Summary:How does literacy develop in children’s early years, and what programs or practices promote adequate literacy for all children? These are the questions Catherine Snow and Timothy Matthews tackle in this article.Fundamental literacy skills can be grouped into two categories, Snow and Matthews write. The first category is constrained skills, which are readily teachable because they’re finite: for example, the 26 letters of the alphabet, or a set of 20 to 30 common spelling rules. These skills have a ceiling; young children can and do achieve perfect performance.As they grow older, though, children need to understand words rarely encountered in spoken language and to integrate new information they encounter with relevant background information. Vocabulary and background knowledge are examples of unconstrained skills—large domains of knowledge acquired gradually through experience. Unconstrained skills are particularly important for children’s long-term literacy success (that is, success in outcomes measured after third grade). Compared to constrained skills, they’re also more strongly predicted by children’s social class or their parents’ education, and more difficult to teach in the classroom. And because of their open-ended nature, unconstrained skills are also much harder to test for. Snow and Matthews write that a drop in literacy scores we see as US children move from elementary to middle school suggests that our schools may be focusing too much on constrained skills—and too little on unconstrained ones—in the early grades.The authors review promising programs and practices for enhancing both constrained and unconstrained skills, ranging from comprehensive school-improvement programs to efforts to improve curricula and teachers’ professional development—although they note that vast differences in programs’ scope, cost, targets, and theories of change make comparing them difficult. Another challenge is that it’s hard to maintain quality and consistency when implementing complex programs over time. Snow and Matthews suggest that to improve young children’s success with literacy, it might be better to introduce and evaluate promising practices that can be mixed and matched, rather than complex programs that are implemented as a package.
{"title":"Reading and Language in the Early Grades","authors":"C. Snow, T. J. Matthews","doi":"10.1353/FOC.2016.0012","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1353/FOC.2016.0012","url":null,"abstract":"Summary:How does literacy develop in children’s early years, and what programs or practices promote adequate literacy for all children? These are the questions Catherine Snow and Timothy Matthews tackle in this article.Fundamental literacy skills can be grouped into two categories, Snow and Matthews write. The first category is constrained skills, which are readily teachable because they’re finite: for example, the 26 letters of the alphabet, or a set of 20 to 30 common spelling rules. These skills have a ceiling; young children can and do achieve perfect performance.As they grow older, though, children need to understand words rarely encountered in spoken language and to integrate new information they encounter with relevant background information. Vocabulary and background knowledge are examples of unconstrained skills—large domains of knowledge acquired gradually through experience. Unconstrained skills are particularly important for children’s long-term literacy success (that is, success in outcomes measured after third grade). Compared to constrained skills, they’re also more strongly predicted by children’s social class or their parents’ education, and more difficult to teach in the classroom. And because of their open-ended nature, unconstrained skills are also much harder to test for. Snow and Matthews write that a drop in literacy scores we see as US children move from elementary to middle school suggests that our schools may be focusing too much on constrained skills—and too little on unconstrained ones—in the early grades.The authors review promising programs and practices for enhancing both constrained and unconstrained skills, ranging from comprehensive school-improvement programs to efforts to improve curricula and teachers’ professional development—although they note that vast differences in programs’ scope, cost, targets, and theories of change make comparing them difficult. Another challenge is that it’s hard to maintain quality and consistency when implementing complex programs over time. Snow and Matthews suggest that to improve young children’s success with literacy, it might be better to introduce and evaluate promising practices that can be mixed and matched, rather than complex programs that are implemented as a package.","PeriodicalId":51448,"journal":{"name":"Future of Children","volume":"26 1","pages":"57 - 74"},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2016-09-22","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"https://sci-hub-pdf.com/10.1353/FOC.2016.0012","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"66361053","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":4,"RegionCategory":"法学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Summary:Parents, professionals, and policymakers agree that quality is crucial for early education. But precise, consistent, and valid definitions of quality have been elusive. In this article, Robert Pianta, Jason Downer, and Bridget Hamre tackle the questions of how to define quality, how to measure it, and how to ensure that more children experience it.Definitions of quality in early education, the authors write, generally include four aspects. The first is a program’s structural elements, such as length of the school day or teachers’ qualifications. The second encompasses general features of the classroom environment, ranging from playground equipment to activities involving staff, children, or parents. Third are the dimensions of teacher-student interactions that children experience directly. Finally, aggregate indices—such as quality rating and improvement systems—combine measurements across types of program elements.Pianta, Downer, and Hamre find very little evidence that programs’ structural features influence children’s development. Instead, they zero in on teacher-student interactions—characterized by teachers’ sensitivity to individual needs, support for positive behavior, and stimulation of language and cognitive development—as a key indicator of classroom quality that appears to benefit all children from prekindergarten through third grade.Teachers’ interactions with children can be significantly and systematically improved through targeted and sustained professional development. Yet efforts to improve the quality of such interactions at scale and to ensure that quality remains consistent from prekindergarten through third grade have so far been ineffectual. If we accept the evidence that direct experiences within classrooms are the best indicators of program quality, the authors argue, then the next wave of science and policy must refine and advance the definition, measurement, production, and consistency of these experiences in early education.
摘要:家长、专业人士和政策制定者一致认为，质量对早期教育至关重要。但是精确、一致和有效的质量定义一直是难以捉摸的。在这篇文章中，Robert Pianta, Jason Downer和Bridget Hamre探讨了如何定义质量，如何衡量质量，以及如何确保更多的孩子体验到质量。作者写道，早期教育质量的定义通常包括四个方面。首先是课程的结构要素，比如上课时间的长短或教师的资格。第二个包括教室环境的一般特征，从操场设备到涉及员工、儿童或家长的活动。三是儿童直接体验到的师生互动维度。最后，综合指数——如质量评级和改进系统——结合了不同类型的项目元素的测量。Pianta, Downer和Hamre发现很少有证据表明项目的结构特征会影响儿童的发展。相反，他们把注意力集中在师生互动上，师生互动的特点是教师对个人需求的敏感性，对积极行为的支持，以及对语言和认知发展的刺激，这是课堂质量的一个关键指标，似乎有益于从学前班到三年级的所有孩子。通过有针对性和持续的专业发展，教师与儿童的互动可以得到显著和系统的改善。然而，到目前为止，为大规模提高这种互动的质量，并确保从学前班到三年级的质量保持一致所做的努力都是无效的。作者认为，如果我们接受课堂上的直接体验是项目质量的最佳指标这一证据，那么下一波科学和政策必须完善和推进早期教育中这些体验的定义、测量、生产和一致性。
{"title":"Quality in Early Education Classrooms: Definitions, Gaps, and Systems","authors":"R. Pianta, J. Downer, B. Hamre","doi":"10.1353/FOC.2016.0015","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1353/FOC.2016.0015","url":null,"abstract":"Summary:Parents, professionals, and policymakers agree that quality is crucial for early education. But precise, consistent, and valid definitions of quality have been elusive. In this article, Robert Pianta, Jason Downer, and Bridget Hamre tackle the questions of how to define quality, how to measure it, and how to ensure that more children experience it.Definitions of quality in early education, the authors write, generally include four aspects. The first is a program’s structural elements, such as length of the school day or teachers’ qualifications. The second encompasses general features of the classroom environment, ranging from playground equipment to activities involving staff, children, or parents. Third are the dimensions of teacher-student interactions that children experience directly. Finally, aggregate indices—such as quality rating and improvement systems—combine measurements across types of program elements.Pianta, Downer, and Hamre find very little evidence that programs’ structural features influence children’s development. Instead, they zero in on teacher-student interactions—characterized by teachers’ sensitivity to individual needs, support for positive behavior, and stimulation of language and cognitive development—as a key indicator of classroom quality that appears to benefit all children from prekindergarten through third grade.Teachers’ interactions with children can be significantly and systematically improved through targeted and sustained professional development. Yet efforts to improve the quality of such interactions at scale and to ensure that quality remains consistent from prekindergarten through third grade have so far been ineffectual. If we accept the evidence that direct experiences within classrooms are the best indicators of program quality, the authors argue, then the next wave of science and policy must refine and advance the definition, measurement, production, and consistency of these experiences in early education.","PeriodicalId":51448,"journal":{"name":"Future of Children","volume":"26 1","pages":"119 - 137"},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2016-09-22","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"https://sci-hub-pdf.com/10.1353/FOC.2016.0015","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"66361189","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":4,"RegionCategory":"法学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Summary:In this article, Deborah Phillips, Lea Austin, and Marcy Whitebook examine educational preparation, compensation, and professional development among the early childhood workforce. Their central theme is that these features look very different for preschool teachers than they do for the elementary school teaching workforce.Most teachers of kindergarten through third grade can count on clear job requirements, professional development opportunities, workplace supports such as paid planning time, and a transparent and rational salary structure based on qualifications and experience. These teachers often earn a wage that approaches the median income in their communities.For most preschool teachers, Phillips, Austin, and Whitebook write, the situation is very different. Job requirements and qualifications vary wildly from program to program and from state to state. Professional development is both scarce and inconsistent. Compensation often fails to reward educational attainment or training; in fact, many preschool teachers are among the lowest-paid workers in the country. Poor compensation fuels turnover, which means that society loses investments in professional learning, and produces economic insecurity and stress among preschool teachers.The crux of quality in early childhood education lies squarely in the interactions that transpire between teachers and children, the authors write. Thus it’s long past time, they argue, to recognize prekindergarten through third grade as a continuum that requires a seamless system of professional learning and compensation tied to qualifications, including education. To move beyond incremental improvements in the quality of early care and education, they conclude, empirical research, intervention, and policy alike should focus on the preparation, professional development, compensation, and wellbeing of early childhood teachers.
{"title":"The Early Care and Education Workforce","authors":"Deborah A. Phillips, L. Austin, M. Whitebook","doi":"10.1353/FOC.2016.0016","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1353/FOC.2016.0016","url":null,"abstract":"Summary:In this article, Deborah Phillips, Lea Austin, and Marcy Whitebook examine educational preparation, compensation, and professional development among the early childhood workforce. Their central theme is that these features look very different for preschool teachers than they do for the elementary school teaching workforce.Most teachers of kindergarten through third grade can count on clear job requirements, professional development opportunities, workplace supports such as paid planning time, and a transparent and rational salary structure based on qualifications and experience. These teachers often earn a wage that approaches the median income in their communities.For most preschool teachers, Phillips, Austin, and Whitebook write, the situation is very different. Job requirements and qualifications vary wildly from program to program and from state to state. Professional development is both scarce and inconsistent. Compensation often fails to reward educational attainment or training; in fact, many preschool teachers are among the lowest-paid workers in the country. Poor compensation fuels turnover, which means that society loses investments in professional learning, and produces economic insecurity and stress among preschool teachers.The crux of quality in early childhood education lies squarely in the interactions that transpire between teachers and children, the authors write. Thus it’s long past time, they argue, to recognize prekindergarten through third grade as a continuum that requires a seamless system of professional learning and compensation tied to qualifications, including education. To move beyond incremental improvements in the quality of early care and education, they conclude, empirical research, intervention, and policy alike should focus on the preparation, professional development, compensation, and wellbeing of early childhood teachers.","PeriodicalId":51448,"journal":{"name":"Future of Children","volume":"26 1","pages":"139 - 158"},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2016-09-22","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"https://sci-hub-pdf.com/10.1353/FOC.2016.0016","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"66361198","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":4,"RegionCategory":"法学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Summary:Parents strongly influence their children’s development, and prekindergarten and early elementary programs—especially those serving children at risk for low achievement because of their family backgrounds—often feature programming to support parents’ role in their children’s learning. Despite the prevalence of such programs, however, we have little good evidence of their effectiveness. In this article, Katherine Magnuson and Holly Schindler review more promising, fully developed parent “add-on” programs.In their daily work, preschool and elementary school programs and teachers commonly use a variety of formal and informal activities to support, educate, and involve parents, such as having parents volunteer in the classroom or encouraging children to share classwork or other materials with their parents. Though such practices are widespread, the authors write, we have little rigorous evidence to show that they’re associated with children’s academic success.“Add-on” parenting programs, in contrast, generally target a particular subset of parents, and they often have a highly specific and clearly developed programmatic approach. Such programs focus on helping parents improve either their children’s early academic skills or their behavior and self-regulation. Among the types of parent support that Magnuson and Schindler review, add-on programs have shown the most promise to improve children’s learning. But parents with many demands on their time may find it hard to sustain a commitment to these programs; technological solutions such as communication by text messaging may be one way to solve this problem.A final way to involve parents is to give them information about the quality of their prekindergarten or elementary school choices, although such information may not be particularly useful to parents who live near a set of similarly high-performing or low-performing schools, or can’t access programs because of limited enrollments or cost.
{"title":"Parent Programs in Pre-K through Third Grade","authors":"K. Magnuson, Holly S. Schindler","doi":"10.1353/FOC.2016.0019","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1353/FOC.2016.0019","url":null,"abstract":"Summary:Parents strongly influence their children’s development, and prekindergarten and early elementary programs—especially those serving children at risk for low achievement because of their family backgrounds—often feature programming to support parents’ role in their children’s learning. Despite the prevalence of such programs, however, we have little good evidence of their effectiveness. In this article, Katherine Magnuson and Holly Schindler review more promising, fully developed parent “add-on” programs.In their daily work, preschool and elementary school programs and teachers commonly use a variety of formal and informal activities to support, educate, and involve parents, such as having parents volunteer in the classroom or encouraging children to share classwork or other materials with their parents. Though such practices are widespread, the authors write, we have little rigorous evidence to show that they’re associated with children’s academic success.“Add-on” parenting programs, in contrast, generally target a particular subset of parents, and they often have a highly specific and clearly developed programmatic approach. Such programs focus on helping parents improve either their children’s early academic skills or their behavior and self-regulation. Among the types of parent support that Magnuson and Schindler review, add-on programs have shown the most promise to improve children’s learning. But parents with many demands on their time may find it hard to sustain a commitment to these programs; technological solutions such as communication by text messaging may be one way to solve this problem.A final way to involve parents is to give them information about the quality of their prekindergarten or elementary school choices, although such information may not be particularly useful to parents who live near a set of similarly high-performing or low-performing schools, or can’t access programs because of limited enrollments or cost.","PeriodicalId":51448,"journal":{"name":"Future of Children","volume":"26 1","pages":"207 - 221"},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2016-09-22","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"https://sci-hub-pdf.com/10.1353/FOC.2016.0019","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"66361331","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":4,"RegionCategory":"法学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Summary:In this article, Cybele Raver and Clancy Blair explore a group of cognitive processes called executive function (EF)—including the flexible control of attention, the ability to hold information through working memory, and the ability to maintain inhibitory controlEF processes are crucial for young children’s learning. On the one hand, they can help students control their anxiety when they face challenging academic tasks. On the other, these same processes can be undermined when children experience chronically stressful situations—for example, poverty, homelessness, and neighborhood crime. Such adverse early experiences interfere with children’s development of EF, hampering their ability to manage challenging situationsThrough both behavioral examples and empirical evidence, Raver and Blair illustrate how children’s cognitive development is intertwined with EF. They show how children’s regulation of higher-order thinking is related to the regulation of emotion—in both top- down and bottom-up fashion—and they review research on early brain development, EF and emotion regulation, and children’s academic performance. They also examine the efficacy of educational interventions that target EF and of integrated interventions that target both emotional and cognitive regulation.What does our understanding of EF imply for policy in pre-K–3 education? First, write Raver and Blair, to help young children learn, school districts need data not only on their academic readiness but also on key dimensions of EF. Second, we already have interventions that can at least partially close the gap in neurocognitive function and academic achievement between children who face multiple types of adversity and those who don’t. In the long run, though, they argue, the best way to help these children is to invest in programs that reduce their exposure to chronic severe stress.
{"title":"Neuroscientific Insights: Attention, Working Memory, and Inhibitory Control","authors":"C. Raver, C. Blair","doi":"10.1353/FOC.2016.0014","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1353/FOC.2016.0014","url":null,"abstract":"Summary:In this article, Cybele Raver and Clancy Blair explore a group of cognitive processes called executive function (EF)—including the flexible control of attention, the ability to hold information through working memory, and the ability to maintain inhibitory controlEF processes are crucial for young children’s learning. On the one hand, they can help students control their anxiety when they face challenging academic tasks. On the other, these same processes can be undermined when children experience chronically stressful situations—for example, poverty, homelessness, and neighborhood crime. Such adverse early experiences interfere with children’s development of EF, hampering their ability to manage challenging situationsThrough both behavioral examples and empirical evidence, Raver and Blair illustrate how children’s cognitive development is intertwined with EF. They show how children’s regulation of higher-order thinking is related to the regulation of emotion—in both top- down and bottom-up fashion—and they review research on early brain development, EF and emotion regulation, and children’s academic performance. They also examine the efficacy of educational interventions that target EF and of integrated interventions that target both emotional and cognitive regulation.What does our understanding of EF imply for policy in pre-K–3 education? First, write Raver and Blair, to help young children learn, school districts need data not only on their academic readiness but also on key dimensions of EF. Second, we already have interventions that can at least partially close the gap in neurocognitive function and academic achievement between children who face multiple types of adversity and those who don’t. In the long run, though, they argue, the best way to help these children is to invest in programs that reduce their exposure to chronic severe stress.","PeriodicalId":51448,"journal":{"name":"Future of Children","volume":"26 1","pages":"118 - 95"},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2016-09-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"https://sci-hub-pdf.com/10.1353/FOC.2016.0014","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"66361155","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":4,"RegionCategory":"法学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Summary:We have many reasons to invest in preschool programs, including persistent gaps in school readiness between children from poorer and wealthier families, large increases in maternal employment over the past several decades, and the rapid brain development that preschoolage children experience. But what do we know about preschool education’s effectiveness?In this article, Hirokazu Yoshikawa, Christina Weiland, and Jeanne Brooks-Gunn report strong evidence that preschool boosts children’s language, literacy, and math skills in the short term; it may also reduce problem behaviors such as aggression. Over the elementary school years, however, test scores of children who were exposed to preschool tend to converge with the scores of children who were not. Many factors may explain this convergence. For example, kindergarten or first-grade teachers may focus on helping children with lower levels of skills get up to speed, or children may lose ground when they transition from high-quality preschools into poor-quality elementary programs. Taking a longer view, some studies have found that attending preschool boosts children’s high school graduation rates and makes them less likely to engage in criminal behavior. Overall, higherquality preschool programs are associated with larger effects.How might preschools produce larger effects that last longer? Developmentally focused curricula, combined with intensive in-service training or coaching for teachers, have been shown to improve the quality of preschool instruction. Focusing on fundamental skills that both predict long-term outcomes and are less likely to be gained in the first years of school might also produce longer-lasting effects. And improving instructional quality in early elementary school and better aligning the preschool and elementary curricula may be another way to sustain the boost that quality preschool education can provide. Above all, the authors write, if we want to see sustained improvements in children’s development and learning, we need to increase the quality of—not just access to—preschool education.
{"title":"When Does Preschool Matter?","authors":"H. Yoshikawa, C. Weiland, J. Brooks-Gunn","doi":"10.1353/FOC.2016.0010","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1353/FOC.2016.0010","url":null,"abstract":"Summary:We have many reasons to invest in preschool programs, including persistent gaps in school readiness between children from poorer and wealthier families, large increases in maternal employment over the past several decades, and the rapid brain development that preschoolage children experience. But what do we know about preschool education’s effectiveness?In this article, Hirokazu Yoshikawa, Christina Weiland, and Jeanne Brooks-Gunn report strong evidence that preschool boosts children’s language, literacy, and math skills in the short term; it may also reduce problem behaviors such as aggression. Over the elementary school years, however, test scores of children who were exposed to preschool tend to converge with the scores of children who were not. Many factors may explain this convergence. For example, kindergarten or first-grade teachers may focus on helping children with lower levels of skills get up to speed, or children may lose ground when they transition from high-quality preschools into poor-quality elementary programs. Taking a longer view, some studies have found that attending preschool boosts children’s high school graduation rates and makes them less likely to engage in criminal behavior. Overall, higherquality preschool programs are associated with larger effects.How might preschools produce larger effects that last longer? Developmentally focused curricula, combined with intensive in-service training or coaching for teachers, have been shown to improve the quality of preschool instruction. Focusing on fundamental skills that both predict long-term outcomes and are less likely to be gained in the first years of school might also produce longer-lasting effects. And improving instructional quality in early elementary school and better aligning the preschool and elementary curricula may be another way to sustain the boost that quality preschool education can provide. Above all, the authors write, if we want to see sustained improvements in children’s development and learning, we need to increase the quality of—not just access to—preschool education.","PeriodicalId":51448,"journal":{"name":"Future of Children","volume":"26 1","pages":"21 - 35"},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2016-09-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"https://sci-hub-pdf.com/10.1353/FOC.2016.0010","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"66361002","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":4,"RegionCategory":"法学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Summary: The extreme temperatures expected under climate change may be especially harmful to children. Children are more vulnerable to heat partly because of their physiological features, but, perhaps more important, because they behave and respond differently than adults do. Children are less likely to manage their own heat risk and may have fewer ways to avoid heat; for example, because they don’t plan their own schedules, they typically can’t avoid activity during hot portions of the day. And very young children may not be able to tell adults that they’re feeling heat’s effects. Joshua Graff Zivin and Jeffrey Shrader zero in on how rising temperatures from global warming can be expected to affect children. They review evidence that high temperatures would mean more deaths, especially among fetuses and young children (as well as the elderly). When combined with other conditions—such as high humidity, diseases, or pollution—heat can be even deadlier. Even when it doesn’t kill, high heat directly causes heat-related illnesses such as heat exhaustion; worsens other conditions, such as asthma, by increasing smog and ozone pollution; and harms fetuses in the womb, often with long-term consequences. High temperatures can also make learning more difficult, affecting children’s adult job prospects. What can we do to protect children from a hotter climate? Graff Zivin and Shrader discuss a range of policies that could help. Such policies include requiring air conditioning in schools; heat wave warning systems coupled with public infrastructure that helps people stay indoors and stay cool; and readjusting schedules so that, for example, children are mostly indoors during the hottest time of day or the hottest season of the year.
{"title":"Temperature Extremes, Health, and Human Capital","authors":"J. Zivin, J. Shrader","doi":"10.1353/FOC.2016.0002","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1353/FOC.2016.0002","url":null,"abstract":"Summary: The extreme temperatures expected under climate change may be especially harmful to children. Children are more vulnerable to heat partly because of their physiological features, but, perhaps more important, because they behave and respond differently than adults do. Children are less likely to manage their own heat risk and may have fewer ways to avoid heat; for example, because they don’t plan their own schedules, they typically can’t avoid activity during hot portions of the day. And very young children may not be able to tell adults that they’re feeling heat’s effects. Joshua Graff Zivin and Jeffrey Shrader zero in on how rising temperatures from global warming can be expected to affect children. They review evidence that high temperatures would mean more deaths, especially among fetuses and young children (as well as the elderly). When combined with other conditions—such as high humidity, diseases, or pollution—heat can be even deadlier. Even when it doesn’t kill, high heat directly causes heat-related illnesses such as heat exhaustion; worsens other conditions, such as asthma, by increasing smog and ozone pollution; and harms fetuses in the womb, often with long-term consequences. High temperatures can also make learning more difficult, affecting children’s adult job prospects. What can we do to protect children from a hotter climate? Graff Zivin and Shrader discuss a range of policies that could help. Such policies include requiring air conditioning in schools; heat wave warning systems coupled with public infrastructure that helps people stay indoors and stay cool; and readjusting schedules so that, for example, children are mostly indoors during the hottest time of day or the hottest season of the year.","PeriodicalId":51448,"journal":{"name":"Future of Children","volume":"26 1","pages":"31 - 50"},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2016-03-22","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"https://sci-hub-pdf.com/10.1353/FOC.2016.0002","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"66360560","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":4,"RegionCategory":"法学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Summary: Climate change may be particularly dangerous for children in developing countries. Even today, many developing countries experience a disproportionate share of extreme weather, and they are predicted to suffer disproportionately from the effects of climate change in the future. Moreover, developing countries often have limited social safety nets, widespread poverty, fragile health care systems, and weak governmental institutions, making it harder for them to adapt or respond to climate change. And the fact that many developing countries have high birth rates and high ratios of children to adults (known as high dependency ratios) means that proportionately more children are at risk there than in the developed world. In this article, Rema Hanna and Paulina Oliva delve into climate change’s likely implications for children in developing countries. Such children already face severe challenges, which climate change will likely exacerbate. In particular, most people in developing countries still depend primarily on agriculture as a source of income, and so anything that reduces crop yields—such as excessive heat or rain—is likely to directly threaten the livelihoods of developing-country families and their ability to feed their children. Poor nutrition and economic disruption are likely to lower children’s scholastic achievement or even keep them out of school altogether. Children in developing countries also face more-severe threats from both air and water pollution; from infectious and parasitic diseases carried by insects or contaminated water; and from possible displacement, migration, and violence triggered by climate change. How can we temper the threat to children in developing countries? Hanna and Oliva write that we should design and fund policies to shield children in developing nations from the harm caused by climate change. Such policies might include developing new technologies, inventing more-weather-resistant crops, improving access to clean water, increasing foreign aid during disasters, and offering more assistance to help poor countries expand their safety net programs.
{"title":"Implications of Climate Change for Children in Developing Countries","authors":"R. Hanna, Paulina Oliva","doi":"10.1353/FOC.2016.0006","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1353/FOC.2016.0006","url":null,"abstract":"Summary: Climate change may be particularly dangerous for children in developing countries. Even today, many developing countries experience a disproportionate share of extreme weather, and they are predicted to suffer disproportionately from the effects of climate change in the future. Moreover, developing countries often have limited social safety nets, widespread poverty, fragile health care systems, and weak governmental institutions, making it harder for them to adapt or respond to climate change. And the fact that many developing countries have high birth rates and high ratios of children to adults (known as high dependency ratios) means that proportionately more children are at risk there than in the developed world. In this article, Rema Hanna and Paulina Oliva delve into climate change’s likely implications for children in developing countries. Such children already face severe challenges, which climate change will likely exacerbate. In particular, most people in developing countries still depend primarily on agriculture as a source of income, and so anything that reduces crop yields—such as excessive heat or rain—is likely to directly threaten the livelihoods of developing-country families and their ability to feed their children. Poor nutrition and economic disruption are likely to lower children’s scholastic achievement or even keep them out of school altogether. Children in developing countries also face more-severe threats from both air and water pollution; from infectious and parasitic diseases carried by insects or contaminated water; and from possible displacement, migration, and violence triggered by climate change. How can we temper the threat to children in developing countries? Hanna and Oliva write that we should design and fund policies to shield children in developing nations from the harm caused by climate change. Such policies might include developing new technologies, inventing more-weather-resistant crops, improving access to clean water, increasing foreign aid during disasters, and offering more assistance to help poor countries expand their safety net programs.","PeriodicalId":51448,"journal":{"name":"Future of Children","volume":"26 1","pages":"115 - 132"},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2016-03-22","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"https://sci-hub-pdf.com/10.1353/FOC.2016.0006","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"66360879","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":4,"RegionCategory":"法学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Summary: We can expect climate change to alter the frequency, magnitude, timing, and location of many natural hazards. For example, heat waves are likely to become more frequent, and heavy downpours and flooding more common and more intense. Hurricanes will likely grow more dangerous, rising sea levels will mean more coastal flooding, and more-frequent and more-intense droughts will produce more wildfires. Children, particularly the poor and those in developing countries, are at risk. Carolyn Kousky considers three ways that natural disasters may harm children disproportionately, often with long-lasting effects. First, disasters can damage children’s physical health. Children may be injured or killed, but they may also suffer from such things as malnutrition caused by disruptions in food supply or diarrheal illness caused by contaminated water. Moreover, disasters can cut off access to medical care, even for non-disaster-related illnesses. Second, disasters can cause mental health problems. Not only are disasters themselves stressful and frightening, but children can suffer psychological harm from the damage to their homes and possessions; from migration; from the grief of losing loved ones; from seeing parents or caregivers undergo stress; from neglect and abuse; and from breakdowns in social networks, neighborhoods, and local economies. Third, disasters can interrupt children’s education by displacing families, destroying schools, and pushing children into the labor force to help their families make ends meet in straitened times. How can we mitigate the dangers to children even as disasters become more powerful and more frequent? For one thing, we can prepare for disasters before they strike, for example, by strengthening school buildings and houses. Kousky also describes actions that have been proven to help children after a disaster, such as quickly reuniting them with parents and caregivers. Finally, a range of policies not designed for disasters can nonetheless help mitigate the harm disasters cause children and their families. In fact, Kousky writes, using existing safety net programs may be easier, faster, and more effective than creating entirely new programs after a disaster occurs.
{"title":"Impacts of Natural Disasters on Children","authors":"C. Kousky","doi":"10.1353/FOC.2016.0004","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1353/FOC.2016.0004","url":null,"abstract":"Summary: We can expect climate change to alter the frequency, magnitude, timing, and location of many natural hazards. For example, heat waves are likely to become more frequent, and heavy downpours and flooding more common and more intense. Hurricanes will likely grow more dangerous, rising sea levels will mean more coastal flooding, and more-frequent and more-intense droughts will produce more wildfires. Children, particularly the poor and those in developing countries, are at risk. Carolyn Kousky considers three ways that natural disasters may harm children disproportionately, often with long-lasting effects. First, disasters can damage children’s physical health. Children may be injured or killed, but they may also suffer from such things as malnutrition caused by disruptions in food supply or diarrheal illness caused by contaminated water. Moreover, disasters can cut off access to medical care, even for non-disaster-related illnesses. Second, disasters can cause mental health problems. Not only are disasters themselves stressful and frightening, but children can suffer psychological harm from the damage to their homes and possessions; from migration; from the grief of losing loved ones; from seeing parents or caregivers undergo stress; from neglect and abuse; and from breakdowns in social networks, neighborhoods, and local economies. Third, disasters can interrupt children’s education by displacing families, destroying schools, and pushing children into the labor force to help their families make ends meet in straitened times. How can we mitigate the dangers to children even as disasters become more powerful and more frequent? For one thing, we can prepare for disasters before they strike, for example, by strengthening school buildings and houses. Kousky also describes actions that have been proven to help children after a disaster, such as quickly reuniting them with parents and caregivers. Finally, a range of policies not designed for disasters can nonetheless help mitigate the harm disasters cause children and their families. In fact, Kousky writes, using existing safety net programs may be easier, faster, and more effective than creating entirely new programs after a disaster occurs.","PeriodicalId":51448,"journal":{"name":"Future of Children","volume":"26 1","pages":"73 - 92"},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2016-03-22","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"https://sci-hub-pdf.com/10.1353/FOC.2016.0004","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"66361247","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":4,"RegionCategory":"法学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Summary: Our failure to mobilize sufficient effort to fight climate change reflects a combination of political and economic forces, on both the national and the global level. To state the problem in its simplest terms, writes Joseph Aldy, future, unborn generations would enjoy the benefits of policies to reduce carbon emissions whereas the current generation would have to bear the costs. In particular, incumbent firms—politically influential fossil-fuel companies and fossil fuel–intensive industries, which are now reaping substantial returns from a status quo that fails to address climate change—might face significant losses from policies that discourage carbon emissions. On the other hand, insurgent firms—companies that are investing in low- and zero-carbon technologies—stand to gain. Aldy analyzes durable, successful public policies in US history whose costs and benefits accrued to different groups—the 1935 Social Security Act, the 1956 Interstate Highway Act, and the 1970 Clean Air Act Amendments. Those policies differ from climate change policy in important ways, but they nonetheless offer lessons. For example, designing climate policy to deliver broad, near-term benefits could help overcome some of the political opposition. To do so might require linking climate change with other issues, or linking various interest groups. We might also win support from incumbent firms by finding ways to compensate them for their losses under climate change policy, or use policy to help turn insurgent firms into incumbents with political influence of their own. Finally, we might account for and exploit the veto points and opportunities embedded in our existing political institutions.
{"title":"Mobilizing Political Action on Behalf of Future Generations","authors":"Joseph E. Aldy","doi":"10.1353/FOC.2016.0008","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1353/FOC.2016.0008","url":null,"abstract":"Summary: Our failure to mobilize sufficient effort to fight climate change reflects a combination of political and economic forces, on both the national and the global level. To state the problem in its simplest terms, writes Joseph Aldy, future, unborn generations would enjoy the benefits of policies to reduce carbon emissions whereas the current generation would have to bear the costs. In particular, incumbent firms—politically influential fossil-fuel companies and fossil fuel–intensive industries, which are now reaping substantial returns from a status quo that fails to address climate change—might face significant losses from policies that discourage carbon emissions. On the other hand, insurgent firms—companies that are investing in low- and zero-carbon technologies—stand to gain. Aldy analyzes durable, successful public policies in US history whose costs and benefits accrued to different groups—the 1935 Social Security Act, the 1956 Interstate Highway Act, and the 1970 Clean Air Act Amendments. Those policies differ from climate change policy in important ways, but they nonetheless offer lessons. For example, designing climate policy to deliver broad, near-term benefits could help overcome some of the political opposition. To do so might require linking climate change with other issues, or linking various interest groups. We might also win support from incumbent firms by finding ways to compensate them for their losses under climate change policy, or use policy to help turn insurgent firms into incumbents with political influence of their own. Finally, we might account for and exploit the veto points and opportunities embedded in our existing political institutions.","PeriodicalId":51448,"journal":{"name":"Future of Children","volume":"8 1","pages":"157 - 178"},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2016-03-22","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"https://sci-hub-pdf.com/10.1353/FOC.2016.0008","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"66360953","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":4,"RegionCategory":"法学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
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