Childhood Professionals

The Twenty-first Century Child of Northwest Indiana

An Initiative Developed to Ensure Success by Six

Written by Cheryl W. DeLeón, Ph.D. and Mary Jane Eisenhauer, Ph.D.

Published on Thursday, 01 September 2011

Introduction

For decades in Northwest Indiana, policies have been enacted and services have been available to young children with the sole purpose of improving their condition. Those services are as diversified as the children whose needs these services meet. There is home-based care for children alone, in groups or care given in centers. There are services available to children whose development may be challenged by socioeconomic conditions developmental disabilities, mental health issues, or family trauma. Regardless of what type of service being provided, or policy for which they are advocating, the groups share one common goal; to improve the young child’s circumstances early in his or her development, recognizing that such an investment can lead to favorable outcomes (Shonkoff & Phillips, 2000). One such initiative created to advocate for urban and rural children developing in Northwest Indiana, and supported by all of the United Way programs in Northwest Indiana is Success by 6.

Preliminary Findings from the Early Head Start Prekindergarten Followup

EARLY HEAD START RESEARCH AND EVALUATION PROJECT

When tasked with designing Early Head Start, the Department of Health and Human Services’ (USDHHS) Advisory Committee on Services for Families with Infants and Toddlers envisioned the continuation of high quality services after families completed the infant and toddler program. Smooth transitions into high quality Head Start and other preschool programs were seen as "important for ensuring continued accessibility to enriching early child development experiences and for providing ongoing family support services that promote healthy family development" (USDHHS, 1994). This vision, as well as research on continuity of early childhood services, guided the analyses of the prekindergarten followup of the Early Head Start Research and Evaluation Project. The primary research questions were:

How did Early Head Start from birth to age 3 contribute to school readiness and family functioning?
How did child development services from birth to age 5, including formal education and care program experiences between ages 3 and 5, contribute to school readiness and family functioning at the time of school entry?

Click here for the rest of this research article.

Preschool benefits last into adulthood, study says

Article by, Associated Press | June 9, 2011 | Article found here: http://abclocal.go.com/wls/story?section=news/health&id=8181286&rss=rss-ipad-wls-article-8181286

June 9, 2011 (CHICAGO) -- Preschool has surprisingly enduring benefits lasting well into adulthood, according to one of the biggest, longest follow-up studies of its kind.

Better jobs, less drug abuse and fewer arrests are among advantages found in the study that tracked more than 1,000 low-income, mostly black Chicago kids for up to 25 years.

Michael Washington was one of them. Now a 31-year-old heating and air conditioning contractor, Washington attended a year of preschool at Chicago's intensive Child-Parent Center Education Program when he was 4.

The ongoing publicly funded program focuses on language development, scholastic skills and building self-confidence. It involves one or two years of half-day preschool, and up to four additional years of educational and family services in grade school. Preschool teachers have college degrees and are certified in early childhood education, and parents are encouraged to be involved in the classes.

Helpful Articles

Check out these great articles on early childhood development.

A Conceptual Framework for Early Childhood Professional Development - Click here.
NAEYC Position Statement on Developing and Implementing Effective Public Policies to Promote Early Childhood and School-Age Care Program Accreditation - Click Here.
Where We Stand - on Standards for Programs to Prepare Early Childhood Professionals - Click Here.
Where We Stand - on Responding to Linguistic and Cultural Diversity - Click Here.

Early Childhood Professional Development

naeyc – National Association for the Education of Young Children
Promoting Excellence in Early Childhood Education

Early childhood professional development is a continuum of learning and support opportunities designed to prepare individuals for work with as opportunities that provide ongoing experiences to enhance this work. These opportunities lead to improvements in the knowledge, skills, practices, and dispositions of early childhood professionals.