The early learning world is full of news these days about babies learning math, new money for home visiting efforts and the importance of confident teachers. Check out the news below as you drink that second cup of coffee.

Babies may be smarter than many thought: Infants can begin to organize numbers, space and time, suggesting they sort their new worlds in a clearer way than some thought, ScienceDaily reported  this week, citing new research.

"We've shown that 9-month-olds are sensitive to 'more than' or 'less than' relations across the number, size and duration of objects,” Stella Lourenco, an Emory University psychologist who led the research, said in the story.

"If we are not born with this system, it appears that it develops very quickly …Either way, I think it's amazing how we use quantity information to make sense of the world,"  Lourenco added.

Check out the article.

$1.5 Billion for Home Visiting: The federal government is getting ready to start sending out $1.3 billion for home visiting programs and Washington State could win $1.3 million in the first round, the Children’s Alliance reports. Earlier this year, Congress and President Barack Obama approved the money as part of the huge health care reform law.

Confident Teachers Help with Reading: Confident teachers may help preschoolers with early literacy, HealthDay News reports via the U.S. News & World Report.

Highly confident teachers and emotional support in the classroom play important roles in helping preschoolers learn language and literacy skills, a new study has found. – Health Day. “Preschoolers' Skills Get Boost From Confident Teachers,” 6/11/10.