A funds of knowledge approach to supporting children’s academic learning: Complexities and enablers in the Australian early childhood context

Abstract

Educators’ engagement with children’s home lives and their funds of knowledge strengthens learning and development. While Australia’s updated Early Years Learning Framework now expects educators to implement funds of knowledge pedagogy, there is limited research from Australia and internationally to show how such an approach can be implemented in early education contexts to support children’s academic learning. Using social constructionist and social justice conceptual frames, together with seminal funds of knowledge theorising, we aimed to extend this knowledge base through a study that explored how educators engage families experiencing economic adversity in early education. We present and analyse a series of interactions – Respecting Faith – to highlight the complexities involved and the service and structural enablers required to implement funds of knowledge pedagogy to support children’s academic learning.

Introduction

Research has shown that high-quality early childhood education and care (ECEC) improves outcomes for children, particularly children in families experiencing disadvantage (OECD, 2022; Taggart et al., 2015). While increasing numbers of families who experience disadvantage are participating in ECEC in Australia, many children continue to start school behind their more advantaged peers. These include children from Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander, culturally and linguistically diverse, and low-income families, as well as families in regional/remote areas and where a child has a disability (DESE, 2022). This educational disparity is often attributed to access barriers that mean these children are underrepresented in ECEC services (Productivity Commission, 2024; Tang et al., 2024).

Less attention, however, has been paid to the learning experiences available to children from low-income families who do attend ECEC services. Research from Australia has found that ECEC quality is generally lower in services located in low, compared to high, socio-economic areas, and that while educators generally provide high levels of emotional support, the level of instructional support required to foster children’s cognitive development and academic growth varied and on average, was moderate (Cloney et al., 2016; Tayler, 2016; Thorpe et al., 2023). Active support of children’s learning during play was also found to be lower in ECEC settings located in low socio-economic areas (Tayler, 2016). Recently, high-level ECEC stakeholders, including policy makers and large providers, considered pedagogy with low-income families to be one of the most weakly-articulated aspects of practice (Skattebol et al., 2023). How educators might utilise culturally responsive pedagogies with children and families experiencing adversity to foster children’s learning was an identified need.

Funds of knowledge presents as a valuable pedagogical approach for early childhood teachers and educators (hereafter collectively referred to as educators) working with children from low-income families. Developed by Luis Moll and colleagues (Moll et al., 1992; González et al., 2005) in response to educational frameworks that positioned children from low-income families as lacking knowledge for school, this approach aims to bring the rich cultural knowledge and practices present in all households to educational settings, so that what children already know and are familiar with is used for subsequent learning and teaching. In recognition of the affordances of this approach, Australia’s Early Years Learning Framework (EYLF) v2 (Australian Government Department of Education [AGDE], 2022) now embeds expectations that educators use families’ funds of knowledge to “extend and enrich children’s learning from birth to five years and through the transition to school” (p. 4).

The purpose of this paper is to support the implementation of funds of knowledge pedagogy such that the academic learning of children from families experiencing financial adversity is facilitated. By ‘academic learning’ we do not mean top-down, “rote-like instruction” (Moll et al., 1992, p. 132). Rather, we draw on funds of knowledge theorising (González et al., 2005; Moll et al., 1992) that conceptualised this pedagogical approach as providing the basis of participatory processes of enquiry through which children’s knowledge and skills in literacy, mathematics, and science are developed. Our focus is grounded in social justice, to support children’s right to a high-quality early education that is transformational and builds capacity for educational success. These early proponents explicitly promoted funds of knowledge as an approach to improve children’s educational experiences and outcomes. The approach was developed to redress low academic achievement attributed to deficit views about low-income families, reflected in classrooms as low expectations as well as learning environments and pedagogies that were culturally disconnected from children’s real-world experiences. This disconnect exacerbates the disadvantage experienced by low-income families (Hogg, 2011).

Drawing on Nancy Fraser’s (2009, p. 16) conceptualisation of social justice as “parity of participation”, we see the redressing of knowledge hierarchies through a funds of knowledge pedagogical approach as social justice in action. Our concern is with children from low-income families being able to participate fully in society, in the ECEC setting and later at school, and not being disadvantaged academically by authorised and privileged knowledge and knowledge systems that marginalise the cultural capital of disadvantaged groups (Miller Marsh & Zhulamanova, 2017; Zipin, 2009). ‘Recognition’ as the cultural justice dimension of participation parity is relevant to families on low incomes, as it requires a respect for cultural diversity such that educators work with all families as full and equal partners. Given previous findings on limited instructional support and the effective use of culturally responsive curriculum to extend children’s learning, there appears a need for intentional approaches to not just know about children’s funds of knowledge, but to utilise them as well.

We begin by revisiting the seminal work of Moll and colleagues to overview the key tenets of funds of knowledge pedagogy. In highlighting the approach’s intent to support children’s academic learning, we conceptually frame the approach as critical pedagogy grounded in social justice. Following an overview of how the approach has been subsequently used in ECEC research and practice, we then detail the expectation in Australia that educators practice funds of knowledge pedagogy.

Funds of knowledge pedagogy

Historically, funds of knowledge emerged from the research of Luis Moll and colleagues (1992; González et al., 2005) with teachers and low-income Latino families from the United States. This work challenged deficit views that positioned children from low-income families as being poor, both financially and in the perceived quality of learning experiences they had at home and in their communities (Moll et al., 2005). Funds of knowledge is defined as the “historically accumulated and culturally developed bodies of knowledge and skills essential for household or individual functioning and well-being” (Moll et al., 1992, p. 133). These funds include children’s and family’s skills, knowledge, beliefs and resources, and ways of thinking and approaches to learning developed over time – sometimes across generations – and which characterise and support household functioning. Notably, the researchers used the term household practices rather than culture, from a concern that ‘culture’ “is loaded with expectations of group norms and often-static ideas of how people view the world and behave in it … the term presumes coherence within groups, which may not exist. Instead, we focused on practice—what households actually do and how they think about what they do” (Gonzales et al., 2005, p. 10).

From a strengths-based view of low-income families and children, and a socio-cultural approach to knowledge construction, the researchers, including teachers, adopted a position of curious enquiry to identify a wealth of knowledge and skills from children’s participation in, and observation of, household relationships, tasks, and activities, but which go untapped in the classroom and the setting up of learning environments and experiences. Implementing a funds of knowledge approach is different to and goes beyond accommodating children’s interests in curriculum. Rather, children’s interests are understood in the context of their family’s household practices, and the knowledge children have developed from these practices.

The approach thus requires educators to have an understanding of children’s rich “households, family practices, and cultural resources” (Moll, 2019, p. 137). Notably, when teachers work with children and their families from a position of learner or researcher, rather than knower, they can develop deep understandings of, and use, these knowledge funds in their teaching. Ensuing relatable learning experiences means that children will be engaged and their “academic development” (Moll et al., 1992, p. 137) supported. In one example from the research, a teacher learned that a child sold sweets made in the country his parents were born to friends and neighbours. Using this knowledge, she generated a week of culturally relevant learning experiences aimed at developing children’s knowledge and skills in literacy, maths, and science.

Since Moll and colleagues (González et al., 2005; Moll et al., 1992) work with school-aged children, research has explored culturally responsive, funds of knowledge approaches in ECEC contexts. This collective body of work highlights the value of learning about children’s funds of knowledge to inform play-based pedagogy and disrupt deficit assumptions about families and cultural resources (Hedges, 2011; Hedges et al., 2011; Hedges, 2015; Hedges et al., 2019; Chesworth, 2016; Riojas-Cortez, 2001; Miller Marsh & Zulamanova, 2017; Woodrow & Staples, 2019). Identified affordances of understanding children’s funds of knowledge are recognition and respect of children’s knowledge and capabilities that might otherwise remain hidden (Chesworth, 2016; Hedges et al., 2019) or ignored (Hedges, 2011); and a transformation of educator-family relationships that support family engagement and culturally responsive pedagogies (Arthur & Woodrow, 2018; Woodrow & Staples, 2019). Hedges’ collective work deepened understandings of children’s interests as emanating from and needing to be understood in the context of their families’ funds of knowledge.

Unlike the application of funds of knowledge to support academic achievement for school-aged students (e.g., Hogg, 2011; Moje et al., 2004; Staubach & Esteban, 2011), explicit attention to academic teaching and learning in these studies is limited. One notable exception (Arthur & Woodrow, 2018) involved educator-participants working intentionally with families from low socio-economic contexts in Australia and Chile to understand and embed their knowledge funds in play-based pedagogies to support children’s literacy and numeracy.

With only one Australian ECEC study having explicitly explored funds of knowledge pedagogy to support children’s academic learning, how to meet funds of knowledge expectations in Australia’s early learning framework remains unclear. In the next section we outline these expectations and then proceed to provide the context of the present study.

Funds of knowledge in Australia’s early years learning framework

Funds of knowledge resonates strongly with child-centred, strengths-focused, play-based early years curriculum approaches. In Australia, the updated version of the Early Years Learning Framework (AGDE, 2022) includes for the first time, reference to children and families’ funds of knowledge. To our knowledge, the EYLF is the only early years learning framework that explicitly expects educators to utilise a funds of knowledge approach in their pedagogical practice.

The EYLF glossary defines funds of knowledge as, “the historically accumulated experiences and understandings that an individual has and includes abilities, skills, bodies of knowledge, life experiences and cultural ways of interacting. A child’s funds of knowledge are often described as a ‘virtual backpack’ of all the life experiences and knowledge they bring into the early childhood setting” (p. 66). This ‘virtual backpack’ is recognised as children’s “individual, family and community ways of being, belonging and becoming” (p. 24; emphasis original).

Eight of the nine references to funds of knowledge in the EYLF are explicitly tied to educators’ pedagogical practices and supporting children’s learning. Educators are expected to be “aware of” (p. 21), “draw on” (p. 13), use (p. 22), and “build on” (pp. 34 and 51) these funds of knowledge as “an important basis for curriculum decision-making” (p. 21) to “assist in building thriving learners” (p. 13). The EYLF also expects educators’ evaluation of how well their pedagogical planning and curriculum is supporting children’s learning to include reflection of how they “know and value” children and families’ funds of knowledge (p. 26). The Framework positions “interests” and “funds of knowledge” as two distinct constructs, with educators expected to know and use both in their practice, for example, “plan and implement worthwhile play-based learning experiences using children’s interests, curiosities and funds of knowledge” (p. 22).

While the updated EYLF positions funds of knowledge as a pedagogical approach to be used by educators with all children, consistent with our social justice orientation, the focus in this paper is how educators in Australia utilise this approach to support the learning of children from families experiencing adversity. The context of the study and our methodological approach are first outlined, with a discussion of key findings to follow.

Methodology

Commencing in 2019, the Engaging Families in Early Education project aimed to provide deep insights into innovative, responsive, and effective practices in ECEC contexts with families experiencing economic adversity that had not previously been effectively documented, strengthened, and brought to scale. Funds of knowledge as a culturally responsive pedagogy was used as a theoretical framework to develop these insights prior to and following the release of the updated EYLF. The research was funded through an Australian Research Council Linkage Grant (LP180100142) in partnership with leading early childhood organisations: Creche & Kindergarten Association; Early Childhood Australia, Family Day Care Australia, Goodstart Early Learning, and KU Children’s Services.

The study was grounded in a social constructionist research paradigm which positions knowledge as constructed from one’s experiences in the world (Crotty, 2020). The design thus utilised a dialogic case study approach that viewed educator participants as research collaborators, and which adopted a participatory action research framing for iterative rounds of data collection and analysis (Woodrow & Newman, 2015). Data collected from interviews and site observations were analysed by the research team after which emergent findings were shared and workshopped with educators. This included discussions in which the educators responded to the findings, elaborated context, and corrected misunderstandings within a critically reflexive frame. An action agenda was negotiated during which further data was generated and findings shared.

Data collection and analysis

Five services with a reputation for high-quality engagement with low-income families were selected through discussion with research partners. The services were either located in low socio-economic areas or were known to enrol a significant number of low-income families. Following ethics approval from the Australian Institute of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Studies Research Ethics Committee (EO221- 20201110), data collection commenced late 2019.

In this paper we interrogate an account – Respecting Faith – shared by the director and a parent from one study site, a preschool. Data was collected through close contact with the preschool for over two years (prior to and following the release of the updated EYLF) and comprised local demographic and resource mapping; key policy and organisational document reviews; 16 interviews with ECEC staff; nine interviews with families using the service; practice and pedagogy observations; and three dialogic workshops with ECEC staff.

The Respecting Faith account shared by the director and parent is presented below as abridged interview excerpts, transcribed by a professional transcription service. Pseudonyms are used to retain anonymity. Data was also workshopped with participants into a short film (Engaging Families in Early Education, 2024) and used as the basis of a professional learning course (Fenech et al., 2024).

Deep analysis of the account was deductively undertaken using funds of knowledge theory. The data was interrogated by all authors to examine how the reported experiences reflected funds of knowledge pedagogy in terms of application and intended outcomes, and the factors that enabled funds of knowledge pedagogy to be practiced.

The preschool site

The context of the account was a not-for-profit community-based preschool situated in the outer suburbs of a major city and in one of Australia’s most disadvantaged suburbs (ABS, 2016). The preschool was licensed for 40 children a day with children attending two days a week during school terms. Children came from culturally and linguistically varied backgrounds, including First Nations and new-migrant families. Just over half (52%) of the enrolled children spoke a language other than English at home – with the dominant language groups being Bangla, Arabic, and Urdu – while a high proportion (46%) identified as having additional needs.

As a service that exceeded all seven national quality areas and with an overall Exceeding National Quality Standards rating, the preschool was well known for its high-quality inclusion practices. Staffing at the preschool was relatively stable and, in recognition of the complex needs of the families and children, exceeded educator:child ratio (1:10) and early childhood teacher (employment of one for a 40-place service) regulatory requirements. These staffing arrangements were made possible through government inclusion support funding supplemented by funding from the service provider. Careful, deliberate consideration of staffing also meant that many of the educators shared cultural and/or religious backgrounds with the families attending the preschool.

Respecting Faith

In the following account, Janet, the teaching director, describes an interaction she had with a newly enrolled four-year old child, Akeem, near the beginning of the teaching year. His family had recently returned to live in the city after several years in a small regional town. Prior to attending the preschool, Akeem had attended family day care. His parents were initially concerned about how he would adjust to being in a larger group of children. Janet described Akeem as being physically active and prone to being distracted. At the start of the year, he was observed to be quiet; seeking out peers but lacking confidence socially. Akeem, along with several of his peers, showed a keen interest in storytelling that involved puppets, so this type of group storytelling was used regularly. During one such storytelling session, a twist in the conversation provided Janet with rich insights into both Akeem’s knowledge of his family’s faith practices and his capacity to share this information. Janet shares how her interaction with Akeem came about.

I was sitting with the children and pulled out my puppet bag […] I have three stories in my puppet bag: the Three Bears, the Three Billy Goats, and the Three Little Pigs. We read the Three Bears, it was fun, the children were very engaged […] Afterwards, as Akeem went to leave the group, he spotted in my bag a pink puppet. He asked, ‘what's that? What’s that pink one?’ I said, ‘it’s a pig, but I don’t know if it’s okay for me to read the story of the pigs because some cultures don’t like pigs’. And he said, ‘we don’t, we don’t like pigs. I’m Muslim’. I said, ‘well, that’s what I thought’.

Akeem continued to express curiosity about the pig puppets. Janet reached out to colleagues – educators also of Muslim faith – to seek their opinion about telling a story based around pigs. One thought it was fine; the other confirmed that her family do not read stories about pigs. As Janet continues:

So, I said, ‘I’m not going to do that story. I think we should talk to your mum and dad about what they think because I don’t want to read a story that’s not okay’. Then Akeem started telling me about how he prays as a Muslim. He showed me the actions. And then Kabir, another boy joined in, and he recited a prayer in Arabic. And Akeem’s going, ‘that’s the prayer!’ By this time, there’s about six, maybe eight, children joining the group. I said ‘okay, well where do you go to pray? Do you go somewhere?’ Akeem answered excitedly ‘yes, we do, we go to the mosque’.

The interaction continued, Akeem described practices around going to the two mosques he was most familiar with, one in the regional town and one where he now lives. Several more children joined the conversation and engaged in discussion about the colour of their prayer mats and attending Arabic school on Saturdays. Janet shared a little about her own faith with the children:

I said, ‘well, I go to church, and this is how I pray’. I did the sign of the cross. Akeem said, ‘that’s not praying’. He’s laughing and Kabir’s laughing. ‘That’s not how you pray’. I said, ‘yeah, it is. You go like this’. ‘No, no, no!’ So, the conversation continued about culture and what they do at home and when they pray. I said, ‘you’ve got Eid coming up’. The shock that I knew what Eid was. I said, ‘I’ve learned so much, this is amazing, I can’t thank you enough for sharing your culture’.

In the group experience Janet aimed to build Akeem’s confidence and encouraged his expressive language. She observed that contrary to his previous short engagement in activities, “he articulated [his faith] so well, he took his time […] He didn’t get worried. He didn’t get nervous. It was like, ‘I know this about me’ and he was happy to share it, and we were all happy to listen”. During the experience, with her guidance, Akeem demonstrated greater sophistication in use of language than she had previously observed.

When Akeem’s mother, Cara, came in the next day, she was thrilled, confirming that Akeem had come home and relayed the discussions about faith and prayer to his parents:

Akeem came home and asked us about reading stories about pigs. Obviously different Muslims feel differently about it. So, for us, reading the story wouldn’t have been an issue – our kids watch Peppa Pig - you know, there are some families for who it would be an issue. But I think for us, it was that they went on to have a conversation about prayer and just different things. What we liked about it was that it came from an immediate position of respect for different beliefs in a small child, and not undermining them, or making them feel like it’s something they have to explain.

In follow-up research interviews, Janet reflected that the interactions were transformative for Akeem: “Having this group experience with him being at the top and explaining…he … found himself.” Janet observed that Akeem was more confident to speak up in a group and share his perspective, and that the social relationships amongst the group of children strengthened, as did both Janet and Akeem’s relationship, and Janet’s relationship with his parents. Janet was now armed with a far more nuanced understanding of Akeem’s expressive capabilities that she could use to maximise his learning.

In the following analysis of these excerpts, informed by Funds of Knowledge theory, attention is paid to how the opportunities and affordances of funds of knowledge are brought to life. We consider how the approach manifests in the recognition and respect of children’s knowledge and capabilities, the positions available to educators when such a lens or framing is used, how it can be used to support academic learning, and what supports educators to enable them to undertake their pedagogical work in this way. Finally, an interrogation of the account highlights possibilities to further extend the already rich funds of knowledge approaches evident in Janet’s practice.

Findings and discussion

Funds of knowledge in practice

Consistent with funds of knowledge theorising, the Respecting Faith account shows Janet bringing Akeem’s rich cultural knowledge into the preschool, thereby connecting his home and early learning lifeworlds. Akeem’s curiosity about the pig puppet highlights how children’s interests can emerge from and be explored through their funds of knowledge (Hedges et al., 2011). His perceived quietness and inattentiveness did not translate to a deficit positioning, with Janet demonstrating a respectful, strengths-based approach that viewed Akeem as an expert on his family’s faith practices. While Janet had some preexisting knowledge of Muslim faith practices, she did not homogenise Muslim culture, seeking instead to understand how Akeem, the other children, and her Muslim colleagues each practiced their religion.

Evident in Janet’s exchanges with Akeem was the execution of what the Australian E4Kids study encapsulated as the instructional support required for academic learning: “connecting to the child’s real world; having back and forth exchanges with children where scaffolding, giving encouragement and affirmation feature; probing children’s thinking and providing information; and modelling language through frequent conversations, open-ended questions, the use of advanced vocabulary and language, repetitions and extensions, and self and parallel talk” (Tayler, 2016, p. 7). These pedagogical interactions with Akeem demonstrated how funds of knowledge pedagogy “tell teachers what children know and are capable of doing” (Riojas-Cortez, 2001, p. 39) and provided an enriched platform to inform future academic learning opportunities.

The time and space provided for the extended conversations, the authentic nature of the interaction between Janet and the child (ren), and her responsiveness to their cultural knowledge can be viewed as supportive and facilitative of children’s oral language. Children’s position as authoritative ‘knowers’, as well as Akeem’s communication capacity, particularly relevant in this case due to his perceived lack of confident social communication, were also validated. In fact, Janet was surprised at the obvious strength of Akeem’s recount of the episode as relayed by his mother. The use of funds of knowledge pedagogy, then, revealed a strength in oral language and narrative recount capacity that Janet, the teacher, had previously been unaware of, an important finding from the data.

Educator positioning

How educators are positioned and position themselves when enacting funds of knowledge pedagogy can also be extracted from this account. As intentional teacher, Janet engaged in deep listening, readily adapting her plans and position according to the emerging context. The puppet activity was a deliberate pedagogical strategy designed to engage the children based on Janet’s knowledge of Akeem’s interests and enjoyment of puppets. However, she followed his lead in allowing the conversation to move in a different direction.

It is also possible to locate the educator as a researcher of local context and children’s and families’ funds of knowledge. In this position, Janet approached the interaction with genuine curiosity, actively seeking to learn more about Akeem by providing him with the opportunity to be the knowledge holder and the space to demonstrate his expressive capabilities and share what he knew. She also did not retreat from Akeem’s challenge that the actions she described as praying were not accurate but asserted herself as expert in her own faith practices, thereby becoming a collaborator in Akeem’s learning.

The role of the educator as a partner with families was also evident in the relationship of mutual respect that was developing between the family and Janet through cultural recognition, knowledge exchange, and authenticity. The communication between Janet and Akeem’s mother involved an exchange of information about Akeem’s communication capability that informed the educators’ future learning plans for him. These characteristics, the development of trust relationships, authentic communication, and exchange of information are the foundations for transformative relationships that arguably could progress through this recognition and active engagement with family funds of knowledge.

Enablers of funds of knowledge pedagogy

Funds of knowledge pedagogy is complex and time-intensive, requiring multiple and interconnecting educator, service, and structural enablers, from the capacities of educators to a centre’s philosophy and structural matters regarding staffing, ratios and funding. The positioning of the educator as a researcher of local context, and of children’s and families’ funds of knowledge, makes different demands on educators to that of expert knower. It involves respect for the ‘other’, and a range of skills and capabilities, including an open disposition to inclusive practices. Moreover, the language and strategies Janet utilised reflect the characteristics of ‘Sustained Shared Thinking’ (Jones et al., 2023; Sylva et al., 2007), an approach identified in world-leading research as conducive to children’s learning and a marker of early childhood program quality (Tayler et al., 2016).

At the centre level, the Respecting Faith account reflects many of the things learned from the educators’ interviews and dialogic workshops from this research site. In particular, the strength of commitment to respectful engagement with diversity, and affirmation of cultural knowledge and practices, was evident and provided a framework for intentional encounters with children and families. The centre’s equity ethos and commitment to inclusion (Fenech & Skattebol, 2021) strongly upholds respect for families, and their knowledge and customs. Janet’s meeting with Akeem’s mother was just one example of educators’ thick engagement with families, marked by frequent and lengthy connections that encouraged families to share their culture with staff and the children, for example, through long conversations, family events, and/or as part of the service’s program. Information gathering extended well beyond thin engagement strategies including enrolment forms and meetings, seeking information and feedback through digital platforms such as Storypark, and brief interactions at drop off and pick up times. This finding reflects Staples and Woodrow’s (2019) conceptualisation of relationships, that spans from one-way ‘inform’ and ‘involve’ approaches to more complex, two-way practices of mutuality.

Staffing practices advocated for by Janet in her director-leadership role also supported deep connection conducive to understanding children and families’ funds of knowledge. Educators with cultural heritage reflective of the local community were employed to support initial and ongoing engagement with families. Additionally, because they could access additional funding, the service was able to exceed minimum ratio and teacher regulatory requirements. These staffing approaches provided educators with the resources required – time and cultural capital – to develop knowledge of families and their cultural practices.

Structural enablers extended beyond the preschool to the service provider and broader government ECEC policy. As a not-for-profit service with an established reputation for providing high-quality ECEC, the preschool’s provider made additional funding available for staffing, in recognition of the complexity and time intensive nature of work with a highly diverse and economically disadvantaged community. Inclusion support funding from government was also critical for this purpose.

Final reflections

The Respecting Faith account showcases funds of knowledge pedagogy practiced at the preschool site to support language development and social inclusion and connectiveness. The account also provided the teacher, Janet, with an accurate assessment of Akeem’s expressive language skills. Importantly, data pertaining to the account was collected at the end of the data collection period, following dialogic workshops that included an unpacking of funds of knowledge theory. At the beginning of their engagement in the research, the preschool team were not familiar with funds of knowledge pedagogy. The attention paid to household practices in the account contrasted with much data initially collected from the site around what Moll and colleagues (1992) and Riojas-Cortez (2001) cautioned were an emphasis by educators on visible or surface culture and artefacts, such as food and cultural celebrations. Application of funds of knowledge pedagogy, such as was evident in the account presented, may be seen as the outcome of her participation in the research and occurred after having the opportunity in the dialogic workshops to reflect on practice with respect to researcher-presented learnings about funds of knowledge. This is not to say the educators had not been working from a funds of knowledge framework prior to the research, but they did not couch their pedagogical practice in these terms. Certainly, the preschool team’s commitment to respectful engagement with diversity, and affirmation of cultural knowledge and practices, was evident and provided a framework for intentional encounters with children and families. Had the research continued, further examples of using funds of knowledge to promote academic learning may have been possible.

Conclusion

A funds of knowledge approach as endorsed in the EYLF v2 (AGDE, 2022) helps educators to understand not just what a child is interested in, but why they have this interest and how much they already know. A curriculum connected to children’s lifeworlds and funds of knowledge has potential to create deep learning experiences, drawing on their everyday and significant cultural practices to extend knowledge and skills while also supporting identity and wellbeing. These affordances are salient for all young children, but particularly those in families experiencing disadvantage.

While interest-based learning is a prevailing discourse in ECEC, funds of knowledge is not. Thus, educators may not only not be acquainted with the approach, they may also lack the language to articulate why extending their practice into the realm of families’ household practices would be valuable to do. Funds of knowledge pedagogy presents as an area of practice that warrants greater attention in preservice teacher education, vocational training, and professional development for early childhood teachers and educators.

The account presented of one teacher seeking to understand a child’s funds of knowledge resonates with Reggio Emilia’s pedagogy of listening (Rinaldi, 2006), which begins from a position of curiosity. Intentionally dialoguing with children and families about their lifeworlds “takes the individual out of anonymity … enriching both those who listen and those who produce the message” (p. 49). From the social justice foundations of a funds of knowledge pedagogy, the endorsement of this approach in the EYLF v2 for educators in Australia presents as an opportunity for this enrichment to include deep connection and recognition, as well as academic learning to redress developmental vulnerability. Additionally, findings point to an imperative for policy and funding reforms to ensure that all educators and services have the resources they need to implement this complex and time-intensive work. Further capacity-building research that mobilises the approach would further support its adaption and implementation in Australian and international early childhood contexts.