Teaching Young Children: An Introduction

Offering a curriculum focus, this is one of the most accessible introductory early childhood texts.  It’s an engaging introduction to practical developmentally appropriate practice.

 

Teaching Young Children is organized around five essential elements of early education—understanding child development, play, guidance, working with families and communities, and diversity. These elements are clearly identified and explored in the prose, through boxed features in every chapter, and in one chapter devoted to each essential element. The book also presents many concrete applications strategies so that you’ll know exactly what to do, including what traits and behaviors to observe and factors to consider and reflect upon in order to insure that you have a firm grasp on each child’s interest and abilities—essential to planning learning activities.

 

Michael Henniger is professor of early childhood education at Western Washington University, where he currently serves as Associate Dean of the Woodring College of Education. Prior to this and other administrative assignments, he taught early childhood education courses at Southern Illinois University at Carbondale, Central Washington University, Northern Illinois University, and Western Washington University for a total of 22 years. University teaching interests include preschool and primary curriculum, play, learning environments, and family/community involvement in education. While completing his doctoral degree at the University of Texas at Austin, Dr. Henniger taught preschool children in the university lab school. His public school experiences were in rural Alaska, where he taught first and second grades and high school mathematics.

 

In addition to numerous articles and presentations on play, playgrounds, parent/community involvement, and technology for young children, Dr. Henniger has authored/co-authored the following books: Working with Parents of Handicapped Children (with Elizabeth Nesselroad); American Education (7^th Edition) (with John Johansen and James Johnson); The Teaching Experience: An Introduction to Reflective Practice;and Teaching Young Children: An Introduction (4^th Edition).

 

Dr. Henniger’s professional and research interests include promoting the importance of indoor and outdoor play experiences for young children, multicultural toys and games, the role of technology in the lives of young children, and family/community involvement strategies. Recent research opportunities have led to a deeper knowledge of integrating curriculum through project learning, curriculum options for infants and toddlers, and health and fitness issues for young children and their families.