Division For Early Childhood Research Articles

Family practices in educator licensure: a content analysis of U.S. state requirements

ABSTRACT Families are critical to children’s learning and play a vital role on their children’s team. As such, preparation standards across the Division for Early Childhood, National Association for the Education of Young Children, and other key entities include family practices as part of their recommendations. This content analysis examined how states included family practices into initial licensure requirements of early childhood (ECE) and early childhood special educators (ECSE). Documents were collected electronically from state departments of education across the U.S. in 2021. This analysis determined if states required family-related practices, what was required, and what terminology and concepts were included in family-related requirements. Overall, 55% of states included family practices for ECSE while 45% of states included them for ECE. Increasing the inclusion of family practices in initial licensure requirements and building relationships across state licensing agencies and institutions of higher education may better prepare educators to partner with families.

Aligning Professional Development With Service Coordinator Knowledge and Skills

Service coordinators under Part C of the Individuals With Disabilities Education Act (IDEA, 2004) help families navigate the early intervention (EI) system and ensure regular communication among team members so services are aligned with family priorities and recommended EI practices. To meet the demands of service coordination, personnel entering the EI field who will serve as service coordinators must receive high-quality professional development to orient them to their unique roles and responsibilities. The purpose of this program evaluation was to examine the effectiveness of one state's service coordination training program and its alignment with the Knowledge and Skills for Service Coordinators (KSSC), a resource document in the Division for Early Childhood and IDEA Infant Toddler Coordinators Association (DEC & ITCA) Joint Position Statement: Service Coordination in Early Intervention (2020). Survey results suggested that the training program was associated with increased knowledge and skills for service coordinator participants in many of the KSSC areas. Participants also reported using what they learned in their work with families. The rubric used to evaluate this training program could be a resource for state-level professional development providers to evaluate alignment of current and future training for service coordinators with the KSSC.

Preparing future leaders: what should we know about mentoring?

ABSTRACT A recent review of literature indicated limited research about the preparation of doctoral students in early intervention/early childhood special education (EI/ECSE). The purpose of this pilot study was to address this gap in research and investigate the mentorship of doctoral students who participated in the Division for Early Childhood’s Consortium for Innovations in Doctoral Excellence (DECIDE). Mentors and mentees who participated in the DECIDE Mentoring Initiative participated in focus groups and interviews to share their mentoring experiences and provide suggestions for the mentorship of doctoral students. Qualitative research methods were used to analyze themes. Findings indicated (a) shifts in power dynamics occurred between the mentor and mentee dyad, (b) mentoring infrastructures may be beneficial, (c) mentoring relationships are unique for each dyad, and (d) further research is needed to investigate the mentoring needs of students from culturally, linguistically, and economically diverse backgrounds.

The tradition of early childhood personnel preparation standards alignment analysis

ABSTRACT There is an extensive history of collaboration with respect to policy initiatives between the National Association for the Education of Young Children (NAEYC) and the Division for Early Childhood (DEC) of the Council for Exceptional Children (CEC). In pursuit of promoting high quality inclusive education for all young children, DEC and NAEYC have partnered to create numerous resources and supports over the years for preservice preparation programs and professional development providers who seek to address both ECE and EI/ECSE personnel preparation standards. One notable result has been the development of formal procedures for alignments of the preparation standards promoted by these organizations. In this paper, we detail this established tradition of early childhood standards alignment analysis by describing the development and details of the procedures used for conducting alignment analyses. These procedures are now precedent and provide a roadmap for future alignment analyses. Implications for personnel preparation and future alignment analysis and standards development are discussed.

How early interventionists support families experiencing vulnerable circumstances: A closer look at family-centered practice

Guidance from national professional organizations (e.g., the Division for Early Childhood) and professional standards characterize specific practices for the provision of birth through age 2 early intervention services for all families. However, research focused on the family-centered practices (FCPs) that providers use to support families experiencing vulnerability is limited. Therefore, this phenomenological study focused on how early interventionists across disciplines (EIs) described the implementation of services in a rural northeastern state. We conducted nine statewide focus groups with EIs (N = 67) to understand (a) how EIs defined the vulnerable circumstances of the families they serve, and (b) what FCPs EIs report using with families in these identified vulnerable circumstances. Thematic qualitative analysis was used. Results suggest that much of their services align with the key elements of FCP. Providers’ use of individualizing services more than any other family centered element is discussed as this may influence aspects of coaching and service delivery.

Practicing Anti-Racism as Inclusion: Start in Early Childhood!

The mission of the Division for Early Childhood (DEC) is to promote policies and advance evidence-based practices that support families and enhance the optimal development of young children (0-8) who have or are at risk for developmental delays and disabilities. DEC is an international membership organization for those who work with or on behalf of young children (0-8) with disabilities and other special needs and their families. The Division for Early Childhood, as individuals and as a system, recognizes we must acknowledge and address the explicit and/or implicit bias that disproportionately impacts the trajectory of children of color and their families. We seek to support and advocate for increasing the diversity of leadership across the early intervention and early childhood special education workforce, intentionally working with families as partners; and actively acknowledging when and how bias impacts our systems, children, and families. We seek to reduce bias to achieve inclusion, equity, and social justice across services and settings.

“I Need You to Show Me:” Coaching Early Childhood Professionals

In most states, Early Childhood Educators (ECEs) with a Birth-Kindergarten teaching license serve as both the general education teacher and special education teacher for children and their families in inclusive early childhood education (ECE) settings. Prior research suggests that inclusive programming does not guarantee these ECE settings are high-quality. Although evidence-based practices (EBP) and the Division of Early Childhood (DEC) Recommended Practices (RPs) have been established, a research-to-practice gap still exists in the inclusive, ECE classroom. Additional research indicates that coaching teachers may influence their implementation of EBPs in classrooms. This study provided early childhood educators (ECEs) the opportunity to share their perceptions about the support they receive from mentors and evaluators, as well as report the specific aspects of coaching needed to be successful while working in inclusive pre-kindergarten (Pre-K) classrooms. Qualitative research methods using an ethnomethodological framework were used to examine ECEs’ responses to semi-structured questions. Findings from this study can inform a prospective coaching model that includes explicit modeling, a deeply reflective component, and an array of professional development (PD) opportunities.

Parents' Part C Experiences in Rural Areas: Alignment With Recommended Practices.

The Division for Early Childhood (DEC) clearly outlined recommended practices for the provision of Part C services. However, there may be challenges in rural areas associated with services aligning with these recommended practices. Therefore, this study focuses on how families experience Part C services and the extent to which services align with specific areas the DEC recommended practices in the large, rural state of Montana. We interviewed parents (N = 30) about their children's Part C services. Deductive qualitative content analysis was used. Parents' reports suggest that while some aspects of their Part C services align with specific recommended practices, others do not. There were some meaningful differences regarding alignment with these recommended practices depending on type of provider being described. The environments in which services take place are discussed, as these may influence aspects of collaboration and building family capacity.

CEC Division for Early Childhood Helps Launch Unifying Framework for the Early Childhood Education Profession

CEC Division for Early Childhood Helps Launch Unifying Framework for the Early Childhood Education Profession

Integrating family content in teacher preparation programs using intentional reflection and planning

ABSTRACTStrong family involvement in children’s education supports positive academic and social-emotional outcomes. Therefore, developing early childhood (EC) professionals’ competence in engaging and involving families in their children’s education is emphasized across state licensure requirements, personnel preparation standards, and professional recommendations (e.g., Division for Early Childhood, Council for Exceptional Children, InTASC, National Association for the Education of Young Children). Although many states have begun to require family course content as part of their licensure for educators, higher education faculty and instructors may struggle to integrate family-related content into their coursework and field experiences while also covering state standards in instructional strategies, assessment, and other content areas. In order to effectively and comprehensively include family content across university programs and courses, faculty need to evaluate their current content and systematically plan to include current and research-based family material. The purpose of this article is to provide a framework for faculty to evaluate, reflect, and plan their use of family content in university courses aligned with the Division for Early Childhood’s Recommended Practices: Family (2014). This article shares self-assessment and action plan tools for integrating family content into course materials, activities, and assignments.

Socioemotional and Autism Spectrum Disorder Screening for Toddlers in Early Intervention: Agreement Among Measures

Identification of problems with socioemotional functioning is an important task in early childhood, particularly for children in early intervention (EI). However, socioemotional concerns raised by families may be under-identified in practice. In accordance with Division for Early Childhood (DEC) recommended practices, Part C providers could benefit from additional guidance on socioemotional screening and assessment, including additional research on available tools. Therefore, we examined agreement among three commonly used measures of socioemotional functioning in an EI sample ( N = 50). Overall, the measures did not have adequate agreement. We found substantial agreement between the Ages and Stages Questionnaires: Social-Emotional (ASQ:SE, first edition) and the Brief Infant Toddler Social-Emotional Assessment (BITSEA), moderate agreement between the ASQ:SE and the Child Behavior Checklist (CBCL), and fair agreement between the BITSEA and CBCL. We also examined their potential to screen for autism spectrum disorder (ASD) by examining agreement with the Modified Checklist for Autism in Toddlers, Revised with Follow-up (M-CHAT-R/F). The BITSEA had substantial agreement with the M-CHAT-R/F, providing initial support for its use as an ASD screener. These findings are preliminary and further study in larger, more diverse samples would be beneficial. Evaluation of the sensitivity and specificity of these tools is also needed.

Finding a Common Lens

The Early Childhood Personnel Center (ECPC) was funded by the Office of Special Education Programs at the U.S. Department of Education to provide technical assistance to State Systems of Early Childhood Intervention and Institutions of Higher Education on issues related to personnel development. One initiative of the ECPC has been to collaborate with professional organizations to identify core cross-disciplinary competencies for all personnel serving infants and young children aged birth through 5 years with disabilities and their families. Seven national organizations representing disciplines providing services in early childhood intervention have been participating in this initiative: the American Occupational Therapy Association; the American Physical Therapy Association; the American Speech-Language-Hearing Association; the Council for Exceptional Children and the Division for Early Childhood; the National Association for the Education of Young Children; and Zero to Three. Alignments of personnel standards, practice guidelines, and competencies yielded 4 areas of competence that are common across service providers serving infants and young children with disabilities and their families. These are: Collaboration and Coordination; Family-Centered Practice; Evidence-Based Practice; and Professionalism.

“We're Building Frameworks”: Administrator and Educator Perspectives on Implementing a Dual Language Pre-K Program to Include All Students

Abstract In this study, one Southwestern public school district strives to implement a Dual Language (DL) for All Pre-K program that includes students with disabilities. The Arizona Revised Statute § 15-751-755 currently restricts K-12 students who speak a language other than English from entering DL programs until they are deemed English proficient. There are no specific standards for the implementation of DL in Pre-K used within the district or state, nor specific standards for the implementation of DL with students with disabilities. This article shares (a) the case of one urban school district implementing a DL Pre-K program for All students for the first time by unpacking the experiences of teachers, paraprofessionals, and administrators, (b) the role of Division of Early Childhood (DEC) Recommended Practices in the implementation and revision of the program, and (c) implications for the future of inclusive DL Pre-K programming. Our research question is how do administrator and educator discourses demonstrate DL leadership in the implementation of programming for culturally and linguistically diverse learners with disabilities? We use the DEC Recommended Practices (2014) for our data analysis of focus groups with administrators and educators because the DEC Recommended Practices include guidance for implementing effective practices for early childhood students with disabilities who are DL learners. The findings suggest that there are five key components of the DEC Recommended Practices (leadership, families, instruction, teaming and collaboration, and environment) that contribute to a successful DL program. Recommendations are made for continued practices to support students and their families, as well as educators and district staff, as essential when designing instruction and programs for DL Pre-K programs.

Needs of Military Families: Family and Educator Perspective

Limited research has focused on the unique needs of military families and their preschool-age children and even less work focused on military families whose preschool children have special needs or disabilities. Researchers implemented a multicase qualitative research design conducted at two sites to gain the perspectives across all service ranks. The study included two groups of participants from each site including (a) early educators working for the school district associated with each military base, and (b) families who had been deployed within the past 5 years and had a child with a disability, or who was at risk for developing a disability, younger than the age of 8 years. Researchers used a semi-structured question protocol to align with the study’s overarching purpose, theory, extant research on military families, and the Division for Early Childhood (DEC) recommended practices for serving children with special needs and their families. Based on the data gathered, researchers describe professional development needs related to developing transportable detailed Individualized Family Service Plans and Individualized Education Programs, using family-centered approaches, and creating a collaborative partnership between school leadership and military command.

A contribuição do educador Jan Amos Comenius para a Primeira infância

O educador Jan Amos Comenius foi um dos importantes pensadores que ajudaram a modificar esta imagem de infncia dirigindo-lhe um olhar dedicado. Opondo-se a prticas educacionais presentes em seu tempo, mas seguindo o pensamento metdico da cincia moderna, props uma Didtica que tinha por objetivo central formar o bom cristo, ter f verdadeira em Deus, praticar aes virtuosas e preparar-se para uma outra vida, estendendo esse objetivo a todos: os pobres, ricos, deficientes e mulheres. Este trabalho reconstri as caractersticas do olhar comeniano para a primeira infncia, na tentativa de observar as modificaes em seu pensamento a respeito desta etapa da vida em trs de suas obras. Como exemplo dessas modificaes, apontamos aqui a diviso da primeira infncia em quatro etapas na obra Didtica Magna, e em seis etapas na Pampaedia, obra escrita cerca de vinte anos depois. Como o primeiro o texto de maior circulao no Brasil entre os pesquisadores da Histria da Educao e da Didtica, essa fase da primavera para Comenius tende a ser compreendida sem o aprofundamento necessrio oriundo da anlise das mudanas do pensamento do autor ao longo da vida. O dilogo entre estes dois textos confrontado com uma terceira obra, intermediria, que foi recentemente traduzida para o portugus (2011), a Escola da Infncia. Por perceber importantes diferenas entre as idades, Comenius fez propostas originais para a lide pedaggica, ao destacar a necessidade de uma ateno s crianas entre zero a seis anos, muito maior do que aquela que lhe pode dar um professor com uma grande turma de crianas. Alm disso, mostrou que cada idade nesse perodo requer um cuidado especfico que deve ser oferecido pela famlia para preparar adequadamente as crianas antes de mand-las para a escola. Para analisar as trs obras comeninanas citadas, este trabalho parte de uma inspirao metodolgica na obra do historiador italiano Carlo Ginzburg (1989, 2001, 2006).

Personal Thoughts on Early Childhood Special Education Research: An Historical Perspective, Threats to Relevance, and Call to Action

This article is based on my 2016 keynote address at the Division for Early Childhood (DEC) Conference, Louisville, Kentucky. Historical tendencies as well as current day research funding mechanisms and priorities are presented. I argue for a more field-initiated research process, a focus on individual participant needs, and a more thoughtful study of factors that lead practitioners and administrators to adopt, use with fidelity, and sustain the use of DEC’s Recommended Practices.

Early Intervention Paraprofessional Standards: Development and Field Validation

Personnel standards are the foundations for how states and nations approve a program, engage in systemic assessment, and provide effective professional development to its early childhood professionals. However, despite the extensive use of paraprofessionals in early intervention/early childhood special education programs, there is a lack of national- and state-level guidance for training paraprofessionals. This article presents the process followed for development and validation of statewide personnel standards for paraprofessionals who work in early intervention settings and the results of this validation study. The development and validation process for these new knowledge and skills competencies followed the process used by Division for Early Childhood and the Council for Exceptional Children for development and validation of personnel standards and K-12 special education paraeducator professional development standards. Challenges, limitations, and future directions are discussed.

Increasing Social Behaviors in Young Children with Social-Communication Delays in a Group Arrangement in Preschool

Abstract Young children with disabilities are less likely to display age-appropriate social behaviors than same-age peers with typical social development, especially children who display social-communication delays. In this study, two concurrently operating single case designs were used to evaluate the use of progressive time delay (PTD) to teach children with disabilities to share and to name peer preferences during dyadic instruction. PTD was effective for teaching children to share and to identify peer preferences. All participants generalized 50 to 100% of peer preference targets to typical classroom activities (e.g., selecting their peer's preferred snack before mealtime), with mixed results regarding sharing during an art activity. Keywords: systematic instruction, sharing, peer preferences, preschool, young children ********** Pro-social behaviors influence the development of friendships beginning in early childhood (Odom, Schertz, Munson, & Brown, 2004), potentially impacting long-term success in academic and social settings (Lane, Stanton-Chapman, Jamison, & Phillips, 2007). High-quality preschool programs focus on increasing pro-social behaviors in young children with and without disabilities (Division for Early Childhood [DEC] and National Association for the Education of Young Children [NAEYC], 2009; Wolery, 2005), providing numerous opportunities for interactions (Grisham-Brown, Hem meter, & Pretti-Frontczak, 2005). However, young children with disabilities are more likely to display social delays that impede appropriate peer interactions, potentially leading to rejection from peer groups (Guralnick, 1999). Young children with disabilities may require structured opportunities for peer-to-peer interactions to recognize the potentially "complex discriminative stimuli" that set the occasion for age-appropriate social behaviors (Ledford & Wolery, 2013, p. 440). Increasing age-appropriate pro-social behaviors in young children with disabilities requires practitioners to select target behaviors common in peer-to-peer interactions. Pro-social behaviors, such as initiating conversations (e.g., commenting on a peer's preferred interest), helping behaviors (providing assistance or aid), and sharing items with peers (giving an item so a peer can engage in or have the same or similar materials during an activity), are behaviors young children with typical social development commonly demonstrate in preschool classrooms (e.g., Babcock, Hartle, & Lamme, 1995). In addition, young children are more likely to identify peers who help and share items as "nice" and as "friends" (Tisak, Holub, & Tisak, 2007), potentially leading to increases in meaningful peer-to-peer interactions. Young children with social-communication delays (SCD), such as autism spectrum disorder (ASD), are less likely to initiate and attend to peers' social initiations than children with intellectual disability or typical development (Bregman & Higdon, 2012) and may display difficulties taking the perspective of others (known as Theory of Mind Impairments [ToM]; Millward, Powell, Messer, & Jordan, 2000; Mundy & Thorp, 2006; Zager, Wehmeyer, & Simpson, 2012), indicating a need for evidence-based interventions that directly teach pro-social behaviors with peers (Reichow & Volkmar, 2010; White, Keonig, & Scahill, 2007; Wolery & Hemmeter, 2011). Direct instruction regarding peer preferences may increase pro-social behaviors by providing contextual support when teaching helping and related behaviors (e.g., conversation skills). One study assessed learning a peer's preferences by presenting this information as instructive feedback during small group academic instruction; all participants learned some of the information without direct instruction, but generalization was not assessed (Lane, Gast, Shepley, & Ledford, 2015). Although knowing a peer's preferences may set the occasion for pro-social behaviors (e. …

Advancing High-Quality Preschool Inclusion

Although considerable progress has been achieved regarding the research and laws supporting preschool inclusion, access to inclusive preschool environments remains intangible for many children with disabilities in the United States. The purpose of this article is to discuss current challenges and solutions to high-quality preschool inclusion. We use the conceptual framework identified in the Division for Early Childhood (DEC)/National Association for the Education of Young Children (NAEYC) inclusion position statement to promote solutions to support high-quality inclusion and the success of all children. We provide conceptual and empirical support for preschool inclusion and outline recommendations to the field.

Frameworks for Response to Intervention in Early Childhood

In February, 2013, the Division of Early Childhood, the National Association for the Education of Young Children, and the National Head Start Association released a collaborative paper to provide clarification and assistance regarding the relationship of response to intervention (RTI) with the field of early childhood (EC). In addition to promoting a broader discussion of this topic, in this article, I provide a valuable resource for families, and general and special education early childhood teachers, administrators, and leaders in the field. The following key elements are discussed: context for RTI in K–12 and EC, features of RTI frameworks in EC, misunderstandings and misconceptions of RTI, and the future of RTI in EC programs.