Educators now recognize the importance of providing students early on with practice to build necessary 21st-century work-related skills, such as collaboration. School robotics programs are increasingly being used to meet the goals of STEM standards-based content assessment and the development of collaboration skills. However, limited…

This study explored the impact of a parent education program and the contextual factors that influenced the experiences of families in the program. Seventeen parents completed a 9-week, face-to-face program and 15 parents completed a similar online program. This study was designed as a multiple case study and utilized multimethods for data…

Early childhood and early childhood special education programs have a focus on parent-educator partnerships. Parent-teacher conferences are a context for these partnerships, and advice giving is one type of exchange occurring within conferences. Parent-teacher conference advice was investigated through participant interviews and the methodology of…

Young children's leadership is an undertheorized and underresearched topic. Much of the research literature involves paired children working on adult-set tasks that are aimed to provide data on specific aspects of children's collaborative work. This article describes and discusses an investigation into children's leadership styles within…

Multiage settings are alternative educational groupings that promote complexity in young children's thinking. Grouping children across ages and grades encourages interconnectedness in social and intellectual development. This study compared the academic achievement of one group of multiage students to national norms on standardized achievement…

Focuses on the interaction patterns of child life interns, nurses, parents, and other attending adults with hospitalized children. Hospital study uses quantitative/qualitative analyses. Suggests that more attention be given to sensitizing child life interns to the importance of involving parents in socially stimulating play with their children.…

Describes factor analysis of preschool children's play behavior, as measured by the Smilansky-Parten play matrix. Varimax rotation solution suggests three factors: Dramatic-Constructive Play, Solitary Behavior, and Functional-Constructive Play. Study suggests that these factors represent constructs of preschoolers' play. (Author/RWB)

Suggests that first-time young collaborators are likely to struggle for control of their writing group and for control of the common text. They are ultimately likely to accept the leadership of the group member who makes best use of other member's skills. Focuses on problem-solving skills. (Author/RWB)

Findings suggested that: (1) peer culture is not a unitary whole but rather a differentiated social system comprised of various groups and different types of players; (2) objects play an important role in peer culture as entry vehicles and social markers; and (3) play periods are social arenas in which the dynamics of the peer culture are enacted.…

Examined what one middle school teacher learned as she directed her students to complete a structural engineering task as a cooperative learning activity. Found that students were on task and collaborated to accomplish the goal, but that the teacher's decisions about how tasks were set up, carried out, and completed affected students' interactions…

Observed four fifth-graders who collaboratively solved problems integrating concepts related to fractions and area. Compared features of learning through peer collaboration with teacher-directed learning, including whole solution versus component parts, appropriation versus scaffolding, analysis versus synthesis, conflict versus errorless…

Describes an action research project that explored whether internally negotiated group control was possible among preadolescents in school settings. Presents John Dewey's thoughts on social control. Discusses study of students' perspectives and actions concerning authority issues and social control. Describes a social studies curriculum used to…