Knowledge Development in Early Childhood

Ashley M. Pinkham, PhD, is a Research Fellow at the University of Michigan. Dr. Pinkham earned her doctoral degree in cognitive-developmental psychology from the University of Virginia. Her research focuses on sources of children’s knowledge acquisition and conceptual development, including observational learning, adult-child conversations, and book-reading experiences. Tanya Kaefer, PhD, is a Research Fellow at the University of Michigan. Dr. Kaefer earned her doctoral degree in developmental psychology from Duke University. She studies reading development and the influence of content knowledge on early literacy skills. Susan B. Neuman, EdD, is a Professor in Educational Studies at the University of Michigan. A former U.S. Assistant Secretary for Elementary and Secondary Education, Dr. Neuman established the Early Childhood Educator Professional Development Program and was responsible for all activities in Title I of the Elementary and Secondary Education Act. Her research and teaching interests include early literacy development, early childhood policy, curriculum, and early reading instruction. Her publications include 12 books and over 100 journal articles

I. Sources of Children’s Knowledge

1. What You See Is What You Get: Learning from the Ambient Environment, Tanya Kaefer

2. Learning through Play: Procedural versus Declarative Knowledge, Jennifer Van Reet

3. How Children Understand and Use Other People as Sources of Knowledge: Children’s Selective Use of Testimony, Sherryse L. Corrow, Jason Cowell, Sabine Doebel, and Melissa A. Koenig

4. Beyond Pedagogy: How Children’s Knowledge Develops in the Context of Everyday Parent–Child Conversations, Maureen Callanan, Jennifer Rigney, Charlotte Nolan-Reyes, and Graciela Solis

5. Drawing on the Arts: Less-Traveled Paths toward a Science of Learning, Jessa Reed, Kathy Hirsh-Pasek, and Roberta Michnick Golinkoff

6. Learning by the Book: The Importance of Picture Books for Young Children’s Knowledge Acquisition, Ashley M. Pinkham

7. Television and Children’s Knowledge, Heather J. Lavigne and Daniel R. Anderson

II. Promoting Knowledge Development in the Classroom

8. Four Play Pedagogies and a Promise for Children’s Learning, Kathleen Roskos and James Christie

9. The Research–Reality Divide in Early Vocabulary Instruction, Tanya S. Wright

10. The Contributions of Curriculum to Shifting Teachers’ Practices, David K. Dickinson, Erica M. Barnes, and Jin-Sil Mock

11. Scaffolding Preschoolers’ Vocabulary Development through Purposeful Conversations: Unpacking the ExCELL Model of Language and Literacy Professional Development, Barbara A. Wasik and Annemarie H. Hindman

12. Building Knowledge through Informational Text, Nell K. Duke, Anne-Lise Halvorsen, and Jennifer A. Knight

13. Knowledge Acquisition in the Classroom: Literacy and Content-Area Knowledge, Carol McDonald Connor and Frederick J. Morrison14. Building Literacy Skills through Multimedia, Rebecca Silverman and Sarah Hines