Diverse Classroom Collection

Every classroom is unique and for many you will have an mix of children from different cultural or even traumatic backgrounds. This collection gives you all the tools you will need to address every child under your care with the most updated theory and practice available from experts that have worked directly in the field. Save 25% when you order these books together.

Bridging the Relationship Gap

Relationships play an important role in human development, especially in the first years of life. Bridging the Relationship Gap provides tools and encouragement to be the strong, positive, and nurturing adult these children need in order to thrive.

Learn more about the factors that contribute to the achievement and relationship gap including ecological, biological, and cultural differences. Most importantly, find many tools and resources to help you more effectively deal with the tough situations and become each child's strongest ally.

200 pages

Awards

Celebrate! 2nd Edition

Since demographics have changed in early childhood programs, questions of how, when, and which holidays to celebrate have also become more complex and controversial. This guide provides educators with a toolbox for:

• Developing inclusive policies
• Evaluating holiday activities for appropriateness
• Addressing commercialism and stereotypes
• Involving families

Includes reproducible holiday policies, sample questionnaires for families, and a sample Holiday Practices Improvement Plan to adapt to assess the strengths and weaknesses of your own holiday activities. This hands-on guide helps you celebrate holidays in your early learning program in culturally responsive, respectful, and inclusive ways.

200 pages

Creating Diversity-Rich Environments

Early childhood educators have the power to help all children learn to respect themselves and others. Creating Diversity-Rich Environments for Young Children is an easy-to-use guide that shows how early childhood professionals can create a positive and inclusive environment for children of all cultures.

The newest addition in the Redleaf Press Quick Guide series includes elements of the National Association for the Education of Young Children’s (NAEYC) developmentally appropriate practice and ethical standards; and correlations to the recommendations from the 2019 NAEYC position statement on Advancing Equity in Early Childhood Education". As well as early childhood progress indicators and best practices in adult learning.

Guides for reflection and planning for educators, cross-cultural competence and self-assessment checklists, and recommended resources are included to further assist educators.

88 pages

The Many Stories of Our Beloved Community

Join author Rukia Monique Rogers for an intimate and inspiring look at the values, practices, and relationships of the Highlander School in Atlanta, Georgia, rooted in the vision of the beloved community as espoused by Reverend Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. Sharing abundant stories and rich photography from the school, the book is both a critique of the history and status quo of how we have confined our thinking and practices and an invitation to reflect on who you are and how you want to reimagine early childhood programs. See the big picture and small details of a program that believes in the full human potential for care, love, and justice, strengthened by deep connections with the earth and each other. We invite you into a journey of profound promise and change.

Full color. 224 pages.

Inclusion Includes Us

Inclusion is not a simple recipe to follow but rather a change in attitude. Many books on inclusion focus on how an educator can adapt their interactions or learning environment to help specific children fit into a classroom, but this creates a dichotomy of “typical” and “atypical” children. This binary thinking is problematic, as it sets up certain behaviors, abilities, and cultures as “the norm,” and any behaviors, abilities, or cultures outside of this as “the other.” Educators must break out of binary thinking to remove barriers in the classroom and create bridges between community members.

Educators can create true inclusion and belonging when they replace binary thinking with constellation thinking, or the understanding that each person in the classroom has a combination of strengths, preferences, needs, and interests that creates a unique constellation. Moving to constellation thinking means thinking of each person in the classroom as an individual, regardless of diagnosis, age, culture, or any other factors. The classroom becomes a community where everyone is a contributing member and everyone belongs.

Inclusion Includes Us includes many real-life examples, practical strategies, and prompts for reflective practice to help educators include everyone—children and adults—in their programs/classrooms.

152 pages

I Like Myself

It is critical that young children begin to form a positive sense of their own identity.? I Like Myself ?uses the latest research into positive identity formation to provide practical solutions for educators. It links together lesson planning insights, academic activities, and children’s book recommendations that are designed to facilitate positive racial identity in Black children, covering topics including hair texture, skin tone, language, self-esteem, and media representation. Supplementing and complementing any curriculum, this critical resource provides information across social-emotional, academic, and fine arts domains that stay faithful to curricular goals while specifically targeting the racial identity needs of Black preschoolers. Targeting the Black identity specifically, the lessons are designed to be engaging, meaningful and effective for all students, so each child feels valued and accepted while also gaining the knowledge and skills that they need to be successful.

Featuring recommendations for over 150 children’s books to support positive identity formation in Black children and 70+ activities and ideas to pair with children’s book read-alouds.

143 pages

Responsive Practice for Dual Language Learners in Early Childhood Education

Responsive Practice for Dual Language Learners in Early Childhood Education provides educators with theoretical background and practical advice as they welcome an increasing number of dual language learners into their early childhood programs, to support these children to learn and flourish. Author Jennifer Chen shares case studies from her fieldwork with diverse early childhood classrooms, demonstrating her Four Cornerstone model of responsive practice while offering reflective questions to help educators implement it in their own contexts.

Learn to apply the Four Cornerstones model’s tenets of developmentally responsive, culturally responsive, linguistically responsive, and contextually appropriate practice in a variety of real-life situations, including while providing scaffolding for children, while building relationships with parents, and while working with children with a variety of needs.

Age Focus: 0–8. Softbound, 144 pgs.

Seeing Ourselves in Nature

In Seeing Ourselves in Nature, editor Jessica Fong asks how Black and Brown educators in the United States create space for predominantly Black and Brown children and families to reconnect to nature. Recognizing the scarcity of stories from people of the global majority in the predominately white literature surrounding nature education in the United States, Fong sought out thirteen other educators of color to share their rich and profound experiences with young children in nature. Sharing these stories is a first step in the long road to making nature education equitable for all children.

Age Focus: 0-8. Softbound. 192 Pages

Awards

Featuring chapters by:

• Ashley Brailsford, Nashville, TN
• Kameeka Shirley, Dade City, FL
• Lotus Chaney, Atlanta, GA
• Ron Grady, New Orleans, LA
• Vanessa Miot, Atlanta, GA
• Alicia Garcia, Hillsborough, FL
• Pilar Carmina Gonzalez, Los Angeles, CA
• Ranita Anderson Dawkins, Durham, NC
• Courtney Newby, Seekonk, MA
• Deja L. Jones, Newark, NJ
• Suzette Salmon, Chicago, IL
• Jasmin Field, Edgewood, MD
• Jessica Fong, Chicago, IL
• Flor Villanueva-Winter, Chicago, IL

Teaching Young Multilingual Learners

Teaching Young Multilingual Learners clarifies the myths and realities, challenges and joys of language learning and teaching. Teaching in a program where multiple languages are spoken presents complexities and challenges, but being multilingual brings so many lifelong benefits to children. With practical and effective advice, this guide honors the linguistic and socio-cultural goals of language learning of all children, including children with disabilities and other support needs, by taking a diversity and equity perspective in the work of teaching and fostering positive relationships among children, families, and staff.

88 pgs