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Articles 1 - 15 of 15

Full-Text Articles in Education

We Are All Learning About Climate Change: Teaching With Picture Books To Engage Teachers And Students, Ysaaca D. Axelrod, Denise Ives, Rachel Weaver Nov 2020

We Are All Learning About Climate Change: Teaching With Picture Books To Engage Teachers And Students, Ysaaca D. Axelrod, Denise Ives, Rachel Weaver

Occasional Paper Series

The topic of climate change and climate justice is politically charged, doesn’t sit neatly within a single subject or content area, and raises concerns of not being ‘age appropriate’ for young children. In this paper we describe how teacher educators in an elementary education program support a student teacher who took up the topic of climate change and climate justice in her 1st grade teaching placement. She designed a unit around a picture book that focuses on the words and work of Greta Thunberg, and used a diverse set of texts to support students’ understanding of the complexity of climate …


Angry Like Me, Catherine-Laura Dunnington, Shoshana Magnet Nov 2020

Angry Like Me, Catherine-Laura Dunnington, Shoshana Magnet

Occasional Paper Series

In this article we take on a challenging picture book, The Heart and the Bottle written and illustrated by Oliver Jeffers, and how one preschool boy’s response changed us. As part of a three-center initiative to discuss hard feelings and grief with preschool learners, we teamed with six preschool teachers to read and work through this text. We explore how both the preschoolers’ and the teachers’ responses challenged us to look at how the disjoint between pedagogy (literature that says we should teach these types of texts) and practice (how this classroom experience actually unfolds) leaves much room for continued …


Family Engagement During Covid-19, Mark Nagasawa Oct 2020

Family Engagement During Covid-19, Mark Nagasawa

Straus Center for Young Children & Families

This is an infographic summarizing findings from a survey conducted in May 2020 (n=3355) about how the COVID-19 was affecting early childhood educators in New York. Unsurprisingly, the survey responses reflected respondents' multimodal creativity and professional commitment to connecting with children's families. Responses also suggested some underlying tensions, such as school-centric notions of family engagement (i.e., more academically focused) vs. family-centric perspectives (i.e., offering emotional and material support to families). Ultimately the survey's contribution lies in shedding some light on important, difficult-to-resolve issues that must be debated as the world moves towards "post" pandemic life (e.g., services, supports, and accessibility …


Equitable Compensation For The Child Care Workforce: Within Reach And Worth The Investment, Emily Sharrock, Courtney Parkerson Oct 2020

Equitable Compensation For The Child Care Workforce: Within Reach And Worth The Investment, Emily Sharrock, Courtney Parkerson

Bank Street Education Center

This brief outlines concrete ideas and innovative strategies to help advance early educator compensation at the local, state, and federal levels and, in turn, support the development and care of our nation's youngest learners.


Forgotten Frontline Workers: A Snapshot Of Family Child Care And Covid-19 In New York, Mark Nagasawa, Kate Tarrant Oct 2020

Forgotten Frontline Workers: A Snapshot Of Family Child Care And Covid-19 In New York, Mark Nagasawa, Kate Tarrant

Straus Center for Young Children & Families

This the third report from the New York ECE and COVID-19 Survey, which focuses on both the unique challenges faced by the family child care (FCC) providers who participated in the survey, as well as their particular resilience. At the time of the survey (May 2020), this group of participants was the most physically open form of ECE and was significantly more affected economically than their other ECE colleagues. Interestingly, several of the survey respondents (in different geographic locations) spoke of organizing efforts for mutual support and collective action, which may be a promising development for reducing social isolation, increasing …


Covid-19 And Online Early Childhood Education, Mark Nagasawa Oct 2020

Covid-19 And Online Early Childhood Education, Mark Nagasawa

Straus Center for Young Children & Families

This infographic summarizes some themes from a survey conducted with early childhood educators across New York in May 2020, when 65% of programs reported providing online ECE. While respondents expressed clear needs for support in providing technologically-mediated ECE - including tech support, curricular, materials, and hardware - they also displayed three key components of any ECE, commitments to relationships, flexibility, and creativity. This highlights a critical need to document educators' many creative approaches and lessons learned from the pandemic.


Who Will Care For The Early Care And Education Workforce? Covid-19 And The Need To Support Early Childhood Educators’ Emotional Well-Being, Mark Nagasawa, Kate Tarrant Jul 2020

Who Will Care For The Early Care And Education Workforce? Covid-19 And The Need To Support Early Childhood Educators’ Emotional Well-Being, Mark Nagasawa, Kate Tarrant

Straus Center for Young Children & Families

This brief report describes issues and opportunities related to early childhood educators' emotional well-being that emerged from a survey exploring how the COVID-19 was affecting early educators across New York City and New York State (n=3355). Among our key findings were: (1) that mental health support was the most frequently identified need (n=910); (2) professional mental health was the least reported approach to coping (n=216); and (3) how those teaching and caring remotely were approximately one-and-a- half times more likely to rate their emotional well-being as lower than those whose sites were closed (CI 95% 1.157, 1.896). We argue, given …


New York Early Care And Education Survey: Understanding The Impact Of Covid-19 On New York Early Childhood System, Kate Tarrant, Mark Nagasawa Jun 2020

New York Early Care And Education Survey: Understanding The Impact Of Covid-19 On New York Early Childhood System, Kate Tarrant, Mark Nagasawa

Straus Center for Young Children & Families

This is the first in a series of reports based upon a survey conducted with 3355 early childhood educators across New York City and New York State, which sought to understand how they were faring during the early phases of the COVID-19 pandemic (May 2020). Among the key findings were: (1) at that time the emotional stress of the pandemic was affecting respondents more than health and financial stressors; (2) Educators’ need for mental health supports exceed other areas of support requested; (3) approximately 70% were engaged in remote instruction in New York City and half were providing remote instruction …


The High Lonesome Sound In Little Voices: The Use Of Appalachian Balladry In The Early Childhood Classroom, Lance Piao May 2020

The High Lonesome Sound In Little Voices: The Use Of Appalachian Balladry In The Early Childhood Classroom, Lance Piao

Graduate Student Independent Studies

Although both music and poetry are thoroughly-integrated into the Early Childhood classroom, the ballad, their intersection, has not been studied. Appalachian music features a prominent tradition of balladry, a synthesis of several different music traditions. With the increased interest in Appalachian Studies after the 2016 U.S. presidential election, the study of Appalachian custom has become increasingly relevant. From a critical-historical perspective, the ballads, their collection, and their analysis have been used to perpetuate the oppressive structures that have come under increased scrutiny since 2016. This study is a hypothetical curriculum for integrating the study of Appalachian ballads into the Early …


Good Things: An Original Picture Book, Maryah Greene Apr 2020

Good Things: An Original Picture Book, Maryah Greene

Graduate Student Independent Studies

The research collected in this study aims to support students, teachers and parents on their journey of building a relationship with houseplants. Whether in a classroom, at home or in a work space, a relationship with a houseplant should be one that is intentional, personal and provides an opportunity for growth both physically and mentally. The following research aims to support this belief while also supporting students, teachers and parents through the creation of the original book material, Good Things.


Barrington Bunny: Case Of The Curious Clouds A Narrative Picture Book For Symbolic Play And Stem Curriculum, Claudia Chung Apr 2020

Barrington Bunny: Case Of The Curious Clouds A Narrative Picture Book For Symbolic Play And Stem Curriculum, Claudia Chung

Graduate Student Independent Studies

Adults constantly use their imagination to help them visualize, problem-solve, enjoy a book, empathize, and think creatively. Therefore, using one's imagination is a critical cognitive skill that can be used throughout life. And it is crucial for educators to encourage imagination, creativity and original ideas in childhood through pretend play, story, picture books, and narrative make-believe if we want our students to be mindful and functioning adults in society. Pretend play is also known as "symbolic play" because it involves the use of symbols. This type of symbolic thought is also needed for language and reading, as our words are …


Technology In Education: The Ongoing Debate Of Access, Adequacy And Equity, Kristiana Roth Apr 2020

Technology In Education: The Ongoing Debate Of Access, Adequacy And Equity, Kristiana Roth

Graduate Student Independent Studies

Technology is intertwined in all aspects of our lives. Technology has evolved in ways that were once considered unimaginable. Yet, access to these advancements in technology are not adequate, especially throughout our education system. The purpose of this paper is to bring to light the significance technology can have on our education system today. This paper will reflect research which supports the integration of technology beginning in early childhood classrooms. This paper will also reflect on the injustices that exist in how educational technology is unequally distributed between socio-economic status. More is available to wealthy, white students. While people from …


Creating Classroom Community To Welcome Children Experiencing Trauma, Katherina A. Payne, Jennifer Keys Adair, Shubhi Sachdeva Apr 2020

Creating Classroom Community To Welcome Children Experiencing Trauma, Katherina A. Payne, Jennifer Keys Adair, Shubhi Sachdeva

Occasional Paper Series

How elementary and early childhood classrooms engage with socio-emotional learning is deeply connected to creating a classroom community. Yet, much of socio-emotional learning curricula focuses on the individual child, rather than on the everyday interactions that build and sustain community. During the Civic Action and Young Children study, we spent a year in a Head Start preschool in Texas, where we noticed that although many children in the class struggled with varied difficult circumstances including poverty, homelessness, discrimination and threat of deportation, the teachers did not label them as homeless, illegal immigrants or poor. Additionally, children seemed to help one …


Looking For Trouble And Causing Trauma, Marquita D. Foster Apr 2020

Looking For Trouble And Causing Trauma, Marquita D. Foster

Occasional Paper Series

The purpose of this paper is to examine the genuine but misguided efforts to address the behaviors of Pre-K students in a Texas public school. After espousing the concept of building strong children through correction, evaluation, and intervention in my role as assistant principal, I began to question how these methods tended to lead to pathologizing the behaviors of Black pre-kindergarteners in my school. In an attempt to find solutions to the children's perceived misbehavior, Pre-K teachers were charged with utilizing PBIS strategies and the RTI process for behavior. Social and emotional learning (SEL) was also considered. We discovered that …


Investing In The Birth-To-Three Workforce: A New Vision To Strengthen The Foundation For All Learning, Emily Sharrock, Courtney Parkerson Jan 2020

Investing In The Birth-To-Three Workforce: A New Vision To Strengthen The Foundation For All Learning, Emily Sharrock, Courtney Parkerson

Bank Street Education Center

This report asserts that every child—regardless of race, income, or opportunity—should have consistent access to high-quality learning experiences from birth and provides a roadmap toward change at scale, including the development of residency programs and improved compensation for the infant/toddler workforce.