Early Childhood Pedagogy in a Socio-cultural Medley in Ghana: Case Studies in Kindergarten

Abstract

In the quest for quality in early childhood education, it is important to explore the subtleties that define socio-culturally relevant pedagogy. A qualitative, multi-case study approach was used to explore perspectives of teachers about socio-cultural influences on their teaching in kindergarten classrooms in Ghana. Four teachers from two kindergartens participated in the research. Data were collected across a six-month period and were drawn from semi-structured individual interviews, paired-teacher interviews, and field notes made during classrooms observations. Both within-case and cross-case analyses were used to explore how the local socio-cultural context influenced the use of learning materials, storytelling, and use of traditional songs and rhymes. Teachers believed that adapting their practices to the socio-cultural context could support children’s understanding of cognitive concepts, language, literacy and moral development. The findings provide evidence about how individual teachers take account of the socio-cultural contexts in their pedagogy. The findings demonstrated that the teachers had sufficient agency to modify and adapt their pedagogies that took account of the social-cultural experiences of children and applied these ideas within the curriculum framework in order to support children’s learning.