UNC School of Education

Clinical Assistant Professor of Early Childhood, Families and Literacy

T 919.843.2048
F 919.962.1533
kcgallag@email.unc.edu

301J Peabody Hall
CB 3500

A clinical assistant professor in the School of Education and an educational psychologist, Kathleen Cranley Gallagher has worked with young children and families for 15 years, teaching and administering programs in early intervention, preschool and kindergarten settings. The emotional and social well-being of children forms the keystone of her research, teaching and service, connecting knowledge of children’s development in the context of social relationships to improve circumstances for those who may struggle in school and social environments.

Grounded in an ecological systems approach, Gallagher’s work emphasizes the development of learners in the context of complex personal and societal relationships. Influenced by Piaget, Vygotsky and Bronfenbrenner, she believes that learners develop, or change over time, as a function of engagement in increasingly complex processes of interaction. In the context of social relationships, learners construct knowledge. Central to Gallagher’s teaching philosophy are the concepts of the teacher as researcher, advocate and leader. Her philosophy of teaching fuses notions of teacher and learner as complementary ─ and sometimes indistinguishable ─ roles.

Research Overview

Kathleen Cranley Gallagher studies children's relationships and developmental competence in the context of families, peers and early education. Developmental competence refers to a holistic view of the child's developmental abilities, including emotional, social, physical and cognitive competence. An emerging confluence of research documents the importance of children's relationships for their developing brain and capacities. Gallagher's research focuses on the role of children's relationships and the mechanisms via which these relationships yield their influence on children's competence in family, peer and school contexts. She examines how children's characteristics contribute to interactions with adults and peers, and how these ongoing processes influence the child's developing social-emotional, academic and psychological competence.

Gallagher's scholarship is informed by Bronfenbrenner's ecological systems theory in which aspects of the child, the child's activities and contexts interact over time, to shape development. In one line of research, she examines contributions of children's temperament and parenting to children's adjustment, mental health, achievement and relationships with peers. She published a theoretical application of that work in Developmental Review. Recent treatments of the importance of early relationships for children's brain development were published in Young Children and the International Encyclopedia of Early Childhood Education.

In another line of research, Gallagher examines the role of children's relationships in the transition to school. She is an investigator with the Early Schools Transition Collaborative of the National Research Center on Rural Educational Support, and with colleagues is developing a professional development intervention in rural North Carolina focusing on the improvement of literacy and social skills for struggling learners. Concurrently, she leads a study of teacher-child relationships, literacy and social-emotional development in the context of a 1:1 story-reading intervention. Through the Storytime project, Gallagher hopes to inform practice in early childhood settings with regard to teachers' relationships with children and supporting early literacy and social development. She plans to continue Storytime as a targeted intervention with children at risk for difficulties in the transition to kindergarten.

• Ph.D. 2002 - University of Wisconsin - Madison, Educational Psychology
• M.A. 1995 - Marquette University, Educational Foundations
• B.A. 1983 - Cardinal Stritch College, Education and Special Education, certification in Nursery/Kindergarten and Early Exceptional Needs

• Child-Adult Relationships and Developmental Competence
• Teacher-Child Relationships and Emergent Literacy
• Parent-Child Relationships and Social Competence with Peers
• Infant-Mother Relationships

• Child Development and Family Studies
  
• Early Childhood Intervention and Family Studies
• Early Childhood, Families and Literacy

• 2001-02, Michael Vincent O’Shea Fellow in Educational Psychology, University of Wisconsin, Madison

• 1999, Reviewer. Choosing Child Care: A Curriculum for Parents. American Red Cross Madison, Wisconsin.
• 1996-98, Board Member (mayoral appointment), Madison Child Care Advisory Board Madison, Wisconsin.

Gallagher, K.C. (2002). Does child temperament moderate the effect of parenting on adjustment? Developmental Review, 22, 623-643.

Clark, R., Tluczek, A., & Gallagher, K.C. (In press). Assessment of parent-child early relational disturbances. In R. DelCarmen & A.H. Carter (Eds.), Assessment of mental health disorders in infants and toddlers. Oxford: Oxford University Press.

Vandell, D., Dadisman, K., & Gallagher, K. (1999). Another look at the elephant: Child care in the nineties, pp. 91-120. In R. Taylor (Ed.). Resilience across contexts: Family, work, culture and community. Hilldale NJ: Earlbaum.

• 2003, Invited Speaker, Best Practices in Early Education and Care, Networking Neurons: Making Connections Conference, Wisconsin Council for Children and Families, Madison, Wisconsin
• 2003, Invited Speaker, Transitions in Early Childhood, Bright Horizons Child Care Family Panel, Madison, Wisconsin
• 1999, Invited Speaker, Child Care in the New Millennium, Wisconsin Early Childhood Association and Meeting House Nursery School Madison, Wisconsin.