Learning Together In The Early Years

This book brings together contributions from international experts on early years education to explore and debate relational pedagogy across different countries and in the context of a broad international field.

Many curriculum books treat teaching as something teachers do to or for children. Deb Curtis and Margie Carter, best-selling authors in the early learning field, believe teaching is a collaborative process in which teachers reexamine their own philosophies and practices while facilitating children’s learning. Each chapter in this curriculum framework includes a conceptual overview followed by classroom stories and photographs to illustrate the concepts. The book helps teachers create materials and a classroom culture reflective of their values: Teach through observation, reflection, inquiry, and action, and encourage children to represent their learning in multiple ways, including songs, stories, and drama.

Early Childhood Education: Learning Together provides a comprehensive overview of early childhood education. This exciting new text encourages students to understand the need for flexible approaches in their work with children. Early childhood education is not a “one size fits all” proposition, so this text encourages students in multiple ways to reflect upon why they are doing what they are doing. With connections to NAEYC standards, case studies, and essays from real people on the front lines of early childhood education, students will leave the course with a superior foundation in both the theoretical aspects of ECE and the real world applications of those theories. In developing Early Childhood Education: Learning Together, we bring together the best research and the most effective practices in Early Childhood. We have heard that many students are using their first Early Childhood course to explore their interest in the field - perhaps to discover a new profession or a second career. These comments shaped every aspect of Early Childhood Education: Learning Together. The resulting textbook is infused with real cases, NAEYC standards, and graphs and tables for easy reference and student review. We also understand that college can be a financial challenge for students. Because of this, Early Childhood Education: Learning Together is half the price of comparable introductory texts.

Children are already learning at birth, and they develop and learn at a rapid pace in their early years. This provides a critical foundation for lifelong progress, and the adults who provide for the care and the education of young children bear a great responsibility for their health, development, and learning. Despite the fact that they share the same objective - to nurture young children and secure their future success - the various practitioners who contribute to the care and the education of children from birth through age 8 are not acknowledged as a workforce unified by the common knowledge and competencies needed to do their jobs well. Transforming the Workforce for Children Birth Through Age 8 explores the science of child development, particularly looking at implications for the professionals who work with children. This report examines the current capacities and practices of the workforce, the settings in which they work, the policies and infrastructure that set qualifications and provide professional learning, and the government agencies and other funders who support and oversee these systems. This book then makes recommendations to improve the quality of professional practice and the practice environment for care and education professionals. These detailed recommendations create a blueprint for action that builds on a unifying foundation of child development and early learning, shared knowledge and competencies for care and education professionals, and principles for effective professional learning. Young children thrive and learn best when they have secure, positive relationships with adults who are knowledgeable about how to support their development and learning and are responsive to their individual progress. Transforming the Workforce for Children Birth Through Age 8 offers guidance on system changes to improve the quality of professional practice, specific actions to improve professional learning systems and workforce development, and research to continue to build the knowledge base in ways that will directly advance and inform future actions. The recommendations of this book provide an opportunity to improve the quality of the care and the education that children receive, and ultimately improve outcomes for children.

Children learn to talk through interaction including involvement in many thousands of conversations with adults and other children. These conversations provide the framework for exploring relationships, understanding the world, and learning – in its widest sense. This book explores how children learn to communicate using language, how they use language to learn and the role of adults in the process. It examines how adults can support children to learn by involving them in positive interactions, meaningful conversation and by helping them play, explore and talk with each other. The book includes: examples of children and adults talking and learning together case studies of successful approaches that support language and learning in early years settings points for reflection and practical tasks Informed by the author’s own experience working with young children, families and practitioners, and from his involvement in the England-wide Every Child a Talker (ECaT) project, it links key research findings with successful practice to inspire practitioners to develop skills when talking with children, influence how adults plan for talk in settings and gain insight into how language develops in the home.

"The Early Learning Program Guide has been organized around foundational elements of a high quality early learning program. The focus is on learning from contemporary literature and practices. Part I describes the vision and principles around which the Guide has been developed. Part II, Children as Competent Learners, explores how beliefs about children and their capabilities impact program design, interactions and, ultimately, children's learning. Part III, Changing Role for Educators, reviews how seeing children as competent learners has caused educators to examine their practices and expand their roles. Part IV, How Young Children Learn, revisits active, experiential learning and why it is vital to child development. The role of exploration in children's learning is examined, as is the importance of holistic learning. Part V, Observation and Reflection--Critical Skills, describes how these powerful practices are foundational to the design of high quality programming. Part VI, High Quality Programming--What Does it Look Like?, highlights three key components of program design--the environment, relationships and planning--and how these are impacted by the foundational elements described in Parts I to V. The remaining portions of the document, Resource Sheets, Appendices and References, provide additional information. Readers will also notice Reflection and Decision Making pages. These are provided to assist educators in reflecting and discussing the foundational elements and planning for implementation."--Document.