A review: Journal of Research in Childhood Education Vol. 12, No. 2, Spring/Summer 1998.

This issue covers a wide range of topics and methods of research, and presents theoretically based points of view on two issues of major interest to educators. It begins with two articles that discuss the effects of training - with children and with adults. The first article reviews the reported benefits of play training, speculates about the specific processes that may be at work in these interventions, and generates an alternative hypothesis about the reasons for its effectiveness. The second article reports on an evaluation of an in-service inclusion training program for child care providers. Three articles address research with diverse ethnic groups - one on African American and Hispanic teachers' perceptions of interactions with children from those ethnic groups, one on elementary children's attitudes in a multiethnic school, and one comparing Jamaican mothers' and teachers' child-rearing ideas. The next series of articles reports on children's in-class behaviors, including their stress levels in DAP and non-DAP preschools, rule knowledge in invented games, changes in social behavior with emotional-socialization models of intervention, and increases in literacy behaviors during block play interventions. Teacher behaviors in two classrooms, one an elementary class encouraging student-initiated learning, and one a primary grade where the ethic of care is modeled, are examined in the last two articles in the issue. The final article also presents the feminist theoretical perspective on the ethics of caring. While most of the articles follow traditional quantitative or qualitative methods, two describe "action research" intervention studies done by teacher-researchers in their classrooms; one of these involves collaboration with a university colleague. Two other studies report on children's behavior in classrooms where teachers and university colleagues cooperatively set up conditions to test particular hypotheses. These studies exemplify the types of teacher action research and school-university research partnerships that are suggested in many reform initiatives, but which do not often find their way to research journals. They are presented in this issue to provide illustrations that may be of interest to other potential teacher researchers.

* Why Play Training Works: An Integrated Model for Play Intervention - Trawick-Smith

Play training, in which adults plan and implement ways to intervene in children's symbolic play so as to enhance play and other areas of development, has been the subject of a major body of research. In general, these interventions have had positive effects; however, there is a lack of clarity as to what causal factors can be attributed to the changes seen in child behavior. Trawick-Smith reviews three types of play training studies and their theoretical base: those that posit change occurring from the direct effects of adult-child interactions and modeling, those that propose indirect effects by enhancing children's play abilities, and those that suggest there are metaplay effects that enable children to reflect on their behavior. The author indicates the limitations of each of these theories and proposes an integrated, responsive model that has implications for classroom interventions, teacher preparation and future research.

* Evaluation of an Inservice Model To Train Child Care Providers About Inclusion - Espinosa, Gillam, Busch & Patterson

An inservice education project designed to assist caregivers in caring for children with disabilities in inclusive settings was evaluated over a two-year period. Caregivers were randomly assigned to training and control groups in each of the two years. The training was initially developed with caregiver input, and during the first year a multidisciplinary team of presenters gave live presentations and provided on-site consultation and demonstration visits. Presenters videotaped their presentations and, during the second year, one presenter led discussions after showing the videotapes, and graduate students conducted the on-site consultation and demonstration visits. The two control groups received no training. Although both training groups showed significantly higher scores on an observation scale and on a self-rating instrument than the control groups did, there were no differences in the groups trained with live presenters or with videotaped presentations. The researchers conclude that the videotape approach can provide a relatively inexpensive training method. Both training groups received on-site consultation, although the consultants differed; there was no presentation-only or on-site-consultant-only test of the model.

* Day Care Interactions and Teacher Perceptions As a Function of Teacher and Child Ethnic Group - Arnold, Griffith, Ortiz & Stowe

This study extended previous studies of teachers' perceptions of children and teacher-child interactions to African American and Hispanic teachers and preschool-age children. Teachers who worked in eight child care centers serving low-SES children were observed and videotaped during circle time; teachers also rated each child on a number of social interaction and learning dimensions. The videotapes were coded for positive, negative and neutral interactions. The results showed that Hispanic teachers had more overall interactions with Hispanic boys, with Hispanic teachers also initiating more interactions with Hispanic boys. Most of the teacher interactions were neutral, rather than positive or negative. There were no significant ethnic differences in observed child-child interactions. On the teacher ratings, however, teachers rated boys as having more behavior problems, with Hispanic teachers rating Hispanic boys as having high behavior problems. Hispanic teachers also rated Hispanic boys as having the poorest peer relationships and being less interested in learning; they also predicted lower academic success for them. Hispanic teachers also rated Hispanic girls as having less interest in learning. The researchers propose several hypotheses to account for the Hispanic-teacher/Hispanic-boys effects, and point out implications for practice.

* Ethnic Attitudes Among Elementary School Students in a Multiethnic School Community - Yamauchi, Nakagawa & Murdoch

Two studies related to elementary school students' tendencies to stereotype ethnic minorities are reported in this article. The first reports interview/survey data from 140 children in kindergarten to 6th grade who are in a multiethnic school environment. The children's descriptions of people from 12 ethnic groups showed that stereotyping was more common among older children. Younger children described others by physical characteristics, while older children used more social and personality descriptors. The second study involved 60 children across the seven grade levels. Children were asked to nominate peers for various roles that connote positive or negative judgments. There were few ethnic differences in these nominations, although Chinese and Japanese Americans were more likely to nominate same-group peers. Younger children showed no significant effects for ethnicity, while older children showed significant ethnicity effects on some nominations (especially for Chinese and Japanese Americans, mixed ethnicity, and part Hawaiian/Samoan Americans). The most robust findings related to gender preferences, with gender differences evident in both older and younger groups. The researchers conclude that children in a multiethnic school environment may have fewer ethnically based biases. However, close contact with children of both genders does not seem to abate gender preferences.

* Ideas About Child Rearing Among Jamaican Mothers and Early Childhood Education Teachers - Morrison, Ispa & Milner

Jamaican mothers and early childhood teachers completed questionnaires about their ideas and feelings concerning child rearing, using an instrument adapted from several other measures used in similar research with other populations. The scale yielded four dimensions: conformity to rules, traditional child-rearing practices, intrusiveness and nurturance scores. Correlational analysis showed positive relationships among conformity to rules, traditional child rearing attitudes, and intrusiveness, while valuing inquisitiveness was negatively correlated with intrusiveness. There was also an overall difference for respondents with varying education levels, with the valuing of traditional child-rearing practices accounting for the significant difference. Teachers valued inquisitiveness more, while mothers valued rule conformity and intrusiveness more. The implications for child outcomes and teacher-parent relationships are discussed.

* Stress Behaviors and Activity Type Participation of Preschoolers in More and Less Developmentally Appropriate Classrooms - Hart, Burts, Durland, Charlesworth, DeWolf & Fleege

This study compared the effects of two types of preschool classrooms - those characterized as more or less developmentally appropriate - on young children's stress behaviors and activity participation rates. The children in the comparative study came from 6 classrooms (selected from a group of 10 classrooms) that had been observed and rated as to developmental appropriateness and whose teachers had given self-reports of their beliefs about developmentally appropriate practice. Three of the classrooms were judged to use similarly developmentally appropriate practice (DAP) and three used developmentally inappropriate practice (DIP). Differential effects of these two types of classrooms were found for socioeconomic status, in that children of lower SES showed significantly more stress-behaviors in DIP classrooms than did such children in DAP classrooms. There were also gender differences, with males in DIP classrooms showing more stress. The lower SES children who were also in DIP classrooms participated in fewer developmentally appropriate activities. The researchers conclude that DIP classrooms are more likely to adversely affect young children who are already vulnerable (i.e., low SES and male), while DAP classrooms appear to benefit children from all SES categories and both sexes. They also cite limitations of the study that could suggest alternative hypotheses, however.

* Children's Rule Knowledge in Invented Games - Castle

This study analyzed 1st- through 3rd-grade children's invented games projects for type, complexity and rule knowledge. The children's game rule knowledge was also compared to their knowledge of classroom rules. In general the types of games the children invented were similar at all three age levels, with 19 of the 24 being board games. Two basic types of rules were found: conduct (specifying appropriate social behavior) and procedural (which outlined how to play the game and also included rules for winning). The conduct rules were similar to those the children experienced in their particular classroom. There were age differences in the complexity of the games invented, with the idea of competition rules (i.e., rules for winning) occurring only at 3rd grade. The researcher suggests educational implications, related to the use of invented games, for promoting children's understanding of rule knowledge.

* "Are You My Friend?": How Two Young Children Learned To Get Along with Others - Burton & Denham

The effects of emotional socialization intervention strategies used with two 4-year-old children who exhibited extreme social interaction problems are described in case studies. The children, both boys, were attending a child care center that used a "primary prevention" program involving components of three socialization models (floor time, turtle and dialoguing). Through videotape observations and teacher interviews, the study tracks the behavior of the two children throughout a year. Each child had different emotional socialization problems, and so the strategies used by teachers had differential effects - "floor time" was most beneficial for one child who harmed other children and needed to form stronger attachment and trust levels; "turtle" was most helpful for the other child who had outbursts of out-of-control behavior. The case studies describe both children's progress as well as also their interactions with each other, and the researchers suggest what types of strategies may be most useful for children with varied social and emotional behavioral issues.

* Literacy Learning During Block Play - Pickett

This action research study, conducted by a teacher researcher, observed the effect of physical and social alterations in the block area of the 1st-grade classroom on the amount of literacy-related pretend play. The subjects were ten 6- to 7-year-old boys who usually chose to play in the block area. Over a three-week period, the environment was observed, with the first week providing the base line data (no changes). The second week involved physical changes in the environment, with the provision of many literacy-related materials; adult modeling of literacy-related pretend occurred during the third week. The activity in the area was videotaped each day, and then coded for observed literacy behaviors during the three-week period. During the baseline week only one such behavior occurred, and in the second week (when the physical environment changed) the literacy incidents increased to four. When adult modeling was added, over the five days of the third week, however, 51 such behaviors were noted. The researcher gives examples of how these scaffolding interactions by adults (teacher and librarian) expanded the children's repertoire of pretend literacy uses, and concludes that engagement in supportive interactions with adults may increase children's literacy behaviors in free-play situations. The long-term effects were not studied, however.

* Wearing Away the Walls: Making a Transition to Student-Initiated Learning - Lenenski & McLaughlin

This collaborative study, involving a teacher researcher and a university faculty member, describes the major portion of a year spent in a 4th-grade class, in which the teachers in two classrooms wished to move from a "teacher-directed" to a "student-initiated" learning model. The elementary school where the study occurred is one-third minority (primarily African American) and two-thirds European American, of whom 10 percent are first-generation immigrants. Students were randomly assigned to the two classrooms. The data sources included notes from class reflective discussions about the change process (held each week and on an as-needed basis at end of day), students' written evaluations of the learning process and their feelings about the changes, and teachers' journal notes and classroom plans. The coding of data to identify emergent curriculum aspects was conducted, finding two aspects to be of most interest: actual curricular changes, and student adjustments to the changes. After the initial weeks, two other aspects were added to the analysis: physical environment changes, and teacher adjustments to the changes. The results are reported in those four categories across the "transitions": for the initial two weeks, weeks 3 to 6, weeks 7 to 12, and weeks 13 to 20. The movement from two separate classrooms with a wall between them to a single classroom "without walls" is discussed in terms of three goals of the project: giving students choices about their learning, exposing students to integrated learning, and teaching students to resolve everyday conflicts. The implications for teachers who wish to make such transitions are discussed in terms of the requisite planning.

* More Than Gentle Smiles and Warm Hugs: Applying the Ethic of Care to Early Childhood Education - Goldstein

This study is set within a framework of feminist moral theory regarding the "ethic of care." The author first provides an in-depth analysis of the difference between the commonly held understanding of "caring" that most early childhood educators might espouse, and the "ethic of care," which emphasizes the ethical, philosophical and experiential roots of such care concerns. This study uses a narrative methodology, which includes a detailed accounting of the routines and regular activities of a primary-grade teacher who exemplifies the ethic of care. The ensuing interpretive reconstruction of this teacher's practice reveals the "language of the classroom." The data sources included daily reflective discussions with the teacher (with journal field notes recorded by the researcher), a number of extended structured conversations with the teacher (some of which were transcribed) and the use of a dialogue journal in which the teacher and researcher exchanged ideas and thoughts. The analysis was ongoing throughout the field work period. The narrative describes morning meetings, activity time, and the relational web in which the teacher is embedded. The researcher discusses how this teacher exemplifies teaching as a relationship and concludes that the feminist interpretation of caring-as a deliberate moral and intellectual stance - provides a powerful construct for early childhood teachers.