Philosophical Inquiry and Contemporary Issues
in Early Childhood Education
The Journey of Early Childhood Education: From Historical Foundations to Present Day Practices
Researching Educational Theories of Early Childhood Education
During this module of the course we began by learning about the various theories that exist in the area of Early Childhood Education. We produced a timeline to highlight some of the key theorists that have contributed to this field and explained how each person was significant in regards to their influence on early childhood education. One of the theorists I found interesting to read about was Lev Vygotsky who believed that social interaction plays an important role in the development of cognition, and that cooperative learning exercises provide an opportunity for children to work together and help each other within the Zone of Proximal Development. This is defined by Vygotsky as the space between what a learner can do unassisted and what they can do with help from a More Knowledgeable Other (MKO).
We also chose one theorist to do our own research about and produced a vlog explaining the key aspects of that person's theory and how we would apply it to our teaching in the early childhood classroom. I chose to research and talk about Maslow's theory of motivation as it is a theory I am fairly familiar with, and I felt many parts of it seemed relevant to maintaining a positive atmosphere in an early childhood classroom. For example, if a child's basic physiological needs are not met such as if the child is hungry or sleepy, they will be too focused on those unmet needs which would prevent them from learning as much as they could if these needs were met.
Identifying and Overcoming Bias in an Early Childhood Learning Environment
We then learnt about issues that can arise when teaching such as implicit bias and the impact of school shutdowns on children. We made an infographic to highlight ways to identify bias and ways to tackle it in the classroom. It is important to celebrate each child's individual differences and expose children to different cultures so that they can learn to embrace differences.​ We also designed our own open house events to promote diversity in the early childhood classroom. This was challenging as my current class are not very culturally diverse, however I was still able to plan an event that would encourage the children to notice and be curious about differences that exist between them.
To highlight the impact of school shut downs on children, we each created a short video presentation using Powtoon. The global pandemic has had a great effect on children and the continual school closures can affect not only their education, but can lead to feelings of isolation and excessive screen time which increases the risk of grooming or cyber bullying.
Meeting the Needs of Early Learners without Parental Support
The Impact of Parental Support in Early Childhood Education
The final topic we studied in this module was the impact of parental support on early childhood education. We created a handout that could be given to parents to highlight the important role they play in their child's education and we also recorded a short video demonstrating how teachers can help students who lack sufficient learning support at home. Research strongly indicates that parental support is far more influential than other factors on a child's educational achievement. Many parents are busy with work or perhaps due to language barriers are not able to be as engaged in their children's education as they would like. It is important to identify the reason for a parent's apparent lack of support and try to find solutions that work for both the child and the parent.
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