This book presents five papers that address a variety of issues confronting those who work directly with young children and their teachers. The first three articles present ways of thinking about what constitutes professionalism in working with children and parents. Specifically, "Contemporary Perspectives on the Roles of Mothers and Teachers" examines the distinctions between the orientations of mothers and teachers toward children and points out ways in which both orientations play an essential role in children's growth and development; "The Professional Preschool Teacher" aims to distinguish professional behavior from both nonprofessional and unprofessional behavior by illustrating types of responses to a dispute between two preschoolers over a tricycle; and "Ethical Issues in Working with Young Children" examines ethical problems specific to the field and analyzes the teacher's relationship with parents and colleagues. The fourth paper, "Assessing the Development of Preschoolers," proposes 11 dimensions useful in determining an individual child's development at a particular time on the basis of everyday behaviors that indicate natural fluctuations in growth. The last paper, "Helping Others with Their Teaching," proposes ideas to help supervisors of teachers and teacher educators decide how they can best encourage the mastery of professional skills in the teachers and student teachers with whom they work. (CB)