Professionalization as an advocacy strategy: a content analysis of Canadian child care social movement organizations’ 2008 discursive resources

Do early childhood education and care (ECEC) professionals make good advocates? Canadian advocates have fought for better child care policies since the mid-1940s. What has happened to this advocacy with the recent increased professionalization of the ECEC sector? How does increased professionalization limit, innovate or expand advocacy strategies? This content analysis of seven Canadian child care social movement organizations’ discursive resources in 2008 examines how different types of child care social movement organizations communicated their positions to their members and the public to manage a changing economic and political climate. Preliminary findings indicate that both ECEC workforce sector associations and grassroots organizations shared common advocacy messages, played down problems associated with a market approach to child care, and framed child care as a business case in their messaging. The authors suggest this reflects a nascent discursive move towards the professionalization of Canadian child care movement advocacy messages.     

The Assimilation of In-Laws: The Impact of Newcomers on the Communication Routines of Families

Although our popular culture stereotypes relationships with in-laws as problematic, these relationships have largely been overlooked by communication researchers. In contrast to existing studies focusing on dyadic relationships, this study looked at how in-laws are assimilated into the family group as newcomers, using structuration theory to examine how routines are reproduced in families. In personal interviews, participants described how their families had assimilated newcomers or how they themselves were received into their spouse's families. A thematic analysis revealed specific communication routines that had to be adjusted upon entry of newcomers, including conversational topics, expected amount of interaction, use of joking, and conversational styles. Adjustments to these routines, although difficult to negotiate because they were not openly discussed, helped to transform the family of childhood into the family of adulthood. Structuration theory would suggest that the perceived stress in relationships with in-laws occurs because newcomers upset the comfort of families by disrupting their communication routines.     

Civic Engagement Among Community College Students Through Service Learning

Higher education has been called upon to prepare its graduates to be civically engaged community members. Since the 1980s, faculty have taken up this call. Service learning is a common strategy that educators have adopted to stimulate civic engagement in students. In this study, service learning students and nonservice learning students from eight community colleges were given precourse and postcourse surveys on civic engagement. Results revealed a statistically significant increase in service learners’ civic engagement when compared to nonservice learners. The findings are consistent with other higher education studies that use an expanded definition of civic engagement.     

Fostering Parental Support for Children's Mathematical Development: An Intervention with Head Start Families

The first national education goal, school readiness, recognizes a need for young children to be better prepared for entry into elementary school. Many low-income children exhibit a pattern of underachievement in school mathematics. Research has revealed a developmental gap between low-income preschool children and their middle-class peers with respect to the extent of their numerical knowledge. Research has also found that many low-income children do not receive a broad base of support for mathematical development at home or in preschool. In each of two studies, we conducted a bi-generation (parent and child) mathematics intervention with Head Start families. The intervention was designed to enhance parental support for pre-kindergarten children's mathematical development. It was found that low-income parents were willing and able to support this area of their children's development once they were provided with the training to do so. The support that parents provided to their children through the intervention was clearly effective in enhancing the development of children's informal mathematical knowledge. Intervention children developed more extensive mathematical knowledge than a comparison group of low-income children. Thus, an important step toward achieving the school readiness goal can be taken by fostering low- income parents' support for young children's mathematical development.     

Book Reviews

Horace Mann: Educational Statesman. By E. I. F. Williams. Illustrated. The Macmillan Co. 354 pp. $1.50.

Recollections and Reflections. By J. J. Thomson. The Macmillan Co. 451 pp. $4.00.

The Woodrow Wilsons. By Eleanor Wilson McAdoo in collaboration with Margaret Y. Gaffey. Illustrated. The Macmillan Co. 301 pp. $3.50.

Glimpses into the Long Ago and a Brave Young Land. By Edna McGuire. First two volumes in a series of History texts for the Elementary School. Illustrated. The Macmillan Co. 333 and 392 pp. $.96 and $1.08.

Measuring Intelligence. A Guide to the Administration of the New Revised Stanford-Binet Tests of Intelligence. By Lewis M. Terman and Maud A. Merrill. Houghton Mifflin Co. 461 pp. $2.25.

My Typewriter and I. By Nellie Louise Merrick, Robert Frederick Bown, and August Dvorak. Foreword by Alfred L. Hall-Quest. American Book Co. 363 pp. $2.20.

Naturalism in American Education. By Geoffrey O'Connell. The Catholic University of America. 219 pp.

Philosophy of Education. By Rupert C. Lodge. Harper and Brothers. 328 pp. $2.00.

Secondary School Teaching. By J. G. Umstattd. Ginn and Co. 459 pp. $3.00.

As of the Gods. By Walter Rollo Brown. D. Appleton-Century Co. 237 pp. $2.00.

Death Stops the Rehearsal. By Richard M. Baker. Charles Scribner's Sons. 335 pp. $2.00.

Notable Short Stories. Selected and Edited by Raymond McFarland. The Macmillan Co. 423 pp. $1.00.

Storm in a Teacup. By Gus March-Phillips. E. P. Dutton and Co. 304 pp. $2.00.

The Long Death. By George Dyer. A Catalyst Club Mystery. Charles Scribner's Sons. 250 pp. $2.00.

Dine at Home with Rector: A Book on What Men Like, Why They Like It, and How to Cook It. By George Rector. Preface by Arthur “Bugs” Baer. E. P. Dutton and Co. 248 pp. $2.50.

For Readers Only. By J. Penn. Cartoons by Low. E. P. Dutton and Co. 289 pp. $2.50.

Forty Years on Main Street. By William Allen White. Illustrated. Farrar and Reinhart. 409 pp. $3.00.

Look Through the Bars. By Ernst Toller. Farrar and Rinehart. 310 pp. $2.75.

Suns Go Down. By Flannery Lewis. The Macmillan Co. 226 pp. $2.00.

A Declaration of Interdependence. By H. A. Overstreet. W. W. Norton and Co. 284 pp. $3.00.

The Dangerous Sea. By George Slocomb. The Macmillan Co. 286 pp. $2.50.