Learning through Web Resuorces

NIEER (National Institute for Early Education Research) has a large variety of links and resources to help a person learn and stay up to date on what is happening in the field of early childhood.  With all the talk and debates regarding implementations of preschool programs nationwide, NIEER is a great site to help someone understand all that is happening.

While exploring this site I was introduced to another organization link, CEELO (Center on Enhancing Early Learning Outcomes) found at ww.ceelo.org. This organization helps to “strengthen the capacity of State Education Agencies (SEAs) to lead sustained improvements in early learning opportunities and outcomes”.  Their simple vision statement “Fostering sustainable change in state policy and practice for children birth to third grade” initially hooked me to this site, as this is my passion to help make changes in teaching practices in children through third grade.  I was amazed at the amount of information, research, and connectedness this website has to early education.  While they are closely connected with NIEER, there is a wealth of unique information on their site that I found myself spending hours reading.    

I took some additional time to research an area of the NIEER site related to current projects.  I was simply astounded at how many projects they are currently working on and how much research they really are putting into the early childhood field.  This gave me peace in knowing that there are more than just politicians and economist who are researching this field.  There are specialist with backgrounds in early childhood who are looking out for the best interests of our children and determining best practices that lead to desired outcomes.  They are researching policy, program evaluations, STEM, international programs, assessments and curriculum, and even specific state policies.  I felt this drive and passion to want to help in these research projects, to help bring to the world the knowledge and importance of early childhood education.

NIEER Research Professor Shannon Riley-Ayers recently presented at the SAAEYC conference and addressed the issue of formative assessments appropriate for young children.  NIEER posted an article as a follow up to her presentation called An Assessment Primer: What is effective assessment in the early childhood classroom? I have been reading, studying, and reflecting on the balance between assessments in young children, appropriateness of how assessments are administered, and deliberate practices that are used to teach desired outcomes assessments are measuring.  This information reconfirmed the understanding of why we assess young children, best practices in assessing, and how to use the information from the assessments.  I was so glad to read the importance of assessing young children against themselves rather than against other children their age.  This progress can be measured and tracked to see their own potential for growth and learning.

On April 4, 2014 NIEER produced the next newsletter, found at http://nieer.org/publications/online-newsletters/volume-13-issue-7 .  This newsletter contained many articles regarding the topics and progress for a universal preschool, children in poverty, and legislative debates.  Of interest to me this week was the article Children and Poverty: the Role of Preschool written by Senior Research Fellow Cynthia Lamy http://preschoolmatters.org/2014/04/03/children-and-poverty-the-role-of-preschool/ .  Lamy mentions that many early childhood professionals themselves do not recognize the long term extent and importance of the work they do with children.  Early childhood educators need to be better at understanding how to help families and children in poverty as they correlate with other community resources and provide a solid, high quality based educational opportunities.  The article asks us to develop stronger relationships, to be smarter about risk factors, and to be a voice in the community for help in expanded services and providing best practice.  This can lead to long term cost effective improvements for families and help fight poverty as we all do our part.

Overall, I realized that there is a large wealth of information available to learn more in the field of early childhood.  I realized that there are many people and organizations with experience, education, research, and expertise in the field that we can turn to for help and support.  As I write for grants and sponsorships to help the children in poverty that I serve, I have found many facts and research that will be helpful in providing information to help others understand what many early childhood professionals already know.