Empowering children and families for a brighter future.
About Culture, Families, and Early Development Lab at NYU
Our research focuses on family practices and the role these play in young children’s early learning and development. We adopt a collaborative research stance, working in partnership with early childhood programs serving families from culturally and linguistically minoritized communities. The overarching goal of our work is to identify and understand the unique ways primary caregivers, especially those from Spanish-speaking and Spanish-English bilingual immigrant families, support their young children's early learning at home and at school.
Through our work, we contribute new knowledge to developmental science that centers Latine families’ voices, perspectives, and practices. The work conducted at the CFD team reflects our joint commitment to address systemic inequities faced by children from minoritized and marginalized communities in the US and Latin America. Our work spans three main areas: Family Language and Literacy Practices, Family STEM Practices, and Family-School Connections.
Family Language and Literacy Practices
We examine the family practices supporting the development of oral language skills that are foundational for children's early literacy learning, especially with Spanish-speaking and Spanish-English bilingual children.
Family STEM Practices
We seek to identify and understand the everyday family practices that support the development of early STEM skills, in particular for Spanish-speaking and Spanish-English bilingual children.
Family-School Connections
We investigate the diverse ways Latine families' are engaged with their children’s early school-based learning.
Why “Latine”?
Our team uses the term Latine, instead of Latino or Latinx, as the linguistically appropriate gender-neutral term. For an elaboration of the reasons behind our choice, see Melzi et al 2021.