Synopses & Reviews
This is the most interesting, comprehensive, and practical educator resource available today for working with families. Designed for students in community colleges and four-year programs and teachers/administrators who work with children of all ages. HOME, SCHOOL AND COMMUNITY RELATIONS is a core course in an Early Childhood Education curriculum. Sometimes called Child, Family, and Community, the course includes coverage of: children's learning and behavior viewpoints, and how they are affected by family members of the immediate and larger community; evolution of the role played by home, school, and community on the child's life; the demographics and the diverse nature of families in the U.S. today; features of the community; and parent involvement. Annual enrollments in the course and current Cengage market share. Include both total enrollment and percentage of market targeted to determine true potential market share. (Include source of estimate.) Over 120,000 students enroll in early childhood education annually. The early childhood education two-year market size consists of approximately 80,000 students obtaining an AA degree or AS degree in ECE from one of the 687 early childhood education programs. ECE four-year programs consist of approximately 40,000 students obtaining a bachelor degree from one of the 884 four-year programs. Due to the increasing demands for quality child care providers, enrollments for early childhood education continue to increase.
Review
"Easy to follow the progression of information in the chapters. Excellent supplemental resources. Easily read and understood by students ..."
Review
"The greatest strengths are comprehensive coverage, up-to-date material, relevant research, state-of-the-art organization, complete bibliographies, relevance to our present day challenges in education, reflective of parents', students' and teachers' concerns, and specific case studies related to parents' problems."
Review
"The organization of the material is very easy to work with. By addressing families and parenting at the beginning, the text creates the opportunity for a course to be child-centered, beginning with a look at those surrounding the child and affecting the child most intimately."
Synopsis
This practical text is designed to meet the needs of administrators, as well as current and practicing teachers across all grade levels who are trying to create effective partnerships with families. It provides an overview of modern families and their complex roles, to sensitize teachers to the diversity and needs of families they will encounter. The text fully discusses both the benefits of creating productive partnerships and the barriers that teachers must work beyond. Practical and effective communication strategies are described, with abundant examples. Emphasis is placed on current developments in the field of early childhood education, legislative mandates in education, and position statements from professional organizations. A discussion of No Child Left Behind and updated NAEYC Code of Ethics accreditation standards for programs and for teacher education supports this emphasis.
About the Author
Carol Gestwicki was an instructor in the early childhood education program at Central Piedmont Community College in Charlotte, North Carolina, for over 30 years. Her teaching responsibilities have included supervising students in classroom situations as they work with families. Earlier in her career, she worked with children and families in a variety of community agencies and schools in Toronto, New York, New Jersey, and Namibia (South West Africa). She received her MA from Drew University. She has been an active member of the NAEYC for many years, including making numerous presentations at state and national conferences. She has been a Fellow in the Early Childhood Leadership Development Project at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, and she has been associated with the T.E.A.C.H. Model/Mentor program. Her other publications include more than two dozen articles about child development and family issues and scripts and design for 14 audiovisual instructional programs. She has three other books on topics in early education published by Delmar Learning: Developmentally Appropriate Practice: Curriculum and Development in Early Education, Fifth edition (2013); Essentials of Early Education (1997); and Authentic Childhood: Exploring Reggio Emilia in the Classroom (2002). Currently, she writes a regular column titled "Grandma Says" for Growing Child.
Table of Contents
Section I: INTRODUCTION TO FAMILIES. 1. A Day with Two Families: Diversity of Experience. 2. Families Today. 3. Parenting. Section II: TEACHER-FAMILY PARTNERSHIPS IN EARLY EDUCATION. 4. What Is Family Involvement? 5. Benefits of Teacher-Family Partnerships for Children, Parents, and Teachers. 6. Potential Barriers to Teacher-Family Partnerships. 7. Foundations of a Successful Partnership. Section III: METHODS FOR DEVELOPING PARTNERSHIPS. 8. At the Beginning with Parents and Children. 9. Informal Communication with Families. 10. Parent-Teacher Conferences. 11. Home Visits with Parents and Children. 12. Families in the Classroom. 13. Parent Education. 14. It Takes a Village: Teachers, Families, and Communities. Section IV: MAKING A PARTNERSHIP WORK. 15. Working with Families from Diverse Backgrounds. 16. Working with Families in Particular Circumstances. 17. Working to Resolve Challenging Attitudes and Behaviors.