scholarly journals Culturally inclusive pedagogies of care: A narrative inquiry

2019 ◽  
Vol 10 (2) ◽  
pp. 87-99
Author(s):  
Lata Rana ◽  
Yvonne Culbreath
Keyword(s):  
Early Childhood ◽  
New Zealand ◽  
Narrative Inquiry ◽  
Teaching And Learning ◽  
Culturally Relevant ◽  
Ways Of Knowing ◽  
Cultural Knowledge ◽  
Narrative Methodology ◽  
Equitable Outcomes ◽  
Diverse Cultures

Abstract This paper is a reflection on culturally relevant pedagogies of care to achieve more equitable outcomes for diverse cultures within early childhood. The authors are academics at a tertiary institute in Auckland, New Zealand. Our aim is to share our experiences as teachers in a diverse and multi-ethnic city in New Zealand. Authors draw on narrative methodology to deconstruct our experiences and share how we position ourselves in teaching and learning. The paper emphasises an enactment of pedagogy that recognises diverse cultural knowledge and other ways of knowing.

scholarly journals Early childhood assessment in Aotearoa New Zealand: Critical perspectives and fresh openings

2015 ◽  
Vol 6 (2) ◽  
pp. 71-86 ◽  
Author(s):  
Sonja Arndt ◽  
Marek Tesar
Keyword(s):  
Early Childhood ◽  
New Zealand ◽  
Teaching And Learning ◽  
Local Context ◽  
Assessment Practices ◽  
Narrative Assessment ◽  
Aotearoa New Zealand ◽  
Learning Stories ◽  
Curriculum Framework ◽  
Te Whāriki

Abstract This paper engages with assessment practices in Aotearoa New Zealand. Te Whāriki, the internationally recognized early childhood curriculum framework, lies at the root of contemporary narrative assessment practices, and the concept of learning stories. We outline historical and societal underpinnings of these practices, and elevate the essence of assessment through learning stories and their particular ontological and epistemological aims and purposes. The paper emphasizes early childhood teaching and learning as a complex relational, inter-subjective, material, moral and political practice. It adopts a critical lens and begins from the premise that early childhood teachers are in the best position to make decisions about teaching and learning in their localized, contextualized settings, with and for the children with whom they share it. We examine the notion of effectiveness and ‘what works’ in assessment, with an emphasis on the importance of allowing for uncertainty, and for the invisible elements in children’s learning. Te Whāriki and learning stories are positioned as strong underpinnings of culturally and morally open, rich and complex assessment, to be constantly renegotiated within each local context, in Aotearoa New Zealand and beyond.

scholarly journals Mobilising tofā sa’ili for ECE leadership: A talanoa confronting dominant conceptualisations from a Pasifika perspective

2021 ◽  
Vol 41 (2) ◽  
pp. 26-32
Author(s):  
Maria Cooper ◽  
Jacoba Matapo
Keyword(s):  
Early Childhood ◽  
New Zealand ◽  
Cultural Values ◽  
Ways Of Knowing ◽  
The Self ◽  
Reciprocal Relationships ◽  
Childhood Education ◽  
The Past ◽  
Aotearoa New Zealand ◽  
Looking Back

Leadership is about all of us, but dominant frames of leadership serve only a few. In this commentary, we challenge the dominance of Western notions of leadership as linear influence relationships in order to shift Pasifika engagement from the margins. For us, ta’ita’i (Pasifika leadership) is centred on serving, not the self, but the collective spirit. It is expansive, holistic, and grounded in reciprocal relationships between people, nature, the cosmos and those of the past, present, and future. Looking back to the teachings of our families and ancestors can guide us in leading communities with strength, unity, and connection. Rather than deny the legitimate place of Western notions of leadership or romanticise ideas of Pasifika leadership, through talanoa (open talk), we mobilise tofā sa’ili (a search for wisdom and meaning) by engaging with traditional Pasifika cultural values and philosophies that hold significance for leadership in early childhood education in Aotearoa New Zealand. In doing so, we hope to open up pathways of thinking that move us beyond individualistic framings of leadership, while honouring Pasifika ways of knowing and being in serving the collective.

Reimagining teacher subjectivity in Pacific early childhood education in New Zealand

2020 ◽  
pp. 147821032096089
Author(s):  
Jacoba Matapo ◽  
Jeanne Teisina
Keyword(s):  
Early Childhood ◽  
New Zealand ◽  
Early Childhood Education ◽  
Teacher Identity ◽  
Ways Of Knowing ◽  
Childhood Education ◽  
Professional Teacher

This article presents a transnational Moana talanoa 1 between two Pacific early childhood education scholars. Calling on both Samoan and Tongan indigenous understandings that breathe life into a Moana subjectivity is inclusive of ways of knowing, relating and becoming. We turn our attention to the importance of talanoa (stories/storying) in reconstituting olaga 2 and tangata kakato 3 in the act of decolonising Pacific 4 personhood in New Zealand early childhood education. Moana, the waters that bind Pacific peoples through genealogy, relationality and cosmogony, generate intersubjectivity; a folding of past-present-futures. It is in the spirit of Moana that we bring attention to the interconnectedness of subjects in the context of early childhood education in New Zealand. By way of movement in and with Moana, the currents, depth and flows, we problematise politics of early childhood education and professional teacher identity. Such tensions require navigation and as Hawaiian scholar Meyer said: ‘How one knows, indeed, what one prioritises with regards to this knowing, ends up being the stuffing of identity, the truth that links us to our distant cosmologies, and the essence of who we are as Oceanic peoples’ (p. 125). In thinking-Moana-intersubjectivity, we call into question how the agency and subjectivity of teacher identity can be reimagined. We share our narratives through poetry and story as a mode of expression in analysing and decolonising personhood.

Children's idiomatic expressions of cultural knowledge

1997 ◽  
Vol os-30 (1) ◽  
pp. 15-24 ◽  
Author(s):  
Akosua Obuo Addo
Keyword(s):  
Learning Styles ◽  
Teaching And Learning ◽  
Educational Practice ◽  
Ways Of Knowing ◽  
Cultural Knowledge ◽  
Culturally Relevant Teaching ◽  
Knowledge Structures ◽  
Theoretical Position ◽  
Knowledge Analysis ◽  
Idiomatic Expressions

The process of teaching and learning music from many cultures is important for imparting cultural knowledge. Analysis of folklore provides information on cultural knowledge structures for educational practice in general and curriculum content in particular. Children develop patterns of culturally accepted human actions and relations, based on cultural knowledge structures as they are enculturated into society. This paper includes (a) a discussion of my theoretical position on culturally relevant teaching and learning styles and (b) a description of children's idiomatic expressions of cultural knowledge in their ways of knowing demonstrated in three teaching scenarios.

Early Childhood Science

Education ◽  
2019 ◽  
Author(s):  
Christine Howitt
Keyword(s):  
Early Childhood ◽  
Young Children ◽  
Teaching And Learning ◽  
Ways Of Knowing ◽  
Early Years ◽  
Formal Schooling ◽  
Early Childhood Science ◽  
Positive Attitudes ◽  
Wide Range ◽  
Before School

In this review, early childhood is defined as children from birth to eight years of age. This age range covers before school years, including child care, and the beginning years of formal schooling. These early years of life are considered crucial in shaping a child’s ability to learn and to think creatively. From birth onward, children actively explore their world as they attempt to make sense of what is around them. Due to its capacity to engage and stimulate children, science education in the early years has been recognized for its potential to improve many aspects of their cognitive and social development, including promoting the development of scientific thinking and science skills and encouraging positive attitudes toward science. Recognition of the importance of providing science-related experiences for young children, the acknowledgement of young children’s science competence, the provision of greater voice for young children, and more appropriate methodologies for working with young children that embrace their multiple ways of knowing have seen an increase in research in early childhood science learning since the early 2000s. This bibliography relates to early childhood science in the 21st century and focuses on the teacher, young children, and the environment in relation to the teaching and learning of science. In an attempt to present the wide range of research that has been published in this area, the bibliography covers different contexts, paradigms, and methodologies.

scholarly journals Exploring How Secondary STEM Teachers and Undergraduate Mentors Adapt Digital Technologies to Promote Culturally Relevant Education during COVID-19

2022 ◽  
Vol 12 (1) ◽  
pp. 48
Author(s):  
Meredith Weaver Kier ◽  
Lindy L. Johnson
Keyword(s):  
Technology Use ◽  
Online Teaching ◽  
Teaching And Learning ◽  
Culturally Relevant ◽  
Digital Tools ◽  
Stem Learning ◽  
Global Pandemic ◽  
Equitable Outcomes ◽  
Cross Case Analysis

The COVID-19 global pandemic presented unprecedented challenges to K-16 educators, including the closing of educational agencies and the abrupt transition to online teaching and learning. Educators sought to adapt in-person learning activities to teach in remote and hybrid online settings. This study explores how a partnership between middle and high school teachers in an urban school district and undergraduate STEM mentors of color leveraged digital tools and collaborative pedagogies to teach science, technology, and engineering during a global pandemic. We used a qualitative multi-case study to describe three cases of teachers and undergraduate mentors. We then offer a cross-case analysis to interpret the diverse ways in which partners used technologies, pedagogy, and content to promote equitable outcomes for students, both in remote and hybrid settings. We found that the partnership and technologies led to rigorous and connected learning for students. Teachers and undergraduates carefully scaffolded technology use and content applications while providing ongoing opportunities for students to receive feedback and reflect on their learning. Findings provide implications for community partnerships and digital tools to promote collaborative and culturally relevant STEM learning opportunities in the post-pandemic era.

scholarly journals Landscapes of Identity: Young children and the visual arts | Paysages identitaires : jeunes enfants et arts visuels

2017 ◽  
Vol 44 (1) ◽  
pp. 4-19
Author(s):  
Lesley Margaret Pohio
Keyword(s):  
Early Childhood ◽  
New Zealand ◽  
Visual Arts ◽  
Ethnic Diversity ◽  
Early Childhood Teachers ◽  
Ways Of Knowing ◽  
Early Childhood Curriculum ◽  
Petite Enfance ◽  
Research Findings ◽  
Te Whāriki

Abstract: This research investigated how early childhood teachers responded to young children’s cultural and ethnic diversity through the visual arts.  The visual arts are a critical means through which children’s cultural ways of knowing can be communicated and made visible. This was a key discovery from a research project underpinned by the New Zealand early childhood curriculum, Te Whāriki, which cites cultural diversity as a central  principle, and motivated by statistics in the 2013 New Zealand Census that showed a strong demographic contrast between the ethnicities of the youthful and adult populations. The research findings presented the teacher participants’ understandings of culture and ethnicity and their interpretation of the multi-faceted and complex ways children’s visual artwork expresses children’s cultural and ethnic identities. Fragments of the artworks were interwoven within a tapestry to visualise these complex and multi-faceted findings.Keywords: Early Childhood Education; Visual Arts; Cultural and Ethnic diversity Résumé : Cette recherche tente d’identifier de quelle façon les éducateurs de la petite enfance réagissent face à la diversité culturelle et ethnique des enfants par le biais des arts visuels. Les arts visuels sont un medium essentiel pour transmettre et rendre tangibles les voies culturelles du savoir chez les enfants. Il s’agit d’une découverte importante faite dans le cadre d’un projet de recherche soutenu par le programme d’étude TeWhāriki de la petite enfance en Nouvelle-Zélande, qui fait de la diversité culturelle un principe fondamental, sur la base de statistiques issues du Recensement néozélandais de 2013 qui met en évidence un contraste démographique important entre les populations de jeunes enfants et d’adultes. Les résultats de cette recherche illustrent les perceptions culturelles et ethniques des enseignants participants et leur interprétation des voies complexes et à multiples facettes utilisées par les jeunes enfants pour exprimer leur identité culturelle et ethnique à travers leurs œuvres artistiques. Des fragments de ces œuvres ont été regroupés dans une tapisserie pour mieux illustrer ces résultats complexes et à multiples facettes (Figure 1).Mots-clés : éducation de la petite enfance ; arts visuels ; diversité ethnique 

scholarly journals Ngā Tuakiri o te Tangata: Being Māori in Early Childhood Education

2016 ◽  
Vol 46 (1) ◽  
pp. 104-114
Author(s):  
Lesley Rameka
Keyword(s):  
Early Childhood ◽  
New Zealand ◽  
Early Childhood Education ◽  
Cultural Knowledge ◽  
Minority Population ◽  
Childhood Education ◽  
Aotearoa New Zealand ◽  
Complex Settings ◽  
Settler Population ◽  
Over Time

Before the arrival of Europeans in Aotearoa, New Zealand and their subsequent settlement in the 1800s, there was no concept of a Māori identity. Over time, however, as a result of rapid colonisation, Māori became a minority population in New Zealand. Consequently, the term Māori as normal or usual, began to lose its meaning (Webber, 2008), and another meaning began to emerge based on contrasts with the Pākehā settler population. This paper explores the complex and increasingly diverse nature of Māori identities in contemporary Aotearoa/New Zealand, including contemporary early childhood contexts. It discusses the importance of negotiating the terrains of cultural knowledge, values and understandings in order to define what ‘being Māori’ means for teachers and children in an increasingly diverse and complex settings.

Japanese children’s experiences in New Zealand early childhood education settings

2021 ◽  
pp. 14-18
Author(s):  
Madoka Takemoto
Keyword(s):  
Early Childhood ◽  
New Zealand ◽  
Early Childhood Education ◽  
Cultural Knowledge ◽  
Japanese Child ◽  
Self Identity ◽  
Cultural Challenges ◽  
Childhood Education ◽  
Doctor Of Education ◽  
Education Data

Early childhood education (ECE) settings in Aotearoa New Zealand are becoming increasingly ethnically superdiverse. This article draws on a research project that examined the cultural challenges that Japanese children sometimes encounter in New Zealand ECE contexts which was undertaken for my Doctor of Education. Data were analysed using a conceptual framework developed from five key notions that apply to third-culture individuals (TCI). The experiences of one child in this project and the tensions he experienced negotiating his self-identity as a Japanese child are described and their impact on his sense of belonging to the group of children at the centre is considered. The findings revealed that, despite the good intentions of teachers, the child’s Japanese cultural identity, and his attempts to share it, were frequently challenged by his teachers’ lack of cultural knowledge about Japan. I argue that these experiences resulted in complex situations for both the Japanese child and his teachers.

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