Dimensions of Early Childhood - Southern Early Childhood ...

Book Reviews
Books for Early Childhood Educators
by E. Anne Eddowes, Editor
Make Early Learning Standards
Come Alive—Connecting Your
Practice and Curriculum to State
Guidelines by Gaye Gronlund. St.
Paul, MN: Redleaf Press, 2006. 148
pp. $25.00.
In this book, Gronlund has built
upon her earlier works, Focused Early
Learning: A Planning Framework for
Teaching Young Children; Focused
Observations: How to Observe Children
for Assessment (with Marlyn
James) and Curriculum Planning
and Focused Portfolios: A Complete
Assessment for the Young Child (with
Bev Engel), in helping the reader see
how to connect classroom practice
and assessment of young children to
meet state guidelines and mandated
early learning standards.
The majority of the book, Chapters
4 through 10, is organized by
standards for pre-K from major content
areas or areas of development.
These areas include: communication
and literacy, mathematics, science
and social studies, social/emotional
development, physical development
and health, and creative arts. Chapter
11 discusses how to communicate
with others about standards, while
the final chapter addresses the need
to improve child outcomes and
remain advocates for addressing
children’s needs.
In the introductory chapters, the
author shares Web sites of national
organizations that have posted
information about early learning
standards from across the United
States. The sites noted include: Early
Childhood Education Assessment
Consortium Council of Chief State
School Officers, www.ccsso.org/
ECEAstandards; National Child
Care Information Center, www.nccic.
org/pubs/goodstart/elgwebsites.html,
and National Institute for Early
Education Research (NIEER),
www.nieer.org/standards/statelist.php.
Early learning standards related
to each content or developmental
area are presented in chart format.
The chart includes a list of states
with similar standards and common
early childhood classroom practices,
and indicates where the standard
may be addressed. Children’s progress
toward that standard is delineated in
three categories: first steps toward
the standard; making progress toward
the standard; and accomplishing the
standard. As an additional resource,
curriculum ideas and activities
teachers can plan and implement are
given for each progress category.
Although a variety of state standards
are examined, the author comments,
“good practices for young
children are good practices no matter
where you live” (p. 8). This strengthens
her message on the importance of
understanding that teaching young
children looks different from teaching
and assessing older children. It is
important for educators to not only
recognize that fact, but also to put
into practice a planning and assessment
plan to support developmentally
appropriate early learning standards.
This book can serve as a valuable
resource for early childhood teachers,
especially those needing to correlate
their teaching practices to
mandated standards of progress. The
author has provided a tool with
which to jumpstart one’s thinking
related to age-appropriate classroom
experiences, as well as how children’s
involvement in those experiences
can be appropriately assessed to
address state guidelines.
—Robbie B. Roberts
Auburn University, Auburn, AL
Playing to Get Smart by Elizabeth
Jones & Renatta M. Cooper. New
York: Teachers College Press, 2006.
136 pp. $19.95.
In this book, readers find a lively
marriage of teacher educator and
practitioner when the authors—
Elizabeth Jones, well-known play
expert and professor from Pacific
Oaks College, and Renatta Cooper,
child care administrator and county
education coordinator—team up.
With a sometimes-distracting nonchalance,
the authors tease the reader
into delving deeper into the value of
play. They do it first by voicing what
many practitioners bemoan, the loss
of free and spontaneous play in early
childhood settings, and second, by
presenting the reader with a new set
of assumptions for measuring the
quality of the play they observe.
The motivation for this book is
in part a reaction to the successful
professionalization of the early
childhood career field. The authors
suggest that the need to quantify our
work as early childhood educators
Winter 2007 DIMENSIONS OF EARLY CHILDHOOD Volume 35, Number 1 39