Parental Practices and Developmental Challenges of Boys of Color: Opportunities for Early Intervention.

The "My Brother's Keeper" initiative (Obama, 2014) has helped to attract public attention to the vulnerabilities faced by many boys of color (BOC). In this article, I review what is known about the developmental status of BOC, identify key family practices that are critical to their development, and consider the implications of both for early intervention. The lack of school readiness skills and early reading competence are seen as the most serious early concerns. BOC struggle with language, literacy, and the regulation of behavior and emotions. These problems are evident at school entry, early intervention to strengthen parental use of facilitate practices--such as the 3 Xs (Expose, Expand, and Explain) and Detect-Connect--and to reduce the use of debilitating strategies--such as Criticism and Control--may improve outcomes for BOC and establish a foundation on which later learning and social competence can be built. (Author abstract)