Early Childhood Education In Australia Research Articles

Theory-informed beliefs in early childhood education: contradictions in child development theories and models of play

ABSTRACT Theory-informed practice has a long tradition within the profession of early childhood education in Australia and internationally. Aligned with longstanding policy and curriculum in Australia, the profession has seen a prominence of resources informed by biological, behaviourism/socio-behaviourist, social learning, psycho-genetic, cultural-historical, critical and poststructuralist theories. Despite the plethora of theories being supported within early childhood education and care, little research has been directed to determining if and how educators use theory to inform their play practices. This paper takes up the challenge by surveying 200 Australian early childhood educators about the theories that were most relevant to their practices and the models of play that informed their day-to-day work in centres. Higher qualified educators were informed most by cultural-historical theory whilst technically qualified educators were more guided by social learning theory. Playwork was the model of play found to be most familiar to all educators. However, the results also show a limited alignment between theories of learning and development and models of play, suggesting an interesting contradiction in understandings of educators that is worthy of further research.

Migrant trailing spouses: Career adaptability and occupational downshifting

AbstractThis study examines career adaptability of trailing spouses whose comparative advantage most strikingly illustrates the erosion over time of career agency for migrant women, or what is known as “occupational downshifting.” Problematising occupational downshifting as a major obstacle to social integration of trailing spouses, we explore how cultural tensions play out vocationally, and the career choices available to trailing spouses become so diminished over time that their agency can be considered “bounded.” Using a life story approach, our study provides evidence of the lived experiences of constrained agency and paradox of 12 early childhood educators in Australia. Our evidence demonstrates that the choice of moving for the family not only creates occupational precarity, but a more grievous occupational downshifting. We consider strategies like vocational facilitation to address the needs of trailing spouses as individuals, and as such facilitate migrant integration and neutralise the forces leading to occupational downshifting.

Early childhood educators’ well-being, work environments and ‘quality’: Possibilities for changing policy and practice

A child’s right to high quality education not only relies on a competent and skilled workforce, but one in which educators are well. Supporting a well workforce requires governments, organisations and educators to attend to work environment quality. This attention needs be based on sound, relevant evidence. In this paper we contribute evidence of educators’ well-being from the survey component of an Australian study with 73 participants. We map results against international guidelines, and policy openings in Australia’s National Quality Standard to understand how educators’ work environments are affecting their well-being. We conclude that existing policies on quality in early childhood education in Australia attend to only some features of work environments, with a notable absence of attention to supporting educators in the relational complexities of their work. To enable educators to provide high quality education and care, greater attention is needed by organisations and governments to what quality work environments might look like.

Formative interventions and the ethics of double stimulation for transformative agency in professional practice

ABSTRACT This article considers the ethical dimensions of efforts to develop professional practice with others, informed by literature on the ethics of intervention in education. Data are presented from three studies with workplace teams in early childhood education in Australia and New Zealand that have employed double stimulation within Change Laboratory activities. These data are used to exemplify how the use of double stimulation exposes issues such as agency, power, decision-making, cultural representation, and relationality in the transformation of professional practice. The central claim of the article is that researchers employing double stimulation to develop professional practice need to develop a nuanced understanding of the ethical complexities of formative efforts, both for themselves and for their fellow participants. The article concludes with a series of questions for researchers to consider when intervening in professional practice, including: Who will likely benefit if we implement the changes we are planning? and Who and what is being transformed?

Educational Leaders and the project of professionalisation in early childhood education in Australia

This paper reports the ways in which Educational Leaders in Australian early childhood education workplaces are interpreting and implementing their mandatory role. Interviews with 20 Educational Leaders in two Australian government jurisdictions were analysed using cultural-historical activity theory. Our analysis suggests a significant gap between government policy orientation toward quality improvement and the project of professionalisation of the field that motivates Educational Leaders. We argue the work of Educational Leaders is primarily oriented towards raising the status and capacity of their colleagues as a pre-requisite for high-quality outcomes, and that concepts of quality operate instead as mediating tools. In this sense, a focus on professionalisation subsumes the international policy focus on quality.

The theory–practice challenge: International early childhood education students making connections in Australia

Increasing numbers of international students are enrolling in Australian universities in early childhood teaching degrees. For many of these students understanding the early childhood education pedagogies and approaches is a different way of viewing teaching and learning from their own cultural perspective. Many of these students struggle to understand the teaching and learning theory that underpins early childhood education in Australia which draws on play-based pedagogies, child centred learning, and intentional teaching. This small-scale case study sought to gain insights into how international students undertaking a Master of Teaching (Early Childhood) in an Australian university were enabled to link their theoretical learning to practical applications of being an early childhood teacher. Using questionnaire data, the study found that the international students struggled to connect the theory and pedagogical thinking that underpins early childhood education. What was most significant for these students was the experiences they gained through their practical placements.

'You feel like you're an artist. Like Leonardo da Vinci': Capturing young children’s voices and attitudes towards visual arts

Abstract Early childhood research is focusing increasingly on issues of acknowledging and respecting the ‘voices’ of young children. Much of the focus in arts education research, however, has explored adult attitudes, resulting in what seems the invisibility of young children’s opinions. Conducted in the context of early childhood education in Australia, the study, following a phenomenological approach, sought to understand the place of visual arts in the lives of four young children aged five to six years in a combined Kindergarten/Year One classroom located in Sydney. A range of childsensitive research tools were adapted from the ‘Mosaic approach’ to explore how children understand and conceive their early experiences of visual arts learning. In acknowledging the views of children, possibilities for improving arts pedagogy were considered as new questions emerged. The study confirmed the need to acknowledge and validate children’s rich and perceptive attitudes through meaningful experiences and valued conversations.

The representation of the national quality framework in the australian print media: silences and slants in the mediatisation of early childhood education policy

ABSTRACTWhile research investigating the mediatisation of education policy has primarily been undertaken in school contexts, this paper reports on a study conducted in the context of early childhood education. The paper examines how a major policy in early childhood education in Australia – the National Quality Framework – has been mediatised in selected newspapers. Drawing on Foucauldian, critical discourse analysis and mediatisation theorising, we utilised the corpus linguistic tools of WordSmith Tools 6.0 to inform content analyses of 121 articles from two major media corporations, News Corp and Fairfax. Our findings highlight the utility of treating our data as two distinct corpora, with each corporation found to have utilised discursive technologies to proffer competing positionings of the Framework. The contested nature of the Framework – generally purported in Fairfax to be a tool that supports quality early education, as opposed to News Corp’s framing of the policy as one that inhibits affordable childcare – poses implications for which advocacy groups are regarded by the media as having authority and thus likely to influence policy through the reporting of their voices. Implications for newspaper media as a discursive influence on parents’ childcare decision-making are also considered.

Place-based nature kindergarten in Victoria, Australia: No tools, no toys, no art supplies

The last decade has witnessed a steady increase in the number of preschool programs operating in Australia where children access a natural outdoor space (in the bush, at the beach or in local parkland) for an extended period of time each week. Over a hundred such programs are now estimated to be operating in Victoria alone. In this paper Victorian educators from the Early Childhood Outdoor Learning Network respond to concerns regarding the direction of Forest Schools and the commodification of Forest School practices in the UK as raised by Leather, Journal of Outdoor and Environmental Education (2018), and the suggestion that a similar model of Forest Schools has spread to Australia. It is argued that the proliferation of nature kindergarten programs in Victoria has followed a more organic trajectory that is less about emulating a set of imported practices, and more about responding to local conditions and influences. Teaching practice in these programs has been described as ‘naked pedagogy,’ emphasizing the role of child-led play without ‘tools, toys and art supplies.’ The authors argue that, despite a considerable and growing body of both popular and academic literature on the benefits of nature and play, few studies have explored this type of nature kindergarten program in the context of early childhood education in Australia.

Avondale Creates Community for Christian Early Childhood Educators in Australia

Avondale has helped establish the first association for Christian early childhood educators in Australia at an inaugural conference organised and hosted by its Discipline of Education. The inter-denominational Australian Christian Early Childhood Educators Association (ACECEA) will bring academics and practitioners together to network, collaborate on research and promote informed practice. “We recognise a key strength will be unity of purpose,” says Kaye Judge, a lecturer in education (early childhood) at Avondale.

Imagining otherwise: A (brief) Darwinian encounter with quality standards

The prevailing discourse of quality in early childhood education in Australia and internationally supports the idea that everyone, from families to educators, policymakers, researchers and politicians, wants high-quality early childhood education programs for all young children. This dominance is so pervasive that it becomes difficult to think about quality in any other terms, putting limitations on ‘what it is possible to think’ when it comes to quality early childhood education. In an attempt to suspend the habitual and contested assumptions associated with the mission for quality, this article aims to move beyond what these discourses make it possible to think and imagine by traversing some of the territory as it exists currently in Australia. As part of this, we adopt an exploratory approach where we try and imagine otherwise. We do this by presenting a vignette, a rich description of a child/pipe/sand event, which we work through using the National Quality Standard in Australia and a brief Darwinian encounter. The intention is to use what is familiar (observation, quality measurement) and make the familiar less familiar in order to create niches for variations and alternative imaginings of ‘quality’.

Equity and educators enacting The Australian Early Years Learning Framework

The mandated learning framework, Belonging, Being & Becoming: The Early Years Learning Framework for Australia is part of a suite of reforms currently being undertaken in early childhood education in Australia. All educators working in direct contact with young children from birth to the age of five are required to use the Framework or an approved alternative. The reforms are aimed at achieving higher quality and greater equity of early childhood education throughout Australia. This article contemplates the equity of the Framework when the workforce required to use it is diverse and ranges from those who are degree, associate or diploma qualified, to becoming qualified. It considers the implicit construct of the ideal professional practitioner in the policy and the social justice effects of the policy. The article concludes that political concerns about a certain group of educators have been reduced to matters of technical efficiency and that as a consequence, the values of social justice and equity for this group have been subsumed to align with dominant economic imperatives.

Governing child care in neoliberal times: Discursive constructions of children as economic units and early childhood educators as investment brokers

At any given time in the field of early childhood, there are discourses at play, producing images of children, and these ways of seeing children might be competing, colliding and/or complementing each other. It is fairly widely accepted that in many countries there are versions of dominant discourses that shape and are shaped by current practices in the field of early childhood. These include (1) romantic notions of children running free and connecting with nature and (2) the ‘Bart Simpson’ version of the naughty, cute or savage child, untamed and in need of civilising. These are far from being the only two discursive constructions of children present in current policies and practices. If early childhood professionals are to be active in shaping and implementing policies that affect their work and workforce, it is important that they are aware of the forces at play. In this article, we point to another powerful discourse at play in the Australian context of early childhood education, the image of children as economic units: investments in the future. We show how a ‘moment of arising’ in contemporary policy contexts, dominated by neoliberal principles of reform and competition, has charged early childhood educators in Australia with the duties of a ‘broker’, ensuring that young children are worth the investment. In this article, we begin with (1) a key policy document in early childhood education in Australia and examine the discursive affordances which shape the document. Next, (2) we pinpoint the shifts in how the work of child care is perceived by interrogating this key policy document through a methodology of discursive analysis. We then turn attention (3) to the work of this policy document along with other discourses which directly affect images of children and the shaping role these have on the work of educators. We conclude with (4) a consideration of how the work of early childhood professionals has come to be shaped by this economic discourse, and how they are being required to both work within the policy imperatives and likely to resist this new demand of them.

Children’s mathematical and verbal competence in different early education and care programmes in Australia

This study investigated the relationship between children’s attendance at different types of early childhood education and care programmes and their mathematical and verbal skills. Analyses of data from 1314 children participating in an Australian longitudinal study, the E4Kids project, revealed no relationship between children’s verbal ability and the early childhood education and care programme attended, but mathematics results tell a different story. At the first measurement, children who consistently attended only informal care outperformed children who either consistently attended a formal early childhood education and care service type or attended a mix of formal and informal care. The development of mathematical and verbal competencies between first and second measurements, 1 year later, did not differ between children who attended different types of early childhood education and care. Early childhood educators in Australia are required to provide programmes that incorporate both mathematical concepts and language development. However, many early childhood educators describe uncertainty about how to support children’s mathematical learning. Further professional development and support in this area is necessary.

Contemporary practice in professional learning and development of early childhood educators in Australia: reflections on what works and why

Continuous professional learning and development (PLD) is an essential component of effective practice in any profession. PLD as a professional responsibility and workplace requirement in early childhood (EC) settings is now embedded in Australian national policy. What PLD looks like and how it happens in EC settings is a hot topic both locally and internationally. Much of this discussion is associated with major reforms in the EC policy landscape. Increasingly, approaches to PLD are being documented as research inquiry in EC journals. Traditional forms of professional development delivered collectively to educators from diverse backgrounds are being questioned in terms of influencing changes in practice. This article will unpack current thinking on PLD of EC educators using research conducted in EC settings in Sydney. The article will outline what strategies were successful, and how and why these strategies enhanced practice. Adopting Hujala’s contextual theory of leadership, examples illustrate how the organisational context and the integration of individual capabilities of educators align in promoting sustained professional growth. Findings highlight the importance of adopting a strategic approach to both organisational improvement and professional advancement of educators at different stages of their careers.

Travelling policy reforms reconfiguring the work of early childhood educators in Australia

Interventions in the field of early childhood education policy, drawn from global policy flows, are reconfiguring the work of early childhood educators in Australia. One such intervention is the requirement to designate an ‘educational leader’ (EL) in each service for young children and their families. This policy intervention has its origins in England's Early Years Professional Status initiative. This paper compares the pedagogical leader imagined in regulatory reforms with the educational labour described in interviews with childcare educators in Queensland and Victoria, Australia. The paper argues these educators are being called upon to navigate the tension between ‘imagined’ and ‘actual’ policy effects and that this is a key part of the work of educational leadership. Such leadership includes re-constituting ‘teachers’ in early childhood services as ‘learners’ who are ‘led’ by ‘ELs’, requiring major shifts in professional knowledge and practice.

Quality Early Childhood Education for my Child or for all Children? Parents as Activists for Equitable, High-Quality Early Childhood Education in Australia

Historical accounts of the development of early childhood education (ECE) in Australia up to the passing of Child Care Act in 1972 (Brennan, 1998; Wong, 2006) show that parents' role in the development of the sector has been limited. This trend has continued since the 1970s, with parents seemingly contributing to the development and quality of individual centres more so than to the development of a quality system of ECE in Australia. In the absence of parent-driven demand for such a system, significant and longstanding barriers to the universal provision of high-quality ECE prevail. This paper suggests that three intersecting influences have collectively induced parents to think about ECE as a personal rather than a public concern. These influences are ECE policy as an ‘art of government’ (Foucault 1991[1978], p. 92); maternalist discourses that naturalise motherhood; and educators' limited engagement with and enacting of systems advocacy. The paper discusses possibilities for educators to subvert these influences and develop activist collaborations with the goal of achieving universal provision of high-quality education for all children in Australia.

Comparative Analysis of Early Childhood Education in Australia and Turkey

The purpose of this article is to compare the historical development and the current situation of early childhood education in Australia. The main objective of the study is to form a conclusion about early childhood education in Turkey, drawing on the Australian example. Campaigns that planned and developed early childhood education began under the leadership of women. The active participation of women in daily life was as a key development that highlighted the importance of early childhood education. Campaigns for preschool education began later in Turkey compared to those in Australia. Today, there are similarities, in terms of philosophy, of both the programme and structure of preschool education in each country. Preschool education is not compulsory in either country. There are play- and child-oriented programmes. To involve families, the HIPPY is applied in Australia, and institution-centred family education is carried out in Turkey.

How we View Australian Early Childhood Education Practice: Indian Migrant Parents' Perspectives

THIS QUALITATIVE CASE STUDY investigates Indian migrant parents' perspectives of early childhood education (ECE) in Melbourne, Australia. The study focuses on exploring parents' understanding of the structure, pedagogy and curriculum practices in early childhood settings. We selected a sample of six Indian parents, who had migrated to Melbourne not more than five years ago and had children attending Australian ECE. To gather their perspectives and experiences, in-depth, face-to-face interviews were conducted. A framework analysis of the data (Ritchie & Spencer, 1994) points to the preference of Australian ECE to Indian ECE. Their preference of Australian ECE is contingent on curriculum flexibility, opportunity for parent participation and active involvement of children in planning and learning. However, participatants, particularly the mothers, missed the academic aspect of Indian ECE and believed that the Australian curriculum and pedagogy distanced their children from their culture. Based on these findings, we argue for early childhood teachers to include the experiences of Indian migrant parents in their children's ECE in Australia to help sustain purposeful partnerships and incorporate culturally relevant activities into the curriculum.

A ‘Humanitarian Idea’: Using a Historical Lens to Reflect on Social Justice in Early Childhood Education and Care

The concept of early childhood education and care (ECEC) as ‘social justice’ is contested and complex. In this article, the author calls on a historical perspective to critically reflect on social justice in ECEC. The author does this by exploring the early history of free kindergartens in Sydney, Australia. The author demonstrates, through this example, that the idea of ‘social justice’ has long been at the core of ECEC work in Australia. The work of the pioneers of early childhood education in Australia has tended to be minimised as little more than middle-class ‘do-gooding’ that perpetuated middle-class ways of knowing. Revisiting this history, the author argues that these early advocates, operating within the confines of their time, constructed free kindergartens as contributing to social justice. Understanding of present constructions of ECEC has much to gain from revisiting and critiquing this early history. A critical and respectful understanding of the history of ECEC enables contemporary advocates to place themselves within a long, hard-fought, though sometimes misguided and often controversial, tradition.