A child’s teacher not only helps them learn the A, B, Cs – but can also be key in supporting a child’s early skills and development.
To increase the odds for later-life success, College of Public Health and Human Sciences’ early childhood researchers have developed a workshop focused on the importance of children’s early self-regulation throughout childhood and into adulthood.
Led by the college’s Hallie E. Ford Center for Healthy Children and Families Professor Megan McClelland and the Kindergarten Readiness Research Team at Oregon State, the free workshop in May provided local preschool and kindergarten teachers with tools needed to optimize children’s early school success.
Using data from a five-year project funded through the U.S. Department of Education Institute for Education Sciences that studied more than 560 children and their parents and 125 teachers in preschools and kindergartens, Megan and her team held the workshop to disseminate some of the findings from the study.
Participants learned about school readiness, what predicts school success and how to promote self-regulation and success in the classroom.
“In addition to learning about school readiness, we hope that these workshops will provide an opportunity for preschool and kindergarten teachers to connect and discuss strategies for promoting school readiness during this critical developmental period for children,” she says.
The workshop, developed as community-based professional development training, was also a way for the Kindergarten Readiness Research Team to connect with teachers and learn from them.
“We hope to continue to build strong relationships with teachers by sharing our results and utilizing their input for future work,” Megan says.
After spending several years collecting data and working with children in nearly 150 classrooms at 49 schools, the workshop “How to Optimize Children’s Early School Success” is the first step in sharing the researchers’ work with the community.
They plan to continue this series of workshops in Fall 2014.
“We are very excited to be entering this phase in the project because it is an opportunity to translate the research and make a difference in classrooms, schools and the community,” she says.
To find out more about this workshop, please email kreadiness@oregonstate.edu.