Home / Educators / Professional Development (3 - 5 YEARS) / The Roots of Early Learning
- Introduction
- Build Strong Relationships
- Offer Interesting Learning Opportunities
- Try It
- Wrap Up
- Learning Guidelines and Standards
- getting in tune: making an emotional connection with a child; paying full attention to her verbal communications and nonverbal signals and responding in ways that strengthen your relationship; also known as synchrony
- powerful interaction: an interchange between an educator and a child in which the educator uses what she knows and observes about a child to make an emotional connection and purposefully extend the child’s learning
- primary caregiver: the educator who has primary responsibility for a particular baby, builds an enduring relationship with him and his family, and can help him connect with others in the program
- STEM: science, technology, engineering, and mathematics as interrelated areas of learning; for babies and toddlers, STEM means learning how the world works and developing concepts like cause/effect, space and time, how much and how many, order and sequence, and how to use tools and strategies to accomplish a goal
- whole-child approach: providing learning opportunities that support children’s development and their pursuit of their own learning agendas, rather than teaching particular subject matter; focusing on a child’s interests, feelings, and physical, social, and emotional development along with his cognitive and language skills
Learning Guidelines and Standards
The content of this tutorial aligns with Massachusetts learning guidelines and standards.
Massachusetts Early Learning Guidelines for Infants and Toddlers
This module highlights the Guiding Principles that provide the foundation for the Massachusetts Early Learning Guidelines for Infants and Toddlers:
- The family, as defined by each culture, is the primary system of support for the development of the child.
- Learning is embedded in the child’s culture. Young children learn best through a comprehensive, whole-child approach integrated in culturally meaningful experiences.
- Nurturing, respectful, and responsive relationships are essential for healthy growth and development, providing a context for learning.
- Each child develops at an individual rate and has a personal approach to learning.
- Rich, responsive language experiences, in the family’s home language when possible, prime children for later academic success.
- Play is the foundation of early learning.
- Learning in each domain is interconnected.
- Informed, reflective, curious adults can support and respond to the infant and toddler’s rapidly changing needs and development.
This module showcases interactions among educators, infants and toddlers, and family members that support children’s development in the interrelated domains of social-emotional development, language and communication development, cognitive development, physical health and well-being, and approaches to learning. However, this module does not go into depth on specific guidelines within these domains.
Massachusetts Quality Rating and Improvement System (QRIS)
Center and School Based:
- Curriculum and Learning 1A: Curriculum, Assessment, and Diversity: Level 2 Materials that promote cultural and individual identity, family relations, cultural appreciation, and cognitive and social development are integrated into the curriculum and children’s everyday experiences.
- Curriculum and Learning 1B: Teacher-Child Relationships and Interactions: Level 2 All staff complete orientation, participate in ongoing formal professional development, and receive supervision in how to develop and maintain positive relationships through positive, warm, and nurturing interactions.
Family Child Care:
- Curriculum and Learning 1B: Teacher-Child Relationships and Interactions: Level 2 Educator has participated in formal professional development on how to support positive relationships and interactions with children through positive, warm and nurturing interactions.