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This longitudinal study investigated the process whereby early parent involvement in preschool effects student achievement from kindergarten through 6^th grade. Participants were 1,539 low-income, mainly African American children and their mothers, in the Chicago Longitudinal Study. Program children (N = 989) received one or two years of the Child-Parent Center (CPC) program - a preschool intervention that strongly promoted parents' development of parent involvement skills within the school and at home. Children from similar backgrounds who did not attend the CPC, but participated in available local resources (e.g. day care), were obtained as a comparison group (N = 550). Path analysis revealed an interactive process between parent involvement, academic achievement, and children's motivation. Early parent involvement directly influenced kindergarten achievement, which in turn influenced first grade student motivation. Highly motivated children then encouraged parents to continue involvement. The cyclic nature of this process across elementary school was observed. The model accounted for 61% of the variance in 6^th grade achievement. Findings suggest that early parent involvement promoted in the CPC program, sets the stage for subsequent parent involvement, student motivation, and academic achievement throughout early and middle childhood.

As early education grows in the United States, in-service professional development in key instructional and interaction skills is a core component of capacity-building in early childhood education. In this paper, we describe results from an evaluation of the effects of MyTeachingPartner, a web-based system of professional development, on language and literacy development during pre-kindergarten for 1338 children in 161 teachers' classrooms. High levels of support for teachers' implementation of language/literacy activities showed modest but significant effects for improving early language and literacy for children in classrooms in which English was the dominant language spoken by the students and teachers. The combination of web-based supports, including video-based consultation and web-based video teaching exemplars, was more effective at improving children's literacy and language skills than was only making available to teachers a set of instructional materials and detailed lesson guides. These results suggest the importance of targeted, practice-focused supports for teachers in designing professional development systems for effective teaching in early childhood programs.

MyTeachingPartner (MTP) is a web-mediated approach that provides ongoing support for teachers to improve the quality of their interactions with children. This study examined the effects of MTP on the preschool language and literacy development of children who are at risk for later academic difficulties. Results of this randomized controlled trial indicated that for English-only classrooms, teachers receiving a high level of support had students who made greater gains in language and literacy skills than teachers who only received access to a curricular supplement. Three implications are drawn from these findings: (1) on-going, video-based consultation holds promise not only for altering teacher-child interactions, but also improving children's learning, (2) technology allows teachers to receive intensive, effective support from a distance, and (3) there is still much to be learned about how professional development can support effective teaching of language and literacy skills to children whose home language is not English.

This article reports the results of a pilot intervention to improve the social skills and literacy preparation of behaviorally at-risk Head Start children. Teachers in eight Head Start classrooms in two Oregon communities participated during the 2002-03 school year. Children in eight classrooms were screened and identified for participation using the Early Screening Project (ESP). Participants (n=16) were randomly assigned to receive social skills training, First Step to Success, social skills plus literacy training, Early Literacy Essentials, or to a comparison condition. Participants in the two intervention groups were combined and compared with the comparison group. Results indicated statistically significant gains in social skills outcomes for the intervention group. However, parent ratings of social skills showed superior effects for the comparison group as well. Receptive vocabulary, as measured by the Peabody Picture Vocabulary Test (PPVT), yielded a large effect size (Cohen's d=.95) for the intervention group. Findings suggest that a combined intervention addressing literacy and social skills, shows promise and is worthy of further development and evaluation.