DAP – NAEYC

  • Defines and describes principles of DAP in early childhood programs for teachers, parents, policymakers, and others who make decision about the care and education of young children.
  • Facilities serving children from birth to age 8.
  • 12 Principles of Child Development and Learning
  1. All areas of development and learning are important.
    1. Domains of children’s development (physical, social, emotional, and cognitive) are closely related. Development in one domain influences and influenced by in other domains.
  2. Learning and development follow sequences.
    1. Later abilities, skills and knowledge are built on those already acquired.
  3. Development and learning proceed at varying rates.
    1. Vary from child to child and within diff. areas of child’s functioning.
  4. Development and learning result from an interaction of maturation and experience.
  5. Early experiences have profound effects on development and learning.
  6. Development proceeds toward greater complexity, self-regulation, and symbolic or representational capacities.
  7. Children develop best when they have secure relationships.
  8. Development and learning occur in and are influenced by multiple social and cultural contexts.
  9. Children learn in a variety of ways.
  10. Play is an important vehicle for developing self-regulation and promoting language, cognition, and social competence.
  11. Development and learning advance when children are challenged.
  12. Children’s experiences shape their motivation and approaches to learning.
  • 10 Effective DAP Teaching Strategies
  1. Acknowledge what children do or say. Let children know that we have noticed by giving positive attention, sometimes through comments, sometimes through just sitting nearby and observing. (“Thanks for your help, Kavi.” “You found another way to show 5.”)
  2. Encourage persistence and effort rather than just praising and evaluating what the child has done. (“You’re thinking of lots of words to describe the dog in the story. Let’s keep going!”)
  3. Give specific feedback rather than general comments. (“The beanbag didn’t get all the way to the hoop, James, so you might try throwing it harder.”)
  4. Model attitudes, ways of approaching problems, and behavior toward others, showing children rather than just telling them (“Hmm, that didn’t work and I need to think about why.” “I’m sorry, Ben, I missed part of what you said. Please tell me again.”)
  5. Demonstrate the correct way to do something. This usually involves a procedure that needs to be done in a certain way (such as using a wire whisk or writing the letter P).
  6. Create or add challenge so that a task goes a bit beyond what the children can already do. For example, you lay out a collection of chips, count them together and then ask a small group of children to tell you how many are left after they see you removing some of the chips. The children count the remaining chips to help come up with the answer. To add a challenge, you could hide the chips after you remove some, and the children will have to use a strategy other than counting the remaining chips to come up with the answer. To reduce challenge, you could simplify the task by guiding the children to touch each chip once as they count the remaining chips.
  7. Ask questions that provoke children’s thinking. (“If you couldn’t talk to your partner, how else could you let him know what to do?”)
  8. Give assistance (such as a cue or hint) to help children work on the edge of their current competence (“Can you think of a word that rhymes with your name, Matt? How about bat . . . Matt/bat? What else rhymes with Matt andbat?”)
  9. Provide information, directly giving children facts, verbal labels, and other information. (“This one that looks like a big mouse with a short tail is called a vole.”)
  10. Give directions for children’s action or behavior. (“Touch each block only once as you count them.” “You want to move that icon over here? Okay, click on it and hold down, then drag it to wherever you want.”)

DAP is informed by three areas of knowledge that are critical components in making good decisions for children.

1. Child development appropriateness

Child development follows general, sequential patterns and is interrelated across domains (cognitive, physical, social and emotional). Know and understand milestones and sequences of development in all domains and use child development information for planning and identifying activities, environments, experiences, and strategies (for large/small groups or individuals) to best promote growth and learning.

2. Individual appropriateness

Each child is an individual and develops in her own, unique way. Know each child’s strengths, abilities, needs, challenges, interests, temperament, and approaches to learning. Know their individual skills, ideas and joys. This can be done through time spent together (conversations, etc.), observation, assessment, work samples, documentation, and information from families and past teachers/programs.

3. Social and cultural appropriateness

All children are of culture. Know each child’s cultural and family background – his unique family, values, language, lifestyles, and beliefs. Ensure that the experiences you provide respect these and are meaningful for each child/family. What makes sense to children is their own culture and teachers must consider this, along with overall child development and  learning program.

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