This investigation is concerned with determining the extent of inservice education provided for special education personnel by the five pilot programs of Plan A. The two methods of determining this involvement are a case study of the pilot programs' inservice education and its relationship to resource agencies such as the Texas Education Agency and Regional Education Service Centers. The purposes of this study include the following: (1) determining the principles underlying the philosophy formulated by school district personnel in regard to the nature and purpose of inservice training for Plan A, (2) identifying the nature, scope, and assessment of a three-year period of inservice education for the pilot Plan A programs, (3) identifying the successful components of and the problems encountered during the three-year period of inservice education, and (4) describing recommendations for future inservice education. Only the five pilot districts are described in the case studies of Plan A programs. Data is reported in the following sequence for each of the pilot districts: background information; philosophy and goals; pre-, in-, and post-service activities for 1970-1971, 1971-1972, and proposals for inservice education for 1972-1973. Also reported is information concerning the role of the Texas Education Agency and the Regional Education …

The problem of this investigation is a case study of parental involvement in the initial Plan A public school districts in Texas. The components of parental involvement isolated for the study are parent education, parent participation, and parent counseling. The major sources of data are questionnaires distributed to parents, teachers, and administrators in the initial Plan A public school districts. Secondary sources of data include interviews with the three categories of respondents to the questionnaires, communication and correspondence with the Regional Education Service Centers, and correspondence and reports from the Texas Education Agency concerning parental involvement. The purposes of the case study of parental involvement are (1) to analyze the various approaches to provide parent education services in the selected Plan A programs, (2) to analyze the various types of parent participation in the initial Plan A programs, (3) to analyze the existing and projected needs for parent counseling in Plan A, (4) to summarize findings into recommendations for effective parental involvement strategies in future implementations of Plan A in Texas, and (5) to suggest modifications or to raise questions for further investigation.

The history of day care licensing standards in Texas was traced from the beginnings in voluntary welfare organizations to the 1976 revisions. The jurisdictional foundations of day care licensing was presented in a summary of the related legislation passed in Texas during the years from 1848 to 1975. Categories of licensing requirements in the different sets of standards promulgated in Texas were compared. The attempt was made to derive a contextual milieu of social, political and educational factors which influenced Texas day care legislation and the development of licensing standards. It was recommended that funds are essential to adequate enforcement of licensing standards. In addition, to facilitate acculturation of day care licensing, consultation and training efforts should expand proportionately to the expansion of day care. The fact that issues related to specific requirements surfaced repeatedly in the different decades studied, a need for carefully controlled research to validate the individual requirements was indicated.

The purposes of this study were to explore the leadership styles and personality types of Texas elementary administrators. The Leader Effectiveness and Adaptability Description-Self (LEAD-Self) assessed the leadership style and adaptability of the administrators. The four identified styles were Telling/Directing, Selling/Coaching, Participating/Supporting, and Delegating. The MBTI measured 16 combinations of 4 personality types which included Extrovert or Introvert, Sensing or Intuition, Thinking or Feeling, and Judging or Perceiving. The sample was 200 Texas elementary administrators: 100 with early childhood certification and 100 without early childhood certification. A chi-square test of independence was utilized. Findings included: (a) A majority of Texas elementary administrators in both groups had a Selling/Coaching or Participating/Supporting leadership style; (b) Leadership adaptability scores of both groups were equivalent; (c) Most Texas elementary administrators had Introvert/Sensing/Thinking/Judging and Extrovert/Sensing/Thinking/Judging personality types; (d) Administrators with early childhood certification had a higher percentage of Intuitive personality types, while administrators without early childhood certification had a predominance of Sensing types; (e) A large percentage of administrators which had Participating/Supporting leadership styles had Feeling personality types; (f) No significant relationship between leadership styles and personality types was found in either group; and (g) No significant relationship between leadership adaptability and personality types was …

This study investigated the impact of the years of teaching experience of classroom teachers on the achievement of third-grade students in inner-city Title I Schools; on the achievement of those third-grade students who were defined as high achievers, average achievers, and low achievers; and on the achievement of boys and girls in the third grade of inner-city Title I schools. An analysis and interpretation of the data revealed that there were no significant differences in reading and mathematics achievement of the third-grade students when the number of years of experience of the teacher was examined. Reading achievement of third-grade boys and third-grade girls did show significant differences. The more-experienced teacher appeared to have the greater increase in reading scores of the students. In addition to data concerning the hypotheses, information about other teacher variables was collected through a teacher self-report questionnaire. One hundred per cent of the teachers in the participating schools responded to the questionnaire. Data were tabulated by frequency of response in groups according to years of teacher experience. Variables included years of teaching experience in Title I schools, classroom size, and demographic data. Analysis of the data indicated that teachers having more years of experience in Title …

This study is concerned with the problem of determining the competencies which inservice kindergarten teachers and kindergarten-teacher trainers consider most important for teaching kindergarten. There are four purposes of the study: to identify specific competencies needed to teach kindergarten, to determine the teacher competencies considered most important by kindergarten teachers, to determine teacher competencies considered most important by teacher trainers, and to compare the rankings of teacher competencies by kindergarten teachers and kindergarten-teacher trainers.

The purposes of this study were to identify the teaching concerns expressed in their early years of teaching by the graduates of the Early Childhood Education program in a church related teacher education institution, and to determine the relationship between teaching concerns and the variables of years of teaching experience and grade level taught.

This study investigates differences in academic achievement and self-concept of students enrolled in a traditional public school program and a public school Montessori program. The attitudes of parents of students are also compared. The population includes 182 experimental and control kindergarten, first-, second-, and third-grade students in a Texas metropolitan school district.

This study measured the resistance to temptation of five-year-old children as related to their sex, Sunday school attendance, and mothers' working status; analyzed the mothers' parenting attitudes as influenced by work, church attendance, and family structure; and examined relationships between children's resistance to temptation and mothers' parenting attitudes.

The problem with which this investigation was concerned was that of surveying the attitudes of parents, teachers, and principals toward parental involvement in school activities. The study had a threefold purpose. The first was to determine the attitudes of parents toward involvement in school activities. The second was to determine the attitudes of teachers and principals toward parental involvement in schools. The third was to identify attitudes of parents, teachers, and principals toward various methods of involvement.

This study investigated the role of the public library in serving children from infancy to age six. The purposes of this research were to obtain recommendations from early childhood education authorities pertaining to the areas of services, programs, materials, physical facilities, and personnel and to utilize these data in the development of guidelines for public libraries. Findings revealed that the majority recommended utilization of volunteers and of early childhood education consultant; preparation of children's librarians in working with adults and young children; provision of services and programs focusing on parent education, led by specialists; preparation of child care personnel in storytelling; programs involving parent and child participation; coordination of public library efforts with those of other community agencies in order to avoid duplication; and services, programs, materials, and physical facilities which facilitate and encourage interest in books and which relate to reading. The minority recommended services, materials, and physical facilities which focus on unstructured recreational play; and services, programs, and materials which focus on formal teaching or testing in cognitive areas.

This study investigates the differences in receptive language of kindergarten children who are taught by different language systems. This study compares the effectiveness of the three most widely adopted oral language systems in the state of Texas. The systems used were (A) Alpha Time, (B) Beginning Readiness Kit; Beginning to Read, Write, and Listen Kits I and II, and (c) McMillan Series R, Bank Street, Threshold K. S. Analysis of variance techniques were used to analyze statistically pretest and posttest scores derived from the sample. The .05 level of significance was used throughout the statistical analyses for rejection or retention of the null hypotheses. Preliminary analysis of data determined no systematic bias for teacher variability or for within group variability. Hypotheses 1, 2, 3, and 5 were tested using a 2 x 3 analysis of covariance. The pretest was used as the covariant in this analysis. No statistically significant differences in the classroom mean scores were determined between teaching methods, teaching methods with only girls as subjects, teaching methods with only boys as subjects, and boys and girls. Hypothesis 4, concerning the pretest differences between boys and girls, was tested using a t-test for independent samples. No statistically significant differences …

The purposes of this study were to compare the childrearing attitudes of church-related Korean American immigrant parents and Korean parents as measured by the Parent As A Teacher Inventory (PAAT), and to identify relationships between the PAAT childrearing subsets and demographic variables including sex of child, sex of parent, education of parent, family income level, maternal employment, accessibility to the child, language of parent, and length of residence in America.

Much of the current discourse surrounding the practice of early reading has emerged from policies that dictate the definition and means by which reading is taught and by which reading success is measured. Although this discourse directly influences the work of preschool teachers, little is known about what preschool teachers think about early reading and how they develop these understandings or constructions. Research concerning preschool teachers’ constructions is useful because of the potential influence on teachers' decisions and classroom behaviors. The purpose of this study is to better understand preschool teachers’ constructions concerning early reading and the process of learning to read. Six preschool teachers, with a variety of personal, educational, and professional experiences, from four diverse early childhood programs in the North Texas area were interviewed over a nine-month period during which each participant was interviewed for approximately three hours. Through systematic, inductive analysis, three themes were identified under an overarching theme of the interdependent and relational nature of early reading influences: out-of-school interactions, in-school interactions, and interactions with text. Without exception, these teachers referred to their life experiences as influencing their approach to teaching in general and to teaching reading in particular. The goals these preschool teachers had …

The purposes of this study were to determine the effect of a short-term parent-education program and to investigate the relationship between parents' knowledge of child development and parents' attitudes toward parent-child relationships. The basic problem under consideration was to assay whether the level of parental knowledge of child development principles makes a difference in the attitudes of the parent in the relationship. Hypothesis I predicted that subjects participating in the training sessions would exhibit a significant gain in knowledge of child development. An analysis of covariance determined the gain to be significant at the .01 level. Hypothesis II stated that a significant relationship would exist between the subjects' knowledge of the defined principles of child development and the subjects' attitudes toward parent-child interactions. A Pearson Product-Moment Correlation of the scores of experimental group and control group on the PARI and the cognitive test revealed a negative correlation of -0.1363. Thus, the second hypothesis that a significant relationship would exist had to be rejected. Hypothesis III projected that a significant difference would exist between the posttest attitudes of the participants of the experimental group and those of the control group. Analysis of covariance was used to determine the significance of the …

The problem of this study was to measure the effectiveness of a public school Montessori program. The purpose of this study was to measure and compare student academic achievement and self-concept, attendance and promotion rates, and level of parental involvement in the schools of students enrolled in public school Montessori and traditional programs. The 95 subjects in this study were third-grade subjects selected from the student populations in Montessori and traditional school sites. The Iowa Test of Basic Skills (ITBS) was used as the pre-test scores, and the Norm-referenced Assessment Program for Texas (NAPT) was used as the post-test scores to compare academic achievement in reading and mathematics. Multiple regression was used to compare the levels of academic achievement and self-concept. Multiple regression was also used to test for possible relationship between the Montessori and traditional programs and gender and ethnicity.

The intent of this study was to determine what understanding and knowledge parents had of developmentally appropriate practice (DAP). The study examined whether the beliefs of parents who enrolled their children in a National Association for the Education of Young Children (NAEYC) accredited program had any impact on their expectations for a philosophy and curriculum that is centered around DAP. In addition, the study examined whether parents' understanding of DAP changed when their children transitioned from infant and toddler programs, to preschool. The study group consisted of parents with children in two privately owned NAEYC accredited centers in 1998 (N=131). Results from parent reports indicated a high level of parent knowledge regarding DAP.

The problem of this study was to describe, analyze, and compare the effects of learning centers and curricular themes upon the writing production of four children within a kindergarten classroom which followed the whole language approach. This study was conducted in a public school. Four subjects were identified from the administration of the Book Handling Knowledge Task. Using the qualitative research method of case studies, the teacher-researcher kept observational notes concerning the writing behavior of the subjects. The written compositions of the subjects were collected daily throughout the school year and were assigned a context, learning center and curricular theme. The compositions were then coded as to writing frequency, function, and form. The following findings resulted from the study: writing occurred most frequently in the art center followed by dramatic play, language, sand, science, social studies, "other," eyes and hands, mathematics, and library-listening; writing occurred most frequently during the curricular theme of Christmas followed by self-concept, shapes and colors, farm animals, Thanksgiving, Winter, transportation, nursery rhymes, patriotic, Valentine, food and nutrition, Halloween, Spring, wild animals, community helpers, gingerbread man, Summer, Easter, and pets; all five functions of language were used in the art center, four in the language, dramatic play, …

The primary purpose of this study was to determine if the implementation of an intervention involving teachers' use of children's literature, related storybook manipulatives, and a scaffolding (LMS) approach to learning would improve preschool children's mathematics test scores. Additionally, the LMS approach was examined to determine whether teachers' perceptions of their effectiveness in mathematics instruction changed from the beginning to the end of the study. The subjects of the study included 60 preschool-aged children and six teachers from two child care centers. The preschool teachers participated in either a control or experimental condition (the LMS approach) in their daily mathematics instruction with their preschool children. The researcher tested the children using the Test of Early Mathematics Ability and an abbreviated version of the Stanford-Binet Intelligence Scale. The study was based on two main research questions. The first question asked if there was a difference in the Test of Early Mathematics Ability total posttest scores between children in the literature-manipulatives-scaffolding intervention group and children in the control group after assuring equivalency of the two groups. The second question addressed if preschool teachers believed they were more effective in their mathematics instruction after implementing the LMS approach with young children. The answer …

Many children in the United States cannot read on level by fourth grade. Traditionally, teachers have delayed reading instruction until first grade. However, involving children sooner in literary activities may provide skills needed to enable them to read on grade level. The purpose for this study was to determine the extent to which daily writing in kindergarten influences the development of invented spelling and learning to read. Five teachers modeled writing with 78 kindergarten children who wrote every day or almost every day for 20 weeks. There were 51 children in an experimental group, and 27 in a control group who were given a pretest and a posttest using the Observation Study (Clay, 1993). Results from a mixed model ANOVA indicated a significant difference between the control group and the experimental group on the Dictation Task F (1, 76) = 11.76, P≤ .001 and the Writing Test F (1, 76) = 4.33, P≤ .01. Results from a z-Test of dependent proportions indicated there were significant differences in the reading levels of the control group from the pretest to the posttest (z = 7.51, P ≥ .05) because (z = 7.51, Zcv = 1.96). The experimental group results from pretest to …

Because of shifting demographics, the Taiwanese government opened the country to immigrants from Southeast Asia. Foreign-born brides of Taiwanese men have contributed significantly to this trend of new immigration, inspiring fears that their children, inadequately prepared for the literacy requirements of early education, might negatively impact the educational system and society. to better understand the socio-political implications of this cultural shift, the researcher gathered data from one hundred and twenty immigrant and native families with first graders in six major cities in Taiwan. Purposes of this research are to: (a) investigate to what extent, if any parenting style is impacted by differences in immigration status between native Taiwanese and Southeast Asian immigrant mothers, (b) examine to what extent, if any maternal parenting styles relate to children’s early literacy, and (c) determine to what extent, if any maternal parenting styles along with the children’s and familial characteristics associate with children’s early literacy. the study found that (a) immigrant mothers are statistically lower on authoritative and higher on permissive parenting style than native mothers; (b) immigrant mothers’ participation in integration programs does not relate to maternal parenting styles or children’s literacy performances; (c) children from immigrant families are significantly lower than their …

This study employed a pretest/posttest control group design to investigate the achievement of second grade Hispanic students from a predominantly low socio-economic school in a large metropolitan city. The thirty Hispanic students with the lowest scores on the Gates MacGinitie Reading Test were randomly assigned to the experimental group (n =15) or the control group (n=15). The treatment consisted of 16, 30-minute sessions of play intervention--2 times per week for 8 weeks. The providers of play therapy were school personnel trained in the principles of child-centered play therapy including tracking, reflecting feelings, and setting limits. Instruments were administered to all subjects prior to the 8 week treatment period and in the two-week period following treatment and included the GMRT, the Joseph Pre-School Primary Self-Concept Test (JPPSCST) and the Child Behavior Checklist Teacher Report Form (CBCTRF). Statistical analyses included a (t-test; 2 tail; p > .05), discriminant analysis, and cross validation. The results indicated that children who received play therapy did not achieve notably higher mean scores in reading. However, play therapy did improve the experimental group's self-concept scores and their internal behavior scores, though not significantly. All differences between the experimental and the control groups were within 1 point except …

Interactional and contextual models have been conceptually proposed in understanding parental influences on children. Yet, empirical model testing has been limited. The purpose of this exploratory study was to investigate the direct and indirect effects of parenting style on child social competence using structural equation modeling in a sample of 544 Chinese families with 6-9 years old children, mainly singleton, residing in Nanjing, China. Five latent models were tested: (a) the direct model between parenting style and child social competence, (b) child temperament as a moderator, (c) parent-child relationship as a mediator, (d) the interaction model between parenting style and family functioning, and (e) bidirectional models of parenting style concurrently with parent-child relationship, and family functioning predicting child social competence. Findings showed: (a) The direct relationship between parenting style and child social competence was significant in both parents with authoritative parenting style on the positive direction, whereas authoritarian and permissive parenting styles on the negative direction; (b) child temperament did not moderate parenting style on child social competence; (c) father-child relationship mediated paternal parenting style on child social competence, whereas maternal parenting style did not; (d) family functioning neither moderated nor mediated the relationship between parenting style and child social …