New Books
Buysse, V., & P.W. Wesley. 2006. Evidence-based Practice in the Early Childhood Field. Washington DC: ZERO TO THREE. 258 pp. ISBN 0-943657-95-4. $34.95.
The authors examine the origin, meaning, and status of the evidence-based practice movement and make recommendations for implementing this practice in the early childhood profession. Evidence-based practice is defined as a decision-making process that integrates the best available research evidence about teaching and learning with family and professional values and wisdom. The book offers a new model for closing the gaps between research, policy, and practice—one that involves practitioners, researchers, and parents working together to build a knowledge base to improve practice and advance the profession.
The authors consider how evidence-based practice changes the way we think about how knowledge for early childhood practice gets created, interpreted, shared, and applied. Other topics address the role of standards or recommended practices (for example, developmentally appropriate practice [DAP]) in the evidence-based movement and the potential for constructing a research base through communities of practice in which diverse constituents focus on issues and ambiguities that emerge from authentic situations in their professional practice.
Rinaldi, C. 2006. In Dialogue with Reggio Emilia: Listening, Researching and Learning. New York: Routledge. 226 pp. ISBN 0-415-345-04-9. $34.95.
This book is a collection of articles, interviews, and lectures by Carlina Rinaldi, a leading interpreter of the Reggio Emilia approach and former director of the early childhood centers in Reggio Emilia, Italy. Rinaldi discusses key ideas characterizing the philosophy, history, and work of Reggio Emilia schools and their place within the town and country’s social and political network.
Familiar topics include documentation and its relation to assessment and research, the interdependence between quality of space and quality of learning, and the critical role of provocation and dialogue. Rinaldi notes that “in Reggio we use a language that is generated from experience and that in turn generates experience.” She reflects on more global issues and theories of early education. This book is for those who want to explore Reggio Emilia ideas more deeply rather than for newcomers to the approach.
Cowhey, M. 2006. Black Ants and Buddhists: Thinking Critically and Teaching Differently in the Primary Grades. Portland, ME: Stenhouse. 244 pp. ISBN 1-57110-418-6. $18.00.
How does a discussion of whether to kill some black ants in the classroom lead to thinking about and engaging in projects to promote peace, nurture the environment, or understand the causes of poverty? A passionate teacher of first- and second-graders shows how to embed social justice in the curriculum to help children learn to think critically and act compassionately in their classroom, school, and community. Cowhey’s approach is based on Paulo Freire’s problem-posing education in which students and teachers are coinvestigators of issues that arise organically from their daily experiences.
Vivid vignettes and poignant samples of children’s work from classroom and community projects illustrate how to integrate critical thinking activities into math, science, social studies, and literacy. In one example, a unit on activism, children learn about citizenship and democracy through a voter registration project, collecting and representing data and making bilingual posters urging parents to register and vote in the local election. Children learn both about math and how to challenge stereotypes through the Mystery Math Guest, a parent from a cultural minority group who visits the class to talk about how she uses math in her work. Teachers will learn how they can use community resources to facilitate critical thinking and nurture sustained interest over time as children learn that their opinions matter in this classroom.
Jacobs, G., & K. Crowley. 2007. Play, Projects and Preschool Standards: Nurturing Children’s Sense of Wonder and Joy in Learning. Thousand Oaks, CA: Corwin Press. 159 pp. ISBN 1-4129-2802-8. $25.95.
These authors provide an overview of early learning standards (the skills, knowledge, and dispositions) and the benchmarks within each standard that more precisely describe what preschoolers should know and be able to do at specific developmental levels. The chapters following address how teachers can help children achieve those benchmarks by designing creative environments and planning developmentally appropriate activities that value exploration and play. The book offers suggestions for supporting bilingual learners and meeting children’s individual needs. Two examples include promoting curiosity by setting out materials in unusual ways, like adding soup ladles and large shells to sand and water tables or dolls in the block area, and teaching awareness of patterns or grouping by making a large, reusable graphing mat to sort items. An inexpensive white shower curtain works as a graph when vertical and horizontal lines are added.
Gonzalez-Mena, J. 2007. 50 Early Childhood Strategies for Working and Communicating with Diverse Families. Upper Saddle River, NJ: Pearson/Merrill/Prentice Hall.132 pp. ISBN 0-13-188857-9. $19.99.
Based on the concept that you can’t separate the child from the family, this author shows programs how to become family centered. The strategies focus on creating partnerships that let parents and teachers share power and responsibility for the child’s welfare and communication that is two-way rather than hierarchical. The book includes such topics as making the physical setting parent friendly, techniques for resolving differences and conflicts, and ideas for handling special situations like abuse and neglect. The text is appropriate for students in teacher preparation programs and newcomers to the field as well as experienced teachers. Each chapter is brief (less than two pages) and divided into two parts: (1) a rationale and background in language that is easy to understand and (2) easy-to-use strategies.
Yager, R.E., & S.K. Enger, eds. 2006. Exemplary Science in Grades PreK–4: Standards-Based Success Stories. Arlington, VA: National Science Teachers Association. 191 pp. ISBN 978-0-87355-261-5. $19.95.
Ten years after the publication of the National Science Education Standards, the National Science Teachers Association looks at how the practice of science education has changed as a result of professional development addressing the standards. The 14 exemplary programs described in this book offer strategies for incorporating the science standards into the classroom curriculum. Teachers and teacher educators describe how their teaching of science moved away from the textbook approach as they helped children share responsibility for their learning: they responded to individual students’ interests and experiences, encouraged students to talk about and use their developing science knowledge, and worked collegially with other teachers in the school to enhance the science program. Success stories range from an exploration of the influence of different surfaces on how toy cars move to discovering the rich content in the prairie grass surrounding the school, building school sensory gardens, and creating habitats for local wildlife with the support of 4-H educators. One project, Hands-on Science Outreach, can be initiated by parents and community programs as well as principals and teachers. It is designed as a part-time after-school program and provides activity guides, inquiry instruction models, and complete kits of take-home materials.
Shub, J., & A. DeWeerd. 2006. Ready to Learn: How to Overcome Social and Behavioral Issues in the Primary Classroom. Portsmouth, NH: Heinemann. 208 pp. ISBN 978-0-325-00875-2. $23.00.
A child psychologist and primary teacher introduce a program called Interplay that helps children learn how to develop self-discipline: the ability to focus their attention, solve learning and social problems, and understand the feelings of others. Interplay is based on the concept that how we behave is determined by our beliefs about who we are. Beginning as toddlers, children make sense of their lives by creating an inner story about the kind of person they are and the meaning of their experiences.
The Interplay program uses stories, role-plays, and structured games to help children develop positive attitudes and thinking skills as they participate in metaphorical adventures. In these adventures children take on the roles of the characters, who must develop new skills and understandings to overcome obstacles. These obstacles correspond to the children’s own difficulties. For example, a kindergarten adventure includes four stories that describe a group of lost animals trying to find their way back home. They flee from a terrible storm and end up lost in an unknown forest. The children take on the roles of the lost animals and must overcome the obstacles of lack of self-control and inability to work with others to get home safely.
The authors present techniques for implementing Interplay and integrating it into the daily life of the classroom. They introduce useful teaching ideas borrowed from developmental psychology and family therapy, such as metaphors, scaffolding, intentional modeling, and reframing. This process is appropriate for all children, but especially those who are struggling with learning difficulties and social problems.
Hanna, P. 2006. Adults and Children Learning Together. Castle Hill, NSW, Australia: Pademelon Press. 98 pp. ISBN 1-876138-21-1. $29.95.
A well-respected early childhood educator from New Zealand writes about the teacher’s role in enhancing the thinking and learning of infants, toddlers, and preschool children. Designed for staff in center-based and family child care settings, Hanna shows how reciprocal, spontaneous interactions are enhanced when educators are open to children’s thinking as well as their own. Both are learners and teachers. Using excerpts from Te Whariki, the New Zealand early childhood education curriculum, the authors describe how to capitalize on children’s interests, ideas, and strengths. Vignettes of adult-child interactions provide insight into children’s thinking and illustrate how the adults can keep children engaged in the experience and extend their thinking. The depth of the children’s involvement illustrates how meaningful, shared learning opportunities in children’s everyday environments are more critical than an array of sophisticated equipment and materials.
Hanna describes how teachers can use documentation both to track individual children’s thinking over time and to document the story of the center. Documentation serves as an ongoing map of the world that the child is constructing, and it is used as the basis for planning. The author discusses three kinds of assessment: evaluating what is currently happening for a child, how the curriculum planning and its implementation works, and the overall, key aspects of the program. Excerpts from selective teacher journals and questions posed at the close of each chapter help teachers reflect on the ideas and directions of the teaching/learning process.
Duncan, M. 2006. Literacy Coaching: Developing Effective Teachers through
Instructional Dialogue. Katonah, NY: Richard C. Owen. 100 pp. plus DVD.
ISBN 978-1-57274-865-1. $24.95.
Instructional dialogue is an on-site professional development tool—a structured conversation between a coach and a teacher, with the goal of helping the teacher gain perspective about her practice and ways to improve it. The process begins with an action plan in which the teacher identifies current challenges and questions she has about her literacy instruction, what she knows about the subject area, the solutions she has tried, and what kind of support she needs. The coach works alongside the teacher to better understand the teacher’s approach and the students’ learning difficulties. In a follow-up dialogue, coach and teacher discuss the day, and the coach provides feedback. Together they decide on the next steps the teacher might take and the expected impact on the students’ learning. They develop a process for how to determine whether the planned approach addresses the identified problems, and they discuss next steps.
The author shows how to set up a coaching program in an elementary school and establish collegial relationships with teachers and administrators. Actual instructional dialogues between a teacher and a coach in both the text and the accompanying DVD help coaches gain insight into the delicate process of knowing when to listen, when to offer suggestions, and when to ask questions.
Dockett, S., & B. Perry. 2006. Starting School: A Handbook for Early Childhood Educators. Castle Hill, NSW, Australia: Pademelon Press. 214 pp. ISBN 978-1876138-24-0. $37.95.
“There are many ways to build a relationship and many relationships to build.” This statement captures the authors’ philosophy that the key to an effective school transition program lies in the quality of the relationships established between all the stakeholders—including those from preschool, elementary school, family, and community. This handbook is informed by the authors’ nine-year research project in which they interviewed families, educators, community members, and children about what matters when a child starts school. Delightful and insightful quotes and photos from this project convey the spirit educators need and practical steps to assure that children feel school is a place they want to be and where they can be successful as learners. The first school experience is important enough to a child and family’s future school experiences to have an appointed transition coordinator and a well-developed program.
The authors introduce guidelines for effective transition programs. They detail all the steps involved in setting up a transition team of stakeholders and in planning, implementing, and evaluating the transition program. They discuss such issues as the difference between orientation to school and transition to school programs as well as the often debated topic of readiness and age—who or what it is that a child needs in order to be ready. The authors’ innovative examples include the following:
- One preschool places an ad in a newspaper inviting any parent whose preschool child is to attend kindergarten at a particular school to come to an information meeting at the preschool and join other parents in helping to form networks.
- Parents in one community develop an addition to the school’s somewhat impersonal enrollment form so new parents can indicate things they think the school should know and value about their children. On the back of the form the children draw a picture of what they think school will be like. These are displayed in the children’s classrooms on the first day.
- In another area, local school boards combine resources with a children’s museum and local businesses to support new families’ visits to schools, information sessions, and Starting School T-shirts and caps, with the event culminating in a community celebration at the children’s museum.
Titles are selected from the many new books received by NAEYC. Educator Gail Perry writes the brief annotations. The books are available from the publishers listed, your local bookstore, or online retailers.
Copyright © 2007 by the National Association for the Education
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