Posts

Scale-up of Early Childhood Programs Must Be Informed by Research to Benefit Kids

By Maggie C. Kane, Reprinted from Child Trends Evidence-based early childhood programs such as prekindergarten, home visiting, and child care have the potential to change children’s lives and trajectories. Commonly cited research also estimates a return on investment of 7 to 13 percent for early childhood programs. However, challenges with scaling up these programs from […]

Sound it Out’s Caregiver Guide (Part 1): Understand

Reprinted from Sound it Out 1. What do we mean by emotional wellbeing? We refer to emotional wellbeing as the full range of a kid’s emotions, behavior, ideas, and relationships. When you think about it, your emotional wellbeing is comparable to that of your physical wellbeing, where the healthy side of the spectrum means your body […]

How Racism Can Affect Child Development

Reprinted from the Center on the Developing Child, Harvard University  Years of scientific study have shown us that, when children’s stress response systems remain activated at high levels for long periods, it can have a significant wear-and-tear effect on their developing brains and other biological systems. This can have lifelong effects on learning, behavior, and […]

How to Help Families and Staff Build Resilience During the COVID-19 Outbreak

Reprinted from The Center on the Developing Child at Harvard University The worldwide outbreak of the coronavirus disease (COVID-19) is a source of unexpected stress and adversity for many people. Resilience can help us get through and overcome hardship. But resilience is not something we’re born with—it’s built over time as the experiences we have interact […]

How you should support a mentee might depend on their age

Yu, M. V. B., & Deutsch, N. L. (2019). Aligning social support to youth’s developmental needs: The role of nonparental youth–adult relationships in early and late adolescence. Applied Developmental Science, 1–17. https://doi.org/10.1080/10888691.2018.1548940 Summarized by Ariel Ervin Notes of Interest:  Although research indicates that important relationships between youth and non-parental adult figures are effective for positive […]

Our developing understanding of child development: A new video on the effects of toxic stress

Written by Justin Preston In a new animated short from the Atlantic, we learn a bit about the progress we’ve made in gaining a better understanding of child development. More specifically, we learn about the impacts of toxic stress on the developing brain and, subsequently, the developing child (for more on toxic stress, see our […]

Eight Things to Remember about Child Development

Originally Posted by Harvard’s Center on the Developing Child Building on a well-established knowledge base more than half a century in the making, recent advances in the science of early childhood development and its underlying biology provide a deeper understanding that can inform and improve existing policy and practice, as well as help generate new […]

Teens get them talking: The results of an evaluation of the Teens and Toddlers program

Humphrey, K. & Olivier, A. (2014). Investigating the impact of teenage mentors on pre-school children’s development: A comparison using control groups. Children and Youth Services Review, 44, 20-24. Summarized by Jessica Cunningham     Background: Research has shown that engaging in play is one of the most important skills for toddlers to learn, as most […]

Child Trends: Five ways trauma-informed care supports children’s development

Child Trends Contributors: Jessica Dym Bartlett, Kristin Anderson Moore, April Wilson, and Zakia Redd Childhood trauma is common. More than two thirds of children in the United States experience a traumatic event or circumstances—such as abuse or neglect, death of a loved one, or community violence—by the time they turn 16. Young children (birth to […]

Two Days Later: Adolescents’ Conflicts With Family Spill Over to School, Vice Versa

Summarized from Child Development, Family Conflict, Mood, and Adolescents’ Daily School Problems: Moderating Roles of Internalizing and Externalizing Symptoms by Timmons, AC, and Margolin, G (University of Southern California). Copyright 2014 The Society for Research in Child Development, Inc. All rights reserved. The lives of adolescents at home and at school may seem quite separate, […]