Study Highlights
Understanding the Early Years is a national initiative that provides research information to help strengthen the capacity of communities to make informed decisions about the best policies and most appropriate programs to serve families with young children. It seeks to provide information about the influence of community factors on children's development and to enhance community capacity to use this data to monitor both early childhood development and to create effective community-based responses. Understanding the Early Years uses three main components (discussed on page 6) to collect data about the community's children from their parents, teachers and the children themselves. It also gathers information about the community environment in which the children are living.
This report is based on research conducted in the community of North York, Ontario — now incorporated into the new city of Toronto as the North Quadrant. The community is both ethnically and culturally diverse, with a large immigrant population and many children whose mother tongue was other than the official languages. Nearly one-quarter of the kindergarten children in the North York sample were living in lone-parent families. Close to half of the parents had completed a college or university degree.
The children in North York scored better on all indicators of behaviour than national and provincial averages, but scores on receptive language assessments were poorer than national and provincial averages. Most of the children were in good health.
Positive parenting practices have been associated with positive behavioural development, which the research in North York confirms. It has generally been accepted that a mother's education has an important impact on a child's level of vocabulary development — a finding also confirmed with this research. Use of educational resources was also linked to enhanced development. Lower scores on learning assessments, however, were seen in children whose families felt they encountered many barriers to participation in community programs and services.
Overall, most parents had positive views of their neighbourhoods and of the larger North York community. Resources were perceived to be readily available and families were functioning with high levels of social support and highly-rated parenting skills.
What's New
