Below are resources for early childhood professionals and those serving the early childhood community.

Report: Community Colleges Play Important Role in Preparing Early Educators  Offering programs that better fit early educators’ schedules, allowing flexibility in completing practicum requirements, and integrating remedial education with credit-bearing coursework are a few of the ways community colleges are helping early educators gain greater access to postsecondary education opportunities, according to a new report from Bellwether Education Partners. (Education Dive)

Community Systems Development Partnership Illinois Action for Children is pleased to announce a new partnership with the Illinois State Board of Education to provide a system of statewide supports for early childhood community systems development! This will include training, technical assistance, and coaching to community collaborations that are focused on enrollment of high-need children ages 0-5 into high-quality early learning programs.

Back-and-forth exchanges boost children’s brain response to language  Massachusetts Institute of Technology released a study detailing how a conversation between an adult and a child alters a child’s brain. Study finds engaging young children in conversation is more important for brain development than “dumping words” on them.

Babies can spot language, even when it’s not spoken  The American Association for the Advancement of Science’s (AAAS) publication Science featured new research from the University of California supporting infant understanding of human language, even when they can’t speak it themselves. Overall, the research presents a consideration for a critical development window in language learning for children.

Early Ed Essentials: Testing New Surveys to Inform Program Improvement The UChicago Consortium and the Ounce of Prevention Fund  partnered to develop and test teacher and parent surveys designed to measure organizational conditions in early childhood education (ECE) programs. A new six-page snapshot highlights key findings from the recent validation study, which found the surveys to be reliable and valid. Full details about the validation can be found in the technical report.