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This working paper is part of the Studies in Early Transitions series emerging from "Young Lives", a 15-year longitudinal study of childhood poverty in Ethiopia, India, Peru and Vietnam. It explores recent trends for children growing up in Andhra Pradesh, one of India's most populous states, based on Young Lives survey data collected for a sample of 1950 young children born in 2001 plus in-depth qualitative research. The paper discusses how poverty levels and location are strongly predictive of whether children attend government or private pre-school. It highlights policy challenges stemming from weak governance of the pre-school sector, notably how the relatively-unregulated and rapidly-growing private sector offers to initiate children into formal learning, in English, from a much earlier age than normally considered to be developmentally appropriate. And it identifies how government provision could be improved and strengthened. "Young Lives" communities description is appended. (Contains 4 tables, 2 figures and 8 footnotes.) [An earlier version of this paper was published as Working Paper 52 in "Young Lives'" own Working Paper series.]

Part of the "Studies in Early Transitions" series, this Working Paper draws on interviews and observations carried out as part of "Young Lives", a 15-year longitudinal study of childhood poverty in Ethiopia, India, Peru and Vietnam based at the University of Oxford's Department of International Development. This paper focuses on the challenges of translating into practice the potential of quality early childhood care and education to transform young lives. These include building a positive equity agenda, setting clear policy objectives, raising quality standards, building the skills and motivation of teachers, and recognising where equity goals can be incompatible with a market-led private system. The paper asks which children do and do not have access to an early childhood programme, and explores children's and parents' views about the quality of what is on offer. A brief summary of data collection methods is appended. (Contains 2 boxes, 21 figures and 9 footnotes.)

Children face many important changes in the first eight years of life, including different learning centres, social groups, roles and expectations. Their ability to adapt to such a dynamic and evolving environment directly affects their sense of identity and status within their community over the short and long term. In particular, the key turning points in children's lives--such as "graduating" from kindergarten to primary school or going through a culturally specific rite of passage--provide challenges and opportunities for learning and growth on multiple levels. This paper provides a review of the major perspectives in research on early childhood transitions and reveals the predominant areas of focus in both academic and professional studies, as well as important neglected viewpoints and study populations. Beginning with a broad and inclusive definition of the topic, the authors provide an overview of early childhood transitions research, highlighting the underlying assumptions that informed the studies. They assess concepts in the developmental theory that preceded transitions research as well as in the logic that determines how transitions are structured. More recent approaches are examined, including systems theories and the role of children as active participants in transitions. Several examples in this review show how multidisciplinary collaboration and culturally sensitive interventions can result in better participation of both parents and children in crucial early childhood transitions. Citing the need to harmonise early childhood education and care programmes with local education practices, the authors stress the value of greater transparency in the creation of policy and programming for children, in order to identify potentially limiting assumptions. Broadening and diversifying perspectives on transitions can lead to more integrated and culturally relevant rights-based early childhood programmes worldwide. A glossary and a bibliography are included. (Contains 7 footnotes.)

A right to development is one of the basic principles of the UN Convention on the Rights of the Child. Several articles are specifically about protecting and promoting children's development, and other articles refer to developmental concepts of maturity and evolving capacity. Realizing young children's right to development is informed by numerous sources: cultural understandings, beliefs and values as well as scientific knowledge and theories. I offer two contrasting ways of thinking about children's rights to development. The first is summarised as three "Ns", emphasising "normal" development, children's "nature" and their "needs". The second is summarised as three "Cs": recognising that development is "contextual", "cultural" and respecting children's "competencies". I explore the potential as well as the limitations of each approach, drawing attention to the tension between universalistic theories and the plurality of pathways through childhood, the respects in which development is a natural versus socio-cultural process, and the implications of recognizing children as active participants, with their own perspective on child development issues, while at the same time ensuring they are adequately guided and protected.

This book describes an experimental compensatory preschool program carried out in England between 1968 and 1973. The program combined a traditional nursery program with a daily 20-minute period focusing on specific language and perceptual activities. Experimental and control subjects, 237 in all, were selected from four state supported nursery schools. The program was conducted in the regular classroom during the school day. A modified version of the Peabody Language Development Kit was used as the primary teaching device for the development of language skills. Perceptual training involved specially planned activities (such as cutting, drawing and sewing) as well as a variety of published games which emphasized matching and sorting. In addition, a parent involvement program was carried out in one nursery school. This program consisted of parent meetings (1970), parent participation in the nursery program (1971), and creative activity sessions for groups of parents (1971). Evaluation of the overall nursery program indicated significant differences in the language development of the experimental children in comparison to the controls at the end of the nursery school term. These experimental-control differences were short-lived, however, and tended to disappear soon after the children entered the infant schools at age 5. Results were discussed in terms of teaching and evaluation instruments used and in terms of the discontinuity in teaching objectives and methods between the nursery and infant schools. (BD)