Early Childhood Programs As The Doorway To Social Cohesion

Over the past decade, early childhood education and care has moved onto the policy agenda in many countries. There is growing recognition that early access to quality education and appropriate care provides young children with a good and fair start in life. While scientific research constantly brings new insights into brain development and the enormous importance of the first years of a child’s life, the early 20th century theories of one Russian psychologist, Lev S. Vygotsky (1896–1934), have had profound and diverse impacts upon the early childhood education traditions in both the East and the West and remain highly relevant today. Recently, more than 750 early childhood education researchers, practitioners, policymakers, and NGO activists from around the world met in Prague at “Exploring Vygotsky’s Ideas: Crossing Borders,” the 17th Annual Conference of the European Early Childhood Education Research Association (EECERA), hosted by the International Step by Step Association (ISSA). In an effort to share many of the intriguing ideas and practices discussed during the conference with a broader audience, ISSA invited leading presenters to explore their experiences in early childhood through the prism of Vygotsky’s theories and ideas. The result of ISSA’s initiative is this volume of papers which examine Vygotsky’s legacy on early childhood education systems in both the East and the West, offering ideas which can be used to work for the benefit of children and societies across the globe.

Pathways to Professionalism in Early Childhood Education and Care is concerned with a growing interest from policy and research in the professionalisation of the early childhood workforce. Illustrated by in-depth case studies of innovative and sustainable pathways to professionalisation, it recognises the importance of a systemic approach to professionalisation across all levels of the early childhood. The authors of this wide-ranging book share insights of professionalism from various European countries and suggest that professionalism in early childhood unfolds best in a ‘competent system’. This book considers a broad range of international issues including Continuous professional support and quality Early Childhood education and care staff with different qualifications in professional development processes. How personal attitudes and competence of educators are related to the wider system of competent teams, leadership, collaboration across services and competent governance From research to policy: the case of early childhood and care Pathways to Professionalism in Early Childhood Education and Care is a crucial and fascinating read for professionals working in the sector and contributes to broadening views on what professionalism in early childhood can mean within a ‘competent system’.

The Early Years Curriculum brings together a range of curriculum models from across the world, providing in-depth discussion on key issues and theories, and enabling readers to consider each approach to children's learning within an international context. It encourages readers to explore different ways of understanding the curriculum, and to develop a critical understanding of the key issues that shape the way a curriculum is designed.

With increasing attention given by governments and policy makers to children’s transition to school, and the associated need for educators, families and communities to be supported in the process, changes are often required to existing structures and pedagogy. This book is framed around the notion of transition as a time of change for those involved in the transition process and as a time for reconceptualising beliefs, policy and practice. It explores transition from a number of international perspectives and raises issues around the coherence of: how children perceive and respond to starting school; the roles and expectations of parents; developmental changes for parents; supporting children with diverse learning needs; how policy, curriculum and pedagogy are conceived and implemented. Readers will be informed about current practices and issues arising out of research in Europe, Scandinavia, the United Kingdom and Australia and will be stimulated to consider how they can change their own transition beliefs, policies and practices. Transition to school: Contemporary Perspectives and Change is essential reading for researchers and educators and anyone wanting to know more about the transition to school and how to support young children, their families and schools.

Taking as its starting point that young children learn and develop in a network of relationships, this book emphasises that each relationship has its own specific features, functions and learning/teaching affordances (Thompson, 2005).

This book provides an important compilation and synthesis of current work in transition to school research. The book focuses strongly on the theoretical underpinnings of research in transition to school. It outlines key theoretical positions and connects those to the implications for policy and practice, thereby challenging readers to re-conceptualize their understandings, expectations and perceptions of transition to school. The exploration of this range of theoretical perspectives and the application of these to a wide range of research and research contexts makes this book an important and innovative contribution to the scholarship of transition to school research. A substantial part of the book is devoted to detailed examples of transition to school practice. These chapters provide innovative examples of evidence-based practice and contribute in turn, to practice-based evidence. The book is also devoted to considering policy issues and implications related to the transition to school. It records a genuine, collaborative effort to bring together a range of perspectives into a Transition to School Position Statement that will inform ongoing research, practice and policy. The collaborative, research, policy and practice based development of this position statement represents a world-first.

This book provides an in-depth look on Content and Language Integrated Learning (CLIL) and Early Childhood Education (ECE), two domains where major joint research is needed. By taking stock on theoretical underpinnings, it explores the ideal conditions for early additional language acquisition in preschool contexts through CLIL with a learner-centered approach grounded in developmentally appropriate practices (DEP) and an emphasis on the importance of play, cognition, holistic content adaptation and social-emotional learning. The book also offers a comprehensive view of how this methodological approach has already set a clear path on Pre-primary education internationally. Finally, it offers insights into CLIL pedagogies as related and adapted to Pre-primary education, resources and materials for very young learners and practical implementation from the classroom. By providing a solid empirical background on Pre-primary CLIL, along with appropriate methodological issues and practices, this book serves as a key resource to students, practitioners, academics as well as teacher educators and policy-makers in international contexts.

Developmental Education is an approach to education in school that aims at promoting children’s cultural development and their abilities to participate autonomously and well-informed in the cultural practices of their community. From the point of view of Cultural-historical Activity theory (CHAT), a play-based curriculum has been developed over the past decades for primary school, which presents activity contexts for pupils in the classroom that create learning and teaching opportunities for helping pupils with appropriating cultural knowledge, skills, and moral understandings in meaningful ways. The approach is implemented in numerous Dutch primary schools classrooms with the explicit intention to support the learning of both pupils and teachers. The book focuses especially on education of young children (4 – 8 years old) in primary school and presents the underpinning concepts of this approach, and chapters on examples of good practices in a variety of subject matter areas, such as literacy (vocabulary acquisition, reading, writing), mathematics, and arts. Successful implementation of Developmental Education in the classroom strongly depends on dynamic assessment and continuous observations of young pupils’ development. Strategies for implementation of both the teaching practices and assessment strategies are discussed in detail in the book.