Helen May

The Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development’s International Early Learning Study: Opening for debate and contestation:

The Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development is initiating the International Early Learning Study, a cross-national assessment of early learning outcomes involving the testing of 5-year-old children in participating countries. The authors use this colloquium to inform members of the early childhood community about this project and to raise concerns about its assumptions, practices and possible effects. The authors also invite readers’ comments, to start a process of democratic dialogue and contestation.

“The blessings of civilisation”: nineteenth‐century missionary infant schools for young native children in three colonial settings – India, Canada and New Zealand 1820s–1840s

In the context of missionary endeavours of the early nineteenth century there were considerable similarities in the religious and education blueprints for providing the “blessings of civilisation” to the young native “heathen” child in various parts of the British Empire. The three case studies presented illustrate a relatively undocumented aspect of missionary work concerning the adaptation of new European ideas for schooling very young children in so‐called infant schools. The comparative focus on the shared aspects of their colonial experience is illuminating of both the pervasiveness of missionary endeavours and the diversity of contexts to which those ideals were applied. This paper provides an overview of the context of new ideas for educating young children in Europe alongside the focus of British missionary endeavour towards its expanding colonial empire in the early years of the nineteenth century. Short illustrative case studies are presented in relation to the missionary infant schools in British India, Canada and New Zealand, all established in parallel during the 1820s–1840s. The characteristic of all infant schools, whether amongst the poor in Britain or the heathen in its colonies, was to create an ordered environment apart from the perceived disorder of the child’s home, and the focus was to produce an educable and orderly child. Each case study provides a different facet of the missionary quest to save children from their heathen ways through schooling.

Towards the Right of New Zealand Children for Free Early Childhood Education

This paper provides an historical and policy overview of early childhood education in New Zealand. The analysis is framed around the introduction, in July 2007, of the government’s policy of 20 hours-a-week free early childhood education for three and four year old children in teacher-led early childhood programmes. This initiative extended a raft of policies intended to improve quality participation in early childhood as part of the Government’s ten year Strategic Plan Pathways to the Future: Ngã Huarahi Arataki 2002–2012. A key plank of this policy is that by 2012 all adults working in teacher-led services will have teaching qualifications. Realising this has been challenging and the implementation of the ‘20 hours free’ policy became a controversial media story. From age five, all New Zealand children have long had a ‘right as a citizen’ to free schooling. There was a level of expectation from parents that this ‘right’ had been extended to early childhood education. The policy was not so bold. This paper outlines the journey towards matching the rights of the school aged and preschool aged child for free education. The ‘20 hours free’ policy is an important step in the process. The paper concludes with an early commentary on the issues that this policy raises in relation to: the rights of children and parents, the costs of quality, and the conflicting roles of government, community, and private enterprise in the provision of early childhood services.

Te Whäriki: Neuseelands frühpädagogisches Curriculum 1991–2001

Eine neuseelandische Fallstudie beschreibt den Kontext der Entwicklung eines Curriculums fir unterschiedliche kulturell und philosophisch orientierte Einrichtungen der Fruherziehung. Sie geht auf die Frage ein, ob und inwieweit ein nationaler Bildungsplan fir Fachkrafte und Kinder ein Gewinn sein kann. In der Maori-Sprache bedeutet Te Whariki „eine Matte, auf der alle stehen konnen“. Als curriculares Dokument enthalt Te Whariki allgemeine Prinzipien und Ziele fir die Arbeit in einer breiten Vielfalt von Kindertagesstatten. Als Metapher gibt Te Whariki jeder Tageseinrichtung den Raum, ihr eigenes Muster zu weben. Te Whariki wurde im Praxisfeld gut angenommen. Gleichzeitig ist das Curriculum mit Herausforderungen verbunden, weil die Rahmenvorgaben keine spezifischen Inhalte prasentieren. In einer Zeit des politisch-administrativen Bemuhens um Kostentransparenz und Qualitat im gesamten fruhpadagogischen Sektor rucken Evaluationsthemen als padagogische Herausforderung in den Vordergrund.1

NINETEENTH CENTURY EARLY CHILDHOOD INSTITUTIONS IN AOTEAROA NEW ZEALAND: LEGACIES OF ENLIGHTENMENT AND COLONISATION

Abstract The nineteenth century colonial setting of Aotearoa NZ is the most distant from the cradle of European Enlightenment that sparked new understandings of childhood, learning and education and spearheaded new approaches to the care and education of young children outside of the family home. The broader theme of the Enlightenment was about progress and the possibilities of the ongoing improvement of peoples and institutions. The young child was seen as a potent force in this transformation and a raft of childhood institutions, including the 19th century infant school, kindergarten, and crèche were a consequence. The colonisation and settlement of Aotearoa NZ by European settlers coincided with an era in which the potency of new aspirations for new kinds of institutions for young children seeded. It is useful in the 21st century to reframe the various waves of colonial endeavour and highlight the dynamic interfaces of being colonised for the indigenous populations; being a colonial for the settler populations; and the power and should be purposed of the colonising cultures of Europe. It can be argued that in the context of ECE neither the indigenous nor settler populations of Aotearoa NZ were passive recipients of European ECE ideas but, separately and together, forged new understandings of childhood and its institutions; enriched and shaped by the lessons learned in the colonial setting of Aotearoa NZ.

Connections Between Early Childhood Policy and Research in Aotearoa New Zealand: 1970s–2010s

This chapter summarises five eras of early childhood policy and research development in Aotearoa New Zealand. In the 1970s, there was a divided system of care and education, and the dominant view that childcare was primarily custodial and sessional care educational was questioned by research. In 1980s, policies moved towards integration, maintaining diversity and improving quality (especially through teacher education), while research explored the nature and long-term impact of quality. The 1990s saw the introduction of bicultural socioculturally based early childhood curriculum guidelines, Te Whāriki, and a wave of qualitative research followed to evaluate and support the curriculum and its implementation. During the 2000s, a strategic plan, Nga Huarahi Arataki (2002–2012), prioritised increased participation and quality and collaboration between services. In 2003, teacher-researcher partnership projects embarked New Zealand on an action research journey to explore, document and disseminate innovative teaching. In the recent era coinciding with a world economic downturn, a more conservative government approach to early childhood policy and cut backs to funding and programmes, research has, by political necessity, focused on the efficiency and effectiveness of taxpayer investment in the sector, increasing cost-effectiveness and promoting the participation of ‘disadvantaged’ children. The goal of improving quality has been put at risk by cutting funding for fully qualified staff.

Lessons and legacies of early childhood history

The topic of this special issue of Early Years is the history of early childhood education and care. The current attention to ECEC programmes and policies worldwide makes it imperative to understan...

A Historical Overview of Early Education Policy and Pedagogy: Global Perspectives and Particular Examples

The history of early children institutions is littered with debates about how best to educate young children, including in regard to mathematics. In this chapter, definitions of instruction and construction are provided as a way of describing aspects of these debates. Some of those debates are discussed in regard to the filling of “socially empty spaces” by pedagogies and practices that drew on the ideologies of proposers of different projects. Drawings and photos are provided to illustrate visually some of the ways that the empty spaces were filled. The most current debates centre on the pulling down of school knowledge and practices into before-school institutions such as preschools.