Early Childhood Education

This document describes specific learning and development standards for four-year-olds in the areas of reading, mathematics, science, history and social science, health and physical development, personal and social development, music and visual arts.

This guidance document is designed to assist Virginia’s school divisions and early childhood communities in identifying, developing and sustaining inclusive opportunities within high-quality, early childhood programs for children with disabilities

This document is designed for adults who teach and care for young children in a variety of settings including home-based child care, center-based child care, Head Start classrooms, early intervention programs, private preschools, public early childhood programs, and Virginia Preschool Initiative (VPI) classes.

The Maryland State Department of Education (MSDE) has established a number of early childhood initiatives promoting best practices in early pedagogy in support of Maryland school reform efforts. Includes Maryland Model for School Readiness, Standard and Instruction Toolkit, Common Core Standards.

The MSDE, Division of Early Intervention/Special Education Services has established partnerships to support the mission of access, equity, and progress for students with disabilities across a continuum of services and programs, with a focus to elevate performance and narrow the existing achievement gap.

Provides common goals for how parents, teachers, and early childhood education providers can support young children's learning.

The early learning standards define the key aspects of development and learning that are the foundation for a child’s school and life-long success. While the progress of children toward the standards will vary depending on a number of factors, the standards act as a guide for educational and programmatic decisions by child care providers, PRE-K-Grade 2 teachers, and public school administrators.

The District of Columbia Early Learning Standards include indicators for infants, toddlers, two-year-olds and preschoolers, as well as exit expectations for children leaving pre-K and kindergarten. These standards provide parents and teachers with information about expectations for what children know and be able to do and describe how children progress at various ages and development levels. They focus on the whole child and include a broad range of domains because young children’s learning and development are interrelated and cross all areas of learning.

The standards or learning criteria are organized into several domains. For children ages three to five, the categories are: Approaches to Learning, Social and Emotional Development, Physical Development including Health and Safety, Language and Literacy, Mathematical Thinking, Scientific Inquiry, Social Studies, and Creative Arts.

The Early Learning Standards include alignment with the Common Core State Standards for English Language Arts and Mathematics (2010) as well as the Next Generation Science Standards (2013). The standards are also aligned with the Head Start Early Learning Outcomes Framework: Ages Birth to Five (2015), thus ensuring that all children receive the same standards-based instruction and appropriate learning experiences regardless of program auspices.

Addresses the following ECE strands: language development,beginning reading, informational text, literary text, research, writing, and English language conventions

NAEYC has set 10 standards for early childhood programs that can help families make the right choice when they are looking for a child care center, preschool, or kindergarten. The standards and criteria are also the foundation of the NAEYC Accreditation system for early childhood programs. To earn accreditation, programs must meet all 10 standards.

Children Now takes a whole-child approach, covering the full-range of key children’s issues, from prenatal through age 26, including early childhood development, education, children’s health, childhood trauma and resilience, foster care, and youth justice.

The DEC Recommended Practices were developed to provide guidance to practitioners and families about the most effective ways to improve the learning outcomes and promote the development of young children, birth through age 5, who have or are at-risk for developmental delays or disabilities. The purpose is to help bridge the gap between research and practice by highlighting those practices that have been shown to result in better outcomes for young children with disabilities, their families, and the personnel who serve them.

Contains program performance standards Parts 1301-1305 dealing with governance, operations, financial and administrative requirement, federal administrative procedures and definitions.

Represent the first standards to focus specifically on the preparation of professionals who work with young children ages birth through 8 who have or are at-risk for developmental delays and disabilities and their families, across home, classroom and community settings.

Designed to help educators and administrators think through options, opportunities, & trade-offs as you support children and families

The National Pre-K and Early Learning Evaluation Center provides: 1) Assistance with designing and implementing pre-k and early learning programs; 2) Evaluation services for states and federally funded pre-k and early learning programs; 3) Dissemination of evaluation findings to policymakers and other stakeholder groups

Established by the AMI Scientific Pedagogy Group, the standards insure that each school offers programs for their children that allow for their full intellectual, social, and psychological growth and that the approach is consistent with what is presented in AMI training courses worldwide.

ACEI shares new approaches to the education of children and ensuring that these approaches are delivered in ways that enhance children's individual skills and abilities and provide opportunities for success in life.

This study gives an overview of the current status of ECE in Chile, Czech Republic, Denmark, Estonia, Italy, Oland, the Russian Federation and the U.S. This initial analysis enables in-depth comparison of policy provision within the different countries, with the goal of learning from the range of approaches to implementation adopted.

UNICEF, its national counter-parts and other partner organizations identified the need to clarify expectations of children’s development and achievement, and indicators against which such development would be measured.

Provides a forum where researchers, practitioners, policy-makers, and managers in the field exchange knowledge, increase understanding, and develop notions of good practice.
From 1996 to present

Embraces academic research, policy, and practice in relation to the health, education, and welfare of children from infancy through to adulthood.
From 1996 to present

Publishes issues comprised of empirical articles, commentaries, and special issues at roughly weekly intervals, all of which pertain to educational policy, with direct implications for educational policy.
from 1993 to present

Focuses on vulnerable children from birth to five years of age and their families.
2002 to present

This journal disseminates research and analysis regarding major issues of child care and education policy relating to young children and their families to a broad international readership, including policymakers, researchers, and practitioners.
From 2014 to present

An international forum for topical issues pertaining to the mental well-being of children, adolescents, and their families.
from 01/01/1992 to present

Offers articles related to research and practice in early intervention for infants and young children with special needs and their families.
From 1981 to present​​

Devoted exclusively to school law, with emphasis on critical current & emerging issues, serving both the legal & educational professions.
from 01/01/2005 to the present

Aims to provide a high-quality forum for educational researchers, practitioners and policymakers to publish analyses and research about how school leaders and educational policies utilize fiscal, material, and human resources to bring about change in education and effectiveness in schools.
from 2002 to present

Fostering sustainable change in state policy and practice for children birth to third grade. Including innovating to improve children's futures, promoting cradle to college and career learning and success, partnering to enhance early learning outcomes

A community of researchers from renowned research institutions and organizations committed to advancing educational policy and practice through evidence-based research. CPRE has adopted an openly-available peer-reviewed publishing model by which member-created research and outputs are distributed online, free of cost or other barriers, in a central open access repository (Scholarly Commons) subsidized by the University of Pennsylvania. You can access CPRE research via our Scholarly Commons repository.

Their mission is to ensure all children from birth through age five have equal access to affordable, comprehensive, high-quality care and education to support their healthy development and help them achieve their full potential in school and life. FFYF has developed a tracker for the early childhood legislation introduced in the 117th Congress. FFYF also has a tracker for early childhood legislation put for forth in the 116th Congress. Inclusion of legislation in the tracker does not represent an FFYF endorsement of the policy changes proposed.

Brings together IDEA information and resources from the Department and our grantees. Includes information for students, parents, educators, service providers, and grantees.

The mission of the National Education Policy Center is to produce and disseminate high-quality, peer-reviewed research to inform education policy discussions. We are guided by the belief that the democratic governance of public education is strengthened when policies are based on sound evidence.

Conducts and communicates research to support high quality, effective, early childhood education for all young children.

The National Center on Early Childhood Quality Assurance (ECQA Center) is pleased to provide this online program standards crosswalk tool that is prepopulated with national early childhood program standards (e.g., Head Start, accreditation, Caring for our Children). This tool is designed to help States that are developing and aligning program standards for licensing, quality rating and improvement systems, and/or prekindergarten programs, to search and compare the content of several sets of national standards.

Find the latest information about ED's work in supporting our nation's youngest learners.

Includes resources for parents, social-emotional wellness quick guides, guidance from VA's Department of Special Education & Student Services, many resources for educators, parents, and the public.

Parents, educators, advocates, and attorneys come to Wrightslaw for reliable information about special education law and advocacy for children with disabilities. It includes links to hundreds of articles, cases, and resources