The children in today's early childhood classroom are more culturally, linguistically, and ability diverse than ever. As a teacher, your challenge is to partner with each family through recognizing their individual strengths, concerns, priorities, and resources.

In The Welcoming Classroom: Building Strong Home-to-School Connections for Early Learning, Dr. Johnna Darragh Ernst offers practical ideas for creating a welcoming atmosphere for families that will encourage them to participate in their children's learning community.

From improving children's school readiness to encouraging positive engagement with peers, promoting student academic achievement, increasing graduation rates, and helping reduce the negative impact of poverty, the benefits of engaging families early will impact the young children in your care long after they leave your classroom

What if educational programs designed curriculum with the end in mind, teaching and assessing only the knowledge and skills necessary for success in the workplace and broader life applications? Competency-Based Education (CBE) provides an answer to questions such as this one that key stakeholders such as employers, learners, parents, and educators are asking. In this book, the authors offer a Competency Development Process Model (CDPM) with unique features that emphasize the interdependence of competencies, assessments, and a robust learning journey within a fully developed career pathway. Two case examples are used throughout the book to contextualize the CDPM. There are seven steps of the model: Step 1: Define the Problem Step 2: Establish the CompetencyFramework Step 3: Draft theCompetency Statements Step 4: EstablishCompetency Measurability Step 5: Develop CompetencyAssessments Step 6: Adopt and ImplementCompetencies in Learning Journey and Credentialing Systems Step 7: Evaluate Impact OverTime The model addresses the importance of situating competencies within a professional learning context using a backward design approach. In doing so, the model aims to elevate the work of designing competencies from merely developing a list of expectations to in-depth analysis and design, with the goal of developing competencies that can be readily used for assessment and career pathway development. Each step in the CDPM is treated as a chapter, and each chapter identifies the central question that must be answered, provides an overview of the tasks in the step, and illustrates the steps in action through the two case examples. Each chapter concludes with "Your Turn"—guiding questions for the reader to apply the step to their own context.

What if educational programs designed curriculum with the end in mind, teaching and assessing only the knowledge and skills necessary for success in the workplace and broader life applications? Competency-Based Education (CBE) provides an answer to questions such as this one that key stakeholders such as employers, learners, parents, and educators are asking. In this book, the authors offer a Competency Development Process Model (CDPM) with unique features that emphasize the interdependence of competencies, assessments, and a robust learning journey within a fully developed career pathway. Two case examples are used throughout the book to contextualize the CDPM. There are seven steps of the model: Step 1: Define the Problem Step 2: Establish the CompetencyFramework Step 3: Draft theCompetency Statements Step 4: EstablishCompetency Measurability Step 5: Develop CompetencyAssessments Step 6: Adopt and ImplementCompetencies in Learning Journey and Credentialing Systems Step 7: Evaluate Impact OverTime The model addresses the importance of situating competencies within a professional learning context using a backward design approach. In doing so, the model aims to elevate the work of designing competencies from merely developing a list of expectations to in-depth analysis and design, with the goal of developing competencies that can be readily used for assessment and career pathway development. Each step in the CDPM is treated as a chapter, and each chapter identifies the central question that must be answered, provides an overview of the tasks in the step, and illustrates the steps in action through the two case examples. Each chapter concludes with "Your Turn"—guiding questions for the reader to apply the step to their own context.