Rights & Needs of Young Children
Defending the Early Years
DEY’s Mission
approaches to learning informed by child development theory and evidence-based research.
DEY’s Primary Goals
- To advocate at the grassroots, local, state, regional, and federal levels for education policies based on child development theory and research.
- To mobilize the early childhood community to speak up for age-appropriate standards, assessments, and classroom practices that are based on research.
- To promote appropriate practices in early childhood classrooms and to support educators in counteracting policies and practices that undermine whole child health and optimal learning.
What’s New at DEY?
Day 1: Embracing Equity in ECEC as a Form of Resistance
Day 2: Diversity is Not Divisive: Teaching Truth to Promote Inclusivity in the Early Years
Day 3: Fostering Care For the Environment in Young Children: An Educator’s Approach to Climate Change
We’re thrilled to announce the release of our newest resource for the campaign, In Defense of ECEC: Restoring the Link Between High Quality and Child Development. This advocacy toolkit is a powerful new resource designed to equip early childhood educators, advocates, and leaders with clear, compelling messaging that links what we know about child development to what we do in practice and policy.
Click on the image to download the toolkit and join us on Thursday, May 29th, at 7 pm EDT for an informational webinar.
Do you want to explore the toolkit in depth? Become a monthly subscriber to our Reflective Practitioner Series and join our next course: In Defense of Quality- A Reflective Course on Whole-Child Development in ECEC.
In this Episode, Kisha chats with Megan about her work as a nature-based curriculum specialist. Megan Gessler, Curriculum Director for Little Explorers, is the founder of three internationally renowned nature-based early education programs.
The DEY Podcast with Kisha Reid is a monthly discussion-styled show featuring educators, advocates and other changemakers about their grassroots projects, innovations in education and reimagining early childhood environments. Our goal is to amplify these voices so we can all learn and work toward a more equitable and playful environment for children. Check out all episodes here.
Check out our latest DEY Dialogue. Denisha talks with Deb Lawrence, President of the International Play Association USA Chapter, about the release of their 50th anniversary white paper and policy briefs.
Moderated by DEY Executive Director Denisha Jones, these dialogues aim to inspire and reaffirm our dedication to protecting and nurturing childhood. Join us in this important mission of defending childhood and advocating for the well-being of society’s youngest members.
Check out our previous dialogues on quality in ECEC, resisting book bans, and concerns about the Science of Reading here.
DEY National Advisor and neuroscientist Kaliris Salas-Ramirez offers this month’s feature on Our Skin, written by Megan Madison, Jessica Rali, and Isabel Roxas. You can find all of our Banned Book Club features here!
DEY continues to resist the attempts to censor children’s literature that explores race, gender, sexual orientation, and the truth about our country’s history. Each month, we will feature a banned early childhood book that we encourage you to read to the children in your life.
Are you interested in sharing a banned book? Email denishajones@dey.org.
DEY has released a new framework to support early childhood educators, caregivers, and parents in supporting young children’s healthy racial identity development. Fostering Healthy Identity Development in Young Children: Affirming Race, Culture, and Ethnicity in the Early Years is a framework for early childhood educators, caregivers, and parents to understand how racial identity develops and to support healthy development in the early years. Click on the read more button to download the framework.
Did you miss our webinar introducing the framework as part of the 2025 National Black Lives Matter at School Week of Action? You can watch the recording below!
Also check out the DEY 2025 BLMAS Resource List here!
Did you miss our book talk with Jesse Hagopian about his new book, Teach Truth: The Struggle for Anti-Racist Education? You can watch the recording here! Thank you to AFT Massachusetts, Boston Teachers Union, and Haymarket Books for co-sponsoring the event.
Also, be sure to register for the Summer Institute to hear Jesse Hagopian give the Day 2 keynote!
Decades of research illustrate Head Start’s effectiveness and its ability to meet the unique needs of local communities—along with the crucial role it plays in state and local economies.
Denisha talks with Rixa Evershed and Aidn White about applying ECEC values Equity, Truth, and Care to global challenges.
Author Rob Sanders features Book Comes Home: A Banned Book’s Journey for the DEY Banned Book Club.
In this episode, Kisha chats with Rusty Keeler about his unique journey to adventurous play. Rusty offers practical advice on incorporating adventure play into your home or program. From Tasmania to Texas, Rusty Keeler has spent the last 30 years traveling the world designing and advocating for children’s play.
Our puppetry collective Hermafrodita is based in the south of Quito, Ecuador’s capital city, and thanks to DEY’s mini-grant, we were able to provide a full arts program for kids in three underprivileged child care centers across the city. Our program’s primary objective was to validate and nurture children’s freedom of self-expression, creativity, and identity by widening the scope of gender roles through the arts.
DEY seeks to rally parents and educators to take action on policies affecting the education of young children, by encouraging them to speak out with well-reasoned arguments against inappropriate standards, assessments, and classroom practices.
DEY provides mini-grants of between $200 and $500 to individuals and organizations to help foster work in communities across the country. DEY’s first mini-grant, awarded in 2014, resulted in a rally for play that took place in Minneapolis.
DEY
Are you concerned about the direction that education policy is going? We are, too!
Help DEY continue its important work advocating for appropriate education for young children. Please Consider Making a Donation.
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