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In this prospective study home literacy is considered a multifaceted phenomenon consisting of a frequency or exposure facet (opportunity), an instruction quality facet, a parent-child cooperation facet, and a social-emotional quality facet. In a multiethnic, partly bilingual sample of 89 families with 4-year-old children, living in inner-city areas in the Netherlands, measures of home literacy were taken by means of interviews with the parents and observations of parent-child book reading interactions when the target children were ages 4, 5, and 6 years. At age 7, by the end of Grade 1, after nearly 1 year of formal reading instruction, vocabulary, word decoding, and reading comprehension were assessed using standard tests. Vocabulary at age 4 and an index of the predominant language used at home were also measured in order to be used as covariates. Correlational and multiple regression analyses supported the hypothesis that home literacy is multifaceted. Home literacy facets together predicted more variance in language and achievement measures at age 7 than each of them separately. Structural equations analysis also supported two additional hypotheses of the present research. First, the effects of background factors (SES, ethnicity, parents' own literacy practices) on language development and reading achievement in school were fully mediated by home literacy, home language, and early vocabulary. Second, even after controlling for the effects of early vocabulary and predominant home language, there remained statistically significant effects of home literacy, in particular, opportunity, instruction quality, and cooperation quality. (Abstract taken from JSTOR.)

Parents and students in a growing number of schools can track fluctuations in a grade-point average from the nearest computer in real time, a ritual that can become as addictive as watching political polls or a stock-market index.

Most kids under 2 are parked in front of the electronic babysitter every day. Author Lisa Guernsey explains how the tube impacts the smallest couch potatoes. A worthwhile article that explains some of the reasoning behind children's television. I can only assume that the book would be worth checking out too.

A few weeks ago, a study connected TV watching to ADHD. But the findings have been blown way out of proportion.

The general website for the Bilingual Research Journal, a journal of the National Association for Bilingual Education and the Southwest Center for Education Equity and Language Diversity, this site contains full-text articles focusing on bilingual education, available in PDF format.

A partnership between the software giant and the Philadelphia School District is an innovative solution to an urban crisis. But can public education survive private management?

It turns out that reading aloud to your child is a violent act.

First Amendment attorney and author Marjorie Heins argues that obscenity laws do children more harm than good.

While girls surge ahead in all subjects at school, boys are lagging behind. Is "girl power" to blame? Do boys need their own dose of "empowerment"?

The British tackled their own education gender gap by letting boys be boys -- with mixed results.