These pictures remind me of the observations that I conducted in the preschools and daycares over the past 5 weeks. The most exciting thing about these photos is that kids are learning and playing in a safe learning environment. These kids demonstrate and promote positive social skills, interactions and cooperative play....something we all learned about in the Early Childhood Development course. All professionals and parents should continue to work together to create productive and safe environments for our children to play in!

Inspirational Quotes

Your children need your presence more than your
presents.

                                                    Anonymous

Children need love, especially when they "do not deserve" it.

                                                ~ Harold Hulbert

This Video Will Assist Toddlers In Learning Numbers

This following video is a numbers song to the ten little tune. It's designed to help children learn the names and the spelling of numbers. This has been arranged and performed by A.J. Jenkins.

After receiving many views and likes on Youtube, here is what some viewers thought about this song.

Lori says:  "My grandchild of two months could not take his eyes off this , he is now one and he still cannot take his eyes off it, he is also trying to sing it now."

Shannon says "My two granddaughters also love it ( and all your great songs)I have put some on my mobile and if they start crying or are bored I put it on for them , they stop crying immediately. Thank you so much."

Kimberly says "my 2 yrs and 5 months old daughter loves to watch your songs even if she doesn't speak english yet :) Very nice, I like it too!"

Janet says "My 18 month old son loves watching your videos. At the end of the video he says again which means he wants to watch it again. Keep up the good work:)"

Assessments in Hong Kong

The amazing fact about children is that they learn in different ways. Some children are visual learners while others learn best by listening. For this reason, I believe that children should be assessed in any area that shows evidence of learning. I agree with Howard Gardner's theory that there are at least 7 multiple intelligences. Children should be assessed Linguistically, Intrapersonally, Interpersonally and Mathematically. When children are assessed in any area, it is important that the area is one that can be used in real life situations. It has to be meaningful.

Vygotsky speculated that parents play an important role in the intellectual development of their children, and that this role includes the transfer of expectations related to their children's academic achievement. Consequently, different parents can produce different contexts of academic achievement for their children. The participants were 215 Primary 5 and 6 students from four primary schools in Hong Kong, and their parents. Students were administered a test of working memory and their academic achievement was indicated by their school-assessed mathematics and language achievement scores.  Parents reported their expectations of their children's academic achievement, the extent of their home and school environment, and their educational and income levels. Correlational and sequential regression analyses showed that different schools yielded different contexts of academic achievement. The results support the hypothesis that parents, and especially parental expectations, play an important role in children's academic achievement, and that within Hong Kong different schools can be characterized by different contexts of achievement.

References

Phillipson, Sivanes. (2009). Context of Academic Achievement: Lessons from Hong Kong. Educational Psychology, v29n4p447-468