Developmentally appropriate teaching practices encompass a wide range of skills and strategies that are adapted to the age, development, individual characteristics, and the family and social and cultural contexts of each child served.
Observing, documenting, and assessing each child’s development and learning are essential processes for educators and programs to plan, implement, and evaluate the effectiveness of the experiences they provide to children.
Because early childhood education settings are often among children’s first communities outside the home, the character of these communities is very influential in children’s development.
NAEYC defines “developmentally appropriate practice” as methods that promote each child’s optimal development and learning through a strengths-based, play-based approach to joyful, engaged learning.
Each and every child, birth through age 8, has the right to equitable learning opportunities—in centers, family child care homes, or schools—that fully support their optimal development and learning across all domains and content areas.
This position statement, one of five foundational documents developed by NAEYC in collaboration with the early childhood profession to advance high-quality early learning for all young children, defines DAP.
Educators who engage in developmentally appropriate practice foster young children’s joyful learning and maximize the opportunities for each and every child to achieve their full potential.
The extent to which educators can fully implement developmentally appropriate practice depends, as efforts to advance equity also do, on decisions at many levels, including program administration, professional development, policy, and more.
NAEYC’s guidelines and recommendations for developmentally appropriate practice are based on the following nine principles and their implications for early childhood education professional practice.
While many of the recommendations have changed considerably over the years, the primary focus of DAP remains the same: NAEYC emphasizes the importance of the relationships between children and well-prepared early childhood educators.
We gathered insights from individuals with various perspectives and roles in early childhood. Here, you will read excerpts of what some of them would share with families about supporting children during this period of rapid change.
The practice of an intentional morning greeting is something that can empower young children to embrace their day and their learning. Young children may be experiencing challenges or anxieties beyond the classroom, whether we are aware of them or not.
The three de-escalation activities detailed here can be useful in targeting anxiety—two are used for de-escalating children’s anxious behaviors, and the third assists children in identifying the cause of their anxiety and in developing coping skills.
Authored by
Authored by:
Sierra L. Brown, Allison McCobin, Stephanie Easley, Kara E. McGoey
Here are three strategies you (as the teacher) can use to help families turn picture books into tools to prompt rich conversations about expressing feelings, gaining self-esteem, showing perseverance, and many other important skills.
This is the first article in a two-part series that explores promoting children’s identity, agency, and voice regarding race through picture books. Included in this article are three exemplary books that early childhood educators can use to foster critica
Children need help making sense of what they are seeing and hearing. These conversations also offer us important teachable moments to engage young children in discussion about their identities, human diversity, fairness and unfairness, and the right of pe
Through inquiry, teachers and young children can create authentic, organic learning that informs their understanding of themselves, of others, and of the world they live in.
