhood educators engaged in the process of collective memory work to critically reflect on how their past experiences as young learners relates to their current teaching practices. Through an iterative analysis of the participants’ discussions and writings, this paper highlights how a group of educators shifted their way of thinking about teaching from a series of damage-based memories of restrictive learning environments towards a focus on desire-based stories of transformational and expansive learning experiences. For this group of teachers, this shift became an essential component to identifying how they could begin to work to create liberatory learning experiences and spaces for all students.

The current study used a regression discontinuity (RD) design to characterize more precisely the link between schooling and literacy by examining whether and how different grade-level, practice-as-usual schooling experiences uniquely predict specific literacy subskills during the transition to school. Data from 334 children revealed moderate positive effects of prekindergarten, kindergarten, and first grade schooling on decoding, while kindergarten and first grade schooling predicted comprehension skills. There was no significant effect of schooling at any grade level on expressive vocabulary or sound awareness. Results were robust to different RD estimation methods and highlight the heterogeneity of schooling effects on early literacy skill development. Implications for understanding early literacy development in the context of regular, public schooling are discussed.

In classrooms tests, students are regularly required to demonstrate their understanding of mathematical concepts. When children encounter problems in demonstrating such understanding, it is often not clear whether this is because of the language of the teachers' questions and instructions or a genuine non-understanding of the concept itself. This paper uses Conversation Analysis to investigate the role that language plays in Year 1 oral maths assessment in an Australian Indigenous community school. This approach allows us to monitor the very subtle communicative gestures, verbal and non-verbal, that contribute to the trajectory of a particular test task. Here we are able to bring to light a range of ways in which language may interfere with demonstrations of understanding of mathematical concepts. These include particular mathematical words (e.g., size, shape, same), as well as problems with what is being asked in an instruction. We argue that while all children must learn new mathematical language in their early years of schooling, the challenge for the students we have recorded may be compounded by the language differences between the Indigenous variety of language they speak in the community, and the Standard Australian English of the classroom and teachers. [Author abstract]

We explored 3 general classroom teachers' experiences of including a child with Down syndrome in their early years classrooms. Located at 3 different Australian school settings, 1 teacher was the head of a Preparatory class, 1 was a Year 3 teacher, and the third was a teacher of a split Preparatory/Year 1 class. Interview data were drawn from a larger study, in which data were gathered over a 5-month period through class observations and teacher interviews. The findings indicate that although there were highly inclusive experiences identified in the school sites, the school context played an important role in the inclusion of the child. Teachers indicated that receiving targeted information about Down syndrome and collaborative support from parents, teaching colleagues, and their wider school enabled them to work more inclusively with their student with Down syndrome in their classroom.

In a random sample of Baltimore school children over the first 2 years of school, there are no direct effects of parent configuration on marks or test score gains in reading and math with one exception: African American children in single-mother families where other adults are present got higher marks in reading at the beginning of 1st grade than did their counterparts in mother- only or mother-father families. Irrespective of family type, however, children whose families had more economic resources and whose parents had higher expectations for their school performance consistently outperformed other children in reading and math. These findings suggest that the effects of parents' psychological and economic resources that are correlated with family type go far toward explaining previous reports of schooling deficits for children from single-parent homes, especially in the early grades.

I propose a comprehensive model for the reproduction of social class inequality among elementary school children, and estimate it using ECLS-K data for a nationally representative sample of American first graders. This model quantitatively tests Lareau's (2003) theory of the role played by parental concerted cultivation as a mediator of the positive effect of parental SES on children's school achievement. I examine the determinants and the consequences of concerted cultivation among white and African American students. I measure concerted cultivation using a scale of 21 items covering the following topics: parents' perceptions of their responsibilities towards their child, leisure-time activities scheduled for the child, relationships with the child's school, and learning-related resources available in the home. I also include measures of parental educational expectations, student behaviors, and socio-demographic control variables. I employ two distinct measures of achievement – reading test scores, and the teacher's judgment of the student's language and literacy skills. In support of Lareau's theory, I found that parental SES is positively and strongly associated with concerted cultivation for both African American and white students. All three SES dimensions (parental education, occupation and family income) exert significant positive effects on all outcomes, with parental education showing the strongest effect. Further, concerted cultivation positively contributes to learning-related behavior among white and African American students, which is one of the most important predictors of achievement. In addition, African American students benefit more than white students from concerted cultivation when the outcome is the teacher's judgment of their language and literacy skills. However, my findings contradict Lareau's argument that concerted cultivation is associated with social class, but not with race. Although social class explains about two thirds of the relationship between race and concerted cultivation, even after controlling for social class, African American parents are less engaged in the process of concerted cultivation of their children than white parents. I present possible explanations for this finding, using both Bourdieu's cultural capital theory and ethnographic studies of African American communities (Carter, 2005; Patillo-McCoy, 1999).

This chapter contains sections titled: Responsibility Early Schooling Language Acquisition Toilet Training Self‐Abuse Socialization New Situations Vacations Recreation Play Abstract Emotion Separation Changing of the Guard Dealing With Tragedy Conclusion

Considerable evidence demonstrates the importance of the cognitive home environment in supporting children's language, cognition, and school readiness more broadly. This is particularly important for children from low-income backgrounds, as cognitive stimulation is a key area of resilience that mediates the impact of poverty on child development. Researchers and clinicians have therefore highlighted the need to quantify cognitive stimulation; however existing methodological approaches frequently utilize home visits and/or labor-intensive observations and coding. Here, we examined the reliability and validity of the StimQ.sub.2, a parent-report measure of the cognitive home environment that can be delivered efficiently and at low cost. StimQ.sub.2 improves upon earlier versions of the instrument by removing outdated items, assessing additional domains of cognitive stimulation and providing new scoring systems. Findings suggest that the StimQ.sub.2 is a reliable and valid measure of the cognitive home environment for children from infancy through the preschool period.