Contemporary Perspectives and Research on Early Childhood Education is a welcome addition to the field of early childhood education. This book enhances the understanding of different approaches to curriculum and instruction; appropriate assessment strategies; the role of math and science in children’s development; the importance of seeing the whole child and ensuring children develop holistically through play and arts; training effective teachers; and the importance of helping parents to be better supporters of their children. Along with this comprehensive content, the book also contains diverse methodologies including qualitative, quantitative and mixed-method approaches, which will further enrich the reader’s perspective and understanding of a wide range of topics in the field. Thus, this book creates a platform for researchers and practitioners to share and discuss research findings, expertise, and experiences about early childhood education.

Child care environments have received extensive research attention by those interested in understanding how participating in nonparental child care might influence the children's development and learning. Throughout the United States (US Census Bureau, 2011) and Europe (Organization for Economic Co-operation and Development, 2006) a large number of young children are cared for outside of the home by non-parental adults. Young children’s nonparental care is commonly referred to as "child care,” and is provided to children whose ages range from birth to 12 years of age. The provision of child care services has become an increasingly important part of early childhood education. In fact, the United Nations Children's Fund (2019) states that a large majority of children worldwide spend at least some of their week in child care, such arrangements include center care, family child care, in-home child care, relative child care, and supplemental child care. Child care researchers have been conducting studies to understand how participating in nonparental child care might influence the children's development and learning outcomes. There are more than enough child care studies to make numerous major inferences. For example, research outcomes show that child care quality seems to be more influential than either the kind of child care or age of admission in determining the children’s development and learning. The adults’ child care affects the quality in child care. In the environment adults who are caring for the children have the opportunity to effectively assume both nurturing and instructional roles to help young children cultivate their social and cognitive abilities. The teachers’ effectiveness is related to their individual characteristics, such as formal education, specialized training, and the classroom environment. However, the majority of the studies show that both family and quality of child care have the most significant effects on the children’s development and learning. Therefore, the concept of child care has heavily influenced modern views. Researchers, scholars, and educators are beginning to understand the current foundations based on theoretical frameworks that contribute to the purposes of the child care in the United States and Europe. The contents of the child care volume reflect the major shifts in the views of these early childhood researchers, scholars, and educators in relation to research outcomes on child care, its historical roots, the role of child care in early childhood education, and its relationship to theory, research, and practice.

Researchers, educators, professional organizations, administrators, parents, and policy makers have increased their involvement in the assessment and evaluation of early childhood education programs. This interest has developed swiftly during the last decades. The National Association for the Education of Young Children (NAEYC) and the National Association of Early Childhood Specialists in State Departments of Education (NAECS/SDE) developed a position statement titled, “Early childhood curriculum, assessment, and program evaluation: Building an effective, accountable system in programs for children birth through age 8,” to address related trends, issues, guiding principles, and values. Appropriate and well-designed evaluations need to address several audiences including researchers, educators, policy makers, children, and parents. They need to encourage the implementation of a strong foundation that improves the quality of the children’s education. Child assessment and program evaluation can lead to effective results and better accountability for preschool, kindergarten, and primary school programs. The purpose of this volume is to share a collection of research strands on contemporary perspectives on research in assessment and evaluation in early childhood education. It provides a review and critical analysis of the literature on assessment and evaluation of programs, children, teachers, and settings. The volume begins with a brief introductory chapter that presents the reader with a map of the area, laying out the issues and alternatives, and linking these to the chapters that follow. It addresses several areas including (1) understanding assessment and evaluation with young children, (2) schools and assessment implications, (3) teacher evaluation and professional development, (4) social relationships and assessment, (5) content areas in early education assessment, (6) technology and assessment, and (7) conclusion with future research directions in assessment and evaluation in early childhood education. The volume is of interest to researchers, educators, policy makers, university faculty, graduate students, and general readers who are interested in research on assessment and evaluation in early childhood education. The chapters are authored by established scholars in the field.

While the research on bullying and peer victimization has increased considerably over the past 20 years, a number of studies are emerging that document mixed results of bullying and prevention programs. During the last decades, several special issues devoted to research on bullying and victimization have been published in national and international scholarly journals. Based on the increase of published articles on bullying and victimization in journals, textbooks, government reports, and documents in professional organizations, it is timely for a special volume on research on bullying and victimization to appear in the series on Contemporary Perspectives in Early Childhood Education. The purpose of this volume is to share a collection of research strands on bullying and victimization of young children. It describes the historical roots and suggests anti?bullying programs and strategies to decrease bullying and victimization. The bullying and victimization volume can be a valuable tool to researchers who are conducting studies in that area. It focuses on important historical and contemporary issues on bullying and victimization in early childhood education (ages 0 to 8) to provide the information necessary to make judgments about these issues. It also motivates and guides researchers to explore gaps on research on bullying and victimization.

This book considers and interrogates a range of new and critical issues in contemporary early childhood education. It discusses both fundamental and emerging topics in the field, and presents them in the context of reflective and contemporary frameworks.

Child development “laboratory schools are dedicated to research-based instruction and furthering innovation in education. Many of these schools are connected to universities, where students are able to benefit from university resources and best practices” (Khan, 2014). They have been in existence on university campuses for centuries in the United States. The earliest colonial colleges (e.g., Harvard, Yale, William and Mary, University of Pennsylvania) administered Latin schools or departments to prepare students for college (Good & Teller, 1973). Rutgers Preparatory School was founded in 1768 and was linked to the university until the 1950s (Sperduto, 1967). During the course of time, the laboratory schools have changed to meet the needs of the teaching professionals and have frequently guided the instructional methods to improve the science and art of teaching [International Association of Laboratory Schools (IALS), 2018]. They have also changed throughout the years from part-day, part-time programs (McBride, 1996, Myers & Palmer, 2017) to full-day child care, some of which is inclusive of care offered through student service funds (Keyes, 1984; Shirah, 1988). Throughout the previous century, college and university institutions have established child development laboratory schools. In the early 1900s, they were initially considered to be sites for the recent discipline of child study but their purposes have progressed gradually. They also have assumed a fundamental function in promoting teaching, research, and service (such as outreach/engagement practice) in child development and early childhood education. However, a lot of them had to struggle for their survival when economic periods turned out to be problematic. Several extended operating programs were discontinued (Barbour & McBride, 2017). In 1894 John Dewey founded the University of Chicago Laboratory School. His laboratory school is unquestionably the most well-known of experimental schools. It was used to research, develop, and confirm innovative theories and principles of child development and education. Later at the beginning of the early 1900s, exemplary schools were developed as important centers for the preparation of teachers. Dewey’s laboratory school and the preparation of interns in a hospital were used as a model for laboratory schools to focus on methodical research, dual faculty university appointments, and the preparation of preservice teachers. During the initial half of the 20th century, laboratory schools increased in colleges and universities, especially between 1920 and 1940. University-based child development laboratory programs assumed a critical responsibility in contributing to the knowledge base on child development and early childhood education as well as the professional development of early childhood educators. This concept of the child development laboratory schools has heavily influenced modern views. Researchers and educators need to understand the current sources based on theoretical frameworks that contribute to the purposes of the child development laboratory schools. The contents of the volume reflect the major shifts in the views of early childhood researchers and educators in relation to the research on child development laboratory schools, the role of child development laboratory programs in early childhood education, and their relationship to theory, research, and practice. The chapters in this special volume reviews and critically analyzes the literature on several aspects of the child development laboratory schools. This volume can be a valuable tool to researchers who are conducting studies in the child development laboratory schools and practitioners who are working directly or indirectly in these schools. It focuses on important contemporary issues on child development laboratory schools in early childhood education (ages 0 to 8) to provide the information necessary to make judgments about these issues. It also motivates and guides researchers to explore gaps in the child development laboratory schools’ literature.

Social epistemology is a broad set of approaches to the study of knowledge and to gain information about the social dimensions. This intellectual movement of wide cross-disciplinary sources reconstructs the problems of epistemology when knowledge is considered to be intrinsically social. In the first chapter, "Social Epistemology and Social Learning," Olivia Saracho and Bernard Spodek discuss the social and historical contexts in which different forms of knowledge are formulated based on the perspective of social epistemology. They also discuss the emergence of social epistemology, which guides researchers to investigate social phenomena in laboratory and field settings. Social factors "external" to the appropriate business of science have a major impact in the social studies researchers’ historical case studies. Thus, social studies researchers may be considered social epistemologists, because (a) they focus on knowledge of social influences and (b) they infer epistemologically significant conclusions from their sociological or anthropological research. In addition, analyses indicate that studies of scientific paradigms are basically a struggle for political power rather than reflecting reliable epistemic merit. Social studies researchers focus on knowledge of social influences on knowledge, which is analogous to the knowledge of the social epistemologists. They also use their sociological or anthropological research to infer epistemologically significant conclusions.

Over the last 35 years, studies focusing in young children’s knowledge about the mental world have developed into an important area. This body of social knowledge is called theory of mind, which refers to the individuals’ ability to interpret and anticipate the other individuals’ thinking, feeling, and behavior based on their interpretation of the situation. Many researchers and theorists believe that a representational theory of mind offers a basis for various critical facets of social-cognitive performance, such as teaching and learning, lying and pretending, making and keeping friends, and social learning more generally. The purpose of this volume is to share a collection of research strands on theory of mind research. It describes its historical roots and suggests improved alternatives. The focus of the volume is to provide a review and critical analysis of the literature on a contemporary domain of knowledge on young children’s Theory of Mind. For several decades scholarly research on theory of mind has been flourishing and a collection of new publication outlets have emerged such as the ones reviewed in the volume, which offers a thorough critical analysis of the research in contemporary perspectives on research in theory of mind in early childhood education. The researchers who conducted the critical analyses of the reseearch focused on understanding the mind in relation to (1) young children, (2) several assessment procedures, (3) metacognitive and neuroscientific processes, (3) emotion and educational representations, (4) interaction of social and cultural elements, and (5) inferences and future research directions. The work of these scholars can help guide those researchers who are interested in pursuing studies in early childhood theory of mind in a specific area of study.

Researchers from different disciplines (e.g., physiological, psychological, philosophical) have investigated motivation using multiple approaches. For example, in physiology (the scientific study of the normal function in living systems such as biology), researchers may use “electrical and chemical stimulation of the brain, the recording of electrical brain-wave activity with the electroencephalograph, and lesion techniques, where a portion of the brain (usually of a laboratory animal) is destroyed and subsequent changes in motivation are noted” (Petri & Cofer, 2017). Physiological studies mainly conducted with animals, other than humans, have revealed the significance of particular brain structures in the control of fundamental motives such as hunger, thirst, sex, aggression, and fear. In psychology, researchers may study the individuals’ behaviors to understand their actions. In sociology, researchers may examine how individuals’ interactions influence their behavior. For instance, in the classroom students and teachers behave in expected ways, which may differ when they are outside the classroom. Saracho (2003) examined the students’ academic achievement when they matched or mismatched their teachers’ way of thinking. She identified both the teachers and students individual differences and defined consistencies in their cognitive processes. In philosophy, researchers can study the individuals’ theoretical position such as supporting Maslow’s (1943) concept that motivation can create behaviors that augments motivation in the future. Abraham H. Maslow’s theory of self-actualization supports this theoretical position (Petri & Cofer, 2017). These areas and others are represented in this volume. This volume is devoted to understanding mutual and contemporary themes in the individuals’ motivation and its relationship to cognition. The current literature covers several methods to the multifaceted relationships between motivational and cognitive processes. Comprehensive reviews of the literature focus on prominent cognitive perspectives on motivation with young children, which includes ages from birth to eight years of age. The chapters in this special volume review and critically analyze the literature on several aspects of the relationships between motivational and cognitive processes and demonstrates the breadth and theoretical effectiveness of this domain. This brief introduction acknowledges the valuable contributions of these chapters to the study of human motivation. This volume can be a valuable tool to researchers who are conducting studies in the motivation field. It focuses on important contemporary issues on motivation in early childhood education (ages 0 to 8) to provide the information necessary to make judgments about these issues. It also motivates and guides researchers to explore gaps in the motivation literature.

Recently, a new understanding of creative thought and creative performance has surfaced. It has also attracted the attention of early childhood professional organizations and researchers. Professional organizations have included it in their publications and conferences. While current creativity researchers have initiated a far more sophisticated understanding of young children’s creative thinking, ways to assess creativity, strategies to promote creativity, and research methodologies. The purpose of this volume is to present a wide range of different theories and areas in the study of creativity to help researchers and theorists work toward the development of different perspectives on creativity with young children. It focuses on critical analyses and reviews of the literature on topics related to creativity research, development, theories, and practices. It will serve as a reference for early childhood education researchers, scholars, academics, general educators, teacher educators, teachers, graduate students, and scientists to stimulate further “dialogue” on ways to enhance creativity. The chapters are of high quality and provide scholarly analyses of research studies that capture the full range of approaches to the study of creativity --- behavioral, clinical, cognitive, cross-cultural, developmental, educational, genetic, organizational, psychoanalytic, psychometric, and social. Interdisciplinary research is also included, as is research within specific domains such as art and science, as well as on critical issues (e.g., aesthetics, genius, imagery, imagination, insight, intuition, metaphor, play, problem finding and solving). Thus, it offers critical analyses on reviews of research in a form that are useful to early childhood researchers, scholars, educators, and graduate students. It also places the current research in its historical context. The volume is also of interest to the general readers who are interested in the young children’s creativity. The chapters are authored by established scholars in the field of young children’s creativity.