Head Start REDI Project

Karen Bierman

PI: Karen Bierman

Celene Domitrovich

Co-PI:Celene Domitrovich

NIH/NICHD 2R01HD046064-09
Administered in: Liberal Arts

Abstract:

The Head Start REDI project began in 2002 with a randomized trial of curriculum and professional development components designed to enhance the impact of Head Start on child school readiness. Two domains of school readiness were targeted: 1) language development/emergent literacy skills, and 2) social-emotional competencies. The program produced improvements in teaching quality in REDI classrooms, including enhanced teacher language use, instructional support, and emotion coaching. Children who received REDI showed enhanced outcomes on measures of vocabulary, emergent literacy skills, social competence, and learning engagement, and reduced aggression at the end of the Head Start year. Currently, REDI is extending these findings in two ways: 1) conducting follow-up assessments with children who participated in the initial trial to evaluate the long-term effects of the REDI program on child school adjustment in the later elementary years (grades three and five), and 2) evaluating the added benefit of a parent-focused extension of the REDI program using a randomized controlled design with a new sample of 200 children attending Head Start classrooms in the original counties.

REDI-3: A pilot project for parents of three-year-olds

In 2010, the School Readiness Research Group received an Administrative Supplement to the REDI grant to pilot test a parenting program for parents of three-year-old children attending Head Start. This project involves a small-scale program development and feasibility trial of a home visitation program modeled after the REDI-P parenting program and the Focus on Learning home visiting intervention.