Educational Background
Hope K. Gerde is an assistant professor in the department of Family and Child Ecology at Michigan State University. Dr. Gerde received her Bachelor’s degree in psychology from Rollins College and her Master’s and Doctoral degrees in Child Development and Family Studies from Purdue University. She completed her Ph.D. dissertation on the relation between teachers’ educational background, teachers’ language use in book reading and free play contexts, and children’s language and literacy development across the preschool year under the guidance of Dr. Douglas Powell, Dr. Karen Diamond, Dr. Daniel Mroczek, and Dr. Jill May. She received the Outstanding Doctoral Student Research Award from the Department of Child Development and Family Studies at Purdue.

Research
Dr. Gerde’s primary research interests focus on the development and evaluation of approaches to promoting children’s early language and literacy growth via professional development for teachers. She is especially interested in how at-risk children’s language and literacy development is affected by the quality of children’s verbal interactions with adults and the relation between adult behavior and their educational background. Her work includes longitudinal analyses of how teachers’ language relates to children’s growth in early language and literacy skills across multiple classroom contexts (e.g., book reading, free play). Also, she has interest in the relation between young children’s development across language and literacy skills. One of her current projects investigates the interconnectedness between children’s oral language, alphabet knowledge, and writing skills.

Teaching:
Dr. Gerde has taught both undergraduate and graduate level courses in child development and early childhood education.

Undergraduate Courses
FCE 321 – Curriculum for Early Childhood Programs

Graduate Courses
FCE 821 – Curriculum in Early Childhood Programs

Curriculum Vitae