This paper presents the results of an intervention study focused on understanding how a 5-month, vocabulary-focused texting program called Text to Talk can enhance home-school connections concerning vocabulary and preschool children's language learning. Classrooms (49) were randomly assigned to intervention or control status in an urban preschool program in the eastern United States. Intervention teachers delivered Text to Talk, a curriculum-aligned program that provides weekly texts for teachers to send to families that include vocabulary words and related activities from books being read in the classroom. Children's target word knowledge and receptive language skills (PPVT) were measured at baseline and follow-up, with treatment effects on target word knowledge ( d = 0.17). Treatment families reported much higher use of texting as a source of communication with teachers, but otherwise rates of home-school communication in person, phone, and with paper were unchanged; family self-report of general home learning activities was also unaffected by treatment status. Implementation analysis showed moderate to high fidelity among teachers and families, with greater family fidelity associated with larger treatment impacts. The findings suggest that a family-focused texting-based program, aligned with the school curriculum, leads to improved taught-word knowledge among children from under-resourced communities. (c) 2021 Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.

AbstractTexting is increasingly used by teachers to communicate with families about classroom logistics and to support learning at home. The authors review the research evidence supporting texting as a tool for increasing family members’ engagement and their children’s learning, including the authors’ own evidence‐based texting program, Text to Talk, which targets students’ vocabulary development. Finally, the authors offer guidelines to teachers regarding effective texting practices to maximize student learning and family engagement. These guidelines might prove useful to teachers beginning to use texting to facilitate students’ word learning specifically and teachers trying to bridge the home–school gap with other content more generally. The authors’ goal is to share these factors with teachers to help support successful home–school connections.

With the advance of technology, additional opportunities for professional development are available through nontraditional means. In this review, we examine the effectiveness of technology-mediated language and literacy professional development (Tech PD) programs for teachers and students in early childhood settings. We review Tech PD interventions that have been evaluated using random or quasi-random assignment, peer-reviewed studies. Two questions about this corpus of research were examined: 1) how technology is being used in the programs and 2) whether Tech PD is effective for supporting teachers' enhanced language and literacy instruction and children's learning. Examining the past 16 years of published works (2001-2017), 11 studies were identified. We identify five different types of Tech PD: remote coaching over live video, remote coaching via recorded video or e-mail, online courses, group courses over satellite or video, and online curricula, with results suggesting that impacts on teachers' language and literacy practices and student learning can be comparable to in-person equivalents.

ABSTRACT With the advance of technology, additional opportunities for professional development are available through nontraditional means. In this review, we examine the effectiveness of technology-mediated language and literacy professional development (Tech PD) programs for teachers and students in early childhood settings. We review Tech PD interventions that have been evaluated using random or quasi-random assignment, peer-reviewed studies. Two questions about this corpus of research were examined: 1) how technology is being used in the programs and 2) whether Tech PD is effective for supporting teachers’ enhanced language and literacy instruction and children’s learning. Examining the past 16 years of published works (2001–2017), 11 studies were identified. We identify five different types of Tech PD: remote coaching over live video, remote coaching via recorded video or e-mail, online courses, group courses over satellite or video, and online curricula, with results suggesting that impacts on teachers’ language and literacy practices and student learning can be comparable to in-person equivalents.

New technologies offer exciting opportunities for improving home-school communication, family engagement, and children's learning in early childhood. This paper presents the results of an exploratory study focused on understanding how texting might enhance family-school engagement in early childhood settings. Using focus groups and surveys of teachers (n=20) and family members (n=30) in an urban early childhood programme in the eastern United States, we examined the nature of current communication (including texting) between school and home, openness among teachers and families to the idea of sending or receiving home-school communication via text, and beliefs among teachers and families about how texting can support various aspects of family-school engagement. Results suggest that many teachers and families are enthusiastic about using texting and view texting as a tool to further family-school engagement and communication and to enhance child outcomes.

Ongoing child assessment is increasingly viewed as a tool for informing and individualizing instruction in early childhood, yet little is known about how ongoing child assessment is implemented at the classroom or the programmatic level. This literature review focuses on how teachers use ongoing assessment and adjust instructional practices and content to better meet the individual strengths, needs, and interests of young children. We identified four important issues in the literature in ongoing assessment in early childhood: (1) many teachers do not consistently collect ongoing assessment data, nor do they use it for instruction and individualization; (2) barriers to using data include lack of pedagogical content knowledge and knowledge about how to conduct assessments and interpret data; (3) teachers want more training and professional development in this area; and (4) more needs to be known about how to support the successful implementation of ongoing child assessment.

Recent attention to the word gap has renewed public interest in the striking vocabulary disparities between children in poverty and their higher income peers during the 1st years of life. Children's outcomes—and the nation's well-being—could be improved by additional research into the mechanisms of vocabulary learning, as well as translational research that produces effective, feasible early-education practices in homes and schools. In this review, we first explain the nature and extent of the word gap and then briefly describe research on how children learn words during the early years. Next, we summarize limits of available interventions. Finally, we detail pressing questions that demand additional study and suggest research that could provide answers. Ultimately, we call for new research on word-learning experiences at home and in school that will support reading and academic success for children at risk.

Recent attention to the word gap has renewed public interest in the striking vocabulary disparities between children in poverty and their higher income peers during the 1st years of life. Children's outcomes-and the nation's well-being-could be improved by additional research into the mechanisms of vocabulary learning, as well as translational research that produces effective, feasible early-education practices in homes and schools. In this review, we first explain the nature and extent of the word gap and then briefly describe research on how children learn words during the early years. Next, we summarize limits of available interventions. Finally, we detail pressing questions that demand additional study and suggest research that could provide answers. Ultimately, we call for new research on word-learning experiences at home and in school that will support reading and academic success for children at risk.

This paper reviews high-quality empirical studies on book reading practices in early childhood that have resulted in increases in child vocabulary. The overarching purpose of this work is twofold: first, to tease apart the myriad ways in which effective book readings can be delivered; and second, to identify questions that remain about book reading and vocabulary learning. We examine various aspects of effective book readings, including the contexts in which the book reading was conducted, the words that were taught through the book reading, the dosage of reading that children received, and the outcome measures used. Findings reveal that six strategies: reading and re-reading texts, explicitly defining words, encouraging dialogue about book-related vocabulary through questions and discussion, re-telling, using props, and engaging children in post-reading activities are consistently implemented across the studies; however, they are used in widely varying combinations. There is great variability across studies in the number of words taught, the criteria for word selection, and the measures used to assess word learning. Moreover, in many studies, children learn only a small proportion of the number of words taught. Finally, this review identifies critical remaining questions about how to optimize vocabulary learning through book reading that require systematic investigation in order to inform effective practice. (C) 2016 Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.

Evocative effects of child characteristics on the quality and quantity of child care were assessed in two studies using longitudinal data from the NICHD Study of Early Child Care. We focus on the influence of child characteristics on two important aspects of the child care experience: language stimulation provided by caregivers and quantity of care. In Study 1, associations between the developmental status of children aged 15 to 54 months and the language stimulation provided by their caregivers were examined using path models, and longitudinal child effects were detected across the earliest time points of the study. In Study 2, the associations among child behavior, temperament, development, and time in care were examined. Little evidence was found for such child effects on time in care. The results are discussed in terms of the effects of child care on child development and implications for developmental processes, particularly for children at greatest risk for developmental delay or psychopathology.

This report describes the design of the Mother and Infant Home Visiting Program Evaluation – Strong Start.

This article describes how a research–practice partnership has informed the iterative development of a web-mediated early childhood language and literacy professional development (PD) intervention. Funded through the Investing in Innovation (i3) program, this new PD model is based on an effective in-situ intervention. As we translated the face-to-face model into a largely web-mediated approach, we partnered with educators to ensure that the resulting intervention was feasible and effective in real-world classrooms serving children at risk. Specifically, an educator advisory board provided ongoing input about the PD. Further, pilot teachers completed the training and provided feedback through a survey about the usability and effectiveness of the training modules, coaching, and instructional strategies in classroom settings. Findings suggest that research–practice partnerships that gather teachers’ situated, comprehensive, and insightful perspectives can be invaluable in developing PD interventions. Collaboration between school districts and university researchers is essential in this iterative development process.

This report describes the design of the Mother and Infant Home Visiting Program Evaluation – Strong Start.

Vocabulary development is critical for children's ability to learn to read and their success at school. Vocabulary has also been identified as a key factor in the achievement gap, with children from low-income families knowing significantly fewer words when they enter school. Although book reading has long been celebrated as an effective way for teachers to introduce children to vocabulary words, teachers have received little specific guidance about exactly which strategies are most effective for teaching children words. In this paper, we review the literature on book reading-focused vocabulary interventions for preschool- and kindergarten-aged children. Findings suggest that teachers should focus on five strategies that boost word learning through book reading, including defining words, discussing and asking questions about the words, rereading books, retelling books, and designing classroom activities that allow children to hear and use new vocabulary throughout the day.

Over the past decade, metabolomics has emerged as an important technique for systems biology. Measuring all the metabolites in a biological system provides an invaluable source of information to explore various cellular processes, and to investigate the impact of environmental factors and genetic modifications. Nuclear magnetic resonance (NMR) spectroscopy is an important method routinely employed in metabolomics. NMR provides comprehensive structural and quantitative information useful for metabolomics fingerprinting, chemometric analysis, metabolite identification and metabolic pathway construction. A successful metabolomics study relies on proper experimental protocols for the collection, handling, processing and analysis of metabolomics data. Critically, these protocols should eliminate or avoid biologically-irrelevant changes to the metabolome. We provide a comprehensive description of our NMR-based metabolomics procedures optimized for the analysis of bacterial metabolomes. The technical details described within this manuscript should provide a useful guide to reliably apply our NMR-based metabolomics methodology to systems biology studies.

This study uses geocoded address data and information about parent's economic behavior and children's development from four random-assignment welfare and anti-poverty experiments conducted during the 1990s. We find that the impacts of these welfare and anti-poverty programs on boys' and girls' developmental outcomes during the transition to early adolescence differ as a function of neighborhood poverty levels. The strongest positive impacts of these programs are among boys who lived in high-poverty neighborhoods at the time their parents enrolled in the studies, with smaller or non-statistically significant effects for boys in lower poverty neighborhoods and for girls across all neighborhoods. This research informs our understanding of how neighborhood context and child gender may interact with employment-based policies to affect children's well-being.