Abstract
The world continues to change in terms of the environment and its human and more-than-human inhabitants. Recent protests around the globe have highlighted the urgency of the situation as well as the differing opinions about the state of the climate, causes and effects. Just like global issues, matters of change in early childhood education tend to be discussed widely. One of these matters relates to social and emotional development.
Social and emotional development is one of the pillars of early childhood education. However, explicit teaching of social and emotional competence has been the exception rather than the rule in the field. In the first article of this issue, Amanda J Moreno, Mark K Nagasawa and Toby Schwartz grapple with the growing global social and emotional movement in compulsory school education to address the relevance of this movement to early childhood education. Their article, ‘Social and Emotional Learning and Early Childhood Education: Redundant terms?’, critically examines both perspectives by contemplating a range of theoretical and practical dimensions in the current context. After careful consideration, the authors favour ‘a cautious but proactive acceptance of new social and emotional learning models’ because this ‘allows a public interrogation of whichever values and methods for imparting them are chosen’.
Governance is the topic of the second article, which is authored by Christopher P Brown, Joanna Englehardt, David P Barry and Da Hei Ku, and titled ‘Questioning democratic notions of governance: A case study examining how a kindergarten teacher and her students give voice to and enact a neoliberal framing of schooling’. The authors employ Foucault’s ideas of governmentality to document the pervasiveness of dominant neo-liberal discourses of schooling. They argue that advocacy in everyday learning activities is not enough and that more democratic practices are needed. While they suggest reframing as a collective rather than a neo-liberal approach of focusing on individuals, the authors recognise that neo-liberal apparatuses of governance are designed to rupture and dismantle collectivism and collectivist actions in classrooms and communities. Not daunted, Brown et al. suggest that informed and purposeful actions can produce democratic citizens who are capable of challenging the neo-liberal status quo.
Children’s friendships have been studied for some time, but friendships of children with a diagnosed disability have been studied less frequently. In her article, ‘“We are all friends”: Disrupting friendship play discourses in inclusive early childhood education’, Karen Watson problematises friendship play for young children. She argues that despite discourses such as ‘We are all friends’, friendship play operationalises what is considered normal and marginalises the Other. Watson draws on data from a six-month ethnography to show how exclusions amongst children occurred and, as a result, is questioning the use of the ubiquitous refrain ‘We are all friends’. She suggests the idea that difference is problematic might be a good place to start to address what hinders inclusive practices.
In the fourth article of this issue, Tamara Cumming and Sandie Wong consider educator well-being in their piece titled ‘Towards a holistic conceptualisation of early childhood educators’ work-related well-being’. With increased attention to well-being in workplaces, homes and communities, Cumming and Wong argue that now is the time for a clearly articulated conceptualisation of early childhood educators’ work-related well-being. By drawing on a range of perspectives, they are able to adopt a holistic and multidisciplinary approach which is also preventive. This then enables them to address specific aspects of educators’ work such as emotional and physiological dimensions of well-being. Cumming and Wong argue that the multidimensional nature of educators’ daily work requires an approach to well-being that reflects this complexity.
The way in which policies are enacted can be very different from what was intended by policymakers. In their article, ‘Navigating the policy directive of child autonomy in universal pre-kindergarten practice’, Sara Michael Luna and Leslee Grey used case-study data to investigate the experiences of four kindergarten teachers working in universal pre-kindergarten (UPK) services in New York City, USA. As the authors state, UPK is provided to address the ‘achievement gap’ and ensure that children are prepared academically and socially for participation in kindergarten. The focus of the investigation was the policy directive of autonomy, which the authors used to highlight the tensions that can arise between universal reform policy and local contexts and practices. Interestingly, the teachers found spaces to operate due to the lack of a ‘script’ from the Department of Education for how to operationalise autonomy. The analysis shows the skilful and imaginative ways in which the teachers were able to infuse support at the interface of policy and local practices.
Laboratory schools located on university campuses are a feature of some universities in the USA. They have particular histories and were established for a variety of reasons, with most adopting developmental perspectives. The final article for this issue is written by Michelle Perez, Koeun Kim and Betsy Cahill, and titled ‘Myrna’s Children’s Village: Reflections on a dynamic early childhood laboratory school community in southern New Mexico’. The authors consider a range of factors related to the laboratory school in their setting, including the unique context and the diverse community that the laboratory school serves. They adopt critical perspectives to examine the potential for progressing the relationship to create a more critically informed, collaborative and connected community.
The Educative Teacher Performance Assessment (edTPA) is the topic of the colloquium, which is titled ‘“The edTPA took away from my student teaching experience”: The impact of the edTPA on student teaching experiences’. Minsun Shin investigates whether the edTPA provides educative benefits as promised, given that so far it affects 41 states and the District of Columbia in the USA.
The book review for this issue has been undertaken by Julie Ovington from Northumbria University in the UK. She comments on the edited book by Wendy Russell, Stuart Lester and Hilary Smith that was published in 2017 and is titled Practice-Based Research in Children’s Play (Policy Press).
We hope that you find ideas in this issue that provoke your thinking, engage you in deep reflection and prompt some fruitful discussion that activates change.