THIS PAPER EXAMINES CURRICULUM DEBATES, particularly those that influence an understanding of the nature and purpose of curriculum, in providing teacher education and in influencing teaching practice. The work of Martin Heidegger provides a framework for questioning the early childhood teacher education curriculum. Central to this analysis are tensions between coherence and diversity; and training and education. For instance, a tension exists between perceiving the practice of educating early childhood teachers as a practice of downloading the ‘right’ knowledge about children, childhood, and pedagogy; alternatively, early childhood teacher education is perceived as a practice of providing a space in which a teacher may develop a ‘teaching self’.
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