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Margaret Brennan
Victoria University of Wellington
Sociocultural theories propose that social context and more experienced cultural members are integral to children’s development and enculturation into their communities. However, the argument is made that the current Western cultural and structural arrangement of group public child care impedes the successful implementation of sociocultural-based curricula because of its individualised and separatist nature. Furthermore, accepting this current cultural and structural arrangement at the theoretical level means that we lose sight of the fact that young children want to be part of adults’ lives and included in their communities. Separating young children and their teachers from adult communities also presents challenges for teachers when attempting to establish authentic relationships with young children and their families. The case is made that we need to reconceptualise theories to more closely align with contemporary enculturation practices and life situations if we are to reflect a truly sociocultural approach to teaching and learning.
Keywords: Sociocultural approaches, socialisation, enculturation, teacher–child relationships
Introduction
This paper draws on observations and literature from my recent doctorate research, a qualitative case study. Using a sociocultural framework, and ethnographic methods of data collection, I explored how young children learn to be part of the group within a childcare setting. In this paper I share my reflections on public child care as a structural and cultural arrangement and comment on the difficulty for teachers when attempting to implement sociocultural-based curricula within this current arrangement.
Introducing the study
Lofland and Lofland (1995) maintain that in complex or differentiated societies people are enmeshed in devising and enacting ideas and activities that are responsive to their immediate needs. Deeply immersed in the participation of their own lives, they have little time to reflect on their life situations and become submerged in increasingly larger scales of social organisation. The aim of my study was to provide a window into everyday life in a childcare centre but also to enlarge perceptions of this social arrangement to encourage different ways of thinking about how we care for and work with young children. My study suggested that group child care, where large numbers of young children are cared for and educated in childcare centres which sit apart from adult communities, is only one of many possibilities for enculturating and educating young children.
My study contributed to many others which have drawn on a diverse body of sociocultural thinking to examine the micro nature and concerns of early childhood care and education. A sociocultural approach to learning in early childhood education has been advocated strongly in Australia and New Zealand and prompted many areas of research (Anning, Cullen & Fleer, 2004; Carr, 2001; Cullen, 1999, 2000; Fleer, 1992, 1995, 2001a, 2001b, 2003; Jordan, 1999, 2003; Smith, 1996, 1998). Recent early childhood studies in New Zealand have included evaluation of the quality of child care, and investigation and critique of the early childhood curriculum (Cullen, 1996; Hedges, 2000; Nuttall, 2002; Podmore, May & Mara, 1998; Ritchie, 2003; Te One, 2003). Evaluative studies have included structural factors as indicators of quality child care (Smith, Grima, Gaffney, Powell, Masse & Barnett, 2000) while others have examined teaching practices and identity (Dalli, 2002; Farquhar, 2003; Nuttall, 2002, 2003) and investigated how management structures (McLeod, 2002) influence both children’s and teachers’ experiences. These studies describe, evaluate, compare and critique early childhood care and education as an existing social arrangement, yet the actual social-structural arrangement of child care itself is seldom questioned or challenged. By implication, such studies reinforce rather than question the current structural and cultural caregiving arrangement, as research continues to be conducted within the ‘four walls’ of the childcare centre. However, Ratner (2000) and Valsiner (2001) ask whether an absence of serious consideration and critique of sociological, macro influences really constitutes sociocultural research.
Locating the study
A review of current literature and research examining the role and effects of child care in contemporary Western societies revealed many perspectives and insights into shared, public caregiving practices, yet I was unable to find studies that provided comment about the actual structural and cultural arrangement of child care itself. In preparation for this study I investigated the concept of socialisation from a range of perspectives. However, when I reviewed literature relating to child care as a socialising tool, I found a gap in the local and international literature, in spite of the fact that the effects of child care on children, teachers, and families is a well-documented area of research.
Child care as an institution
Institutionalisation has become a distinctive feature of modern childhood, and children today spend a considerable amount of time within the sphere of public socialisation (Sommer, 1992). As a consequence, childhood is now formed by two major divergent norm systems and child-rearing practices: on the one hand by the norms and traditions of the family, and on the other hand by the norms and child-rearing practices of professional educators (Dencik, 1989, 1995, 1998). However, Chaiklin (2001) states that there is very little research which attempts to better understand the complexities the parent or teacher encounters in selecting the socialisation procedures to attain the socially preferred end. These complexities are likely to be particularly acute where tradition no longer blindly dictates the approved techniques and where experts are often in disagreement, a situation exacerbated by a rapidly changing society in which the traditional primary socialising unit, the private family, is also changing (Chaiklin, 2001; Dencik, 1995, 1998; Sommer, 1992).
Contemporary group care arrangements for young children have made socialisation a public rather than private social practice. In addition, private family practices have been exposed in the public arena through young children’s daily attendance at day care centres. Teachers are privy to many aspects of family life that in earlier eras would have remained private knowledge. Dencik (1998) argues that modernisation is strengthening the tendencies towards individuation, yet notes that this is balanced by a contrasting observation. The more the child is individualised through the modernisation process, the more intensely he or she seeks out social belonging. Moreover, the ‘longing to belong’ is a neglected phenomenon in modern child research (Dencik, 1989, 1995). Western research has only recently adopted the sociocultural perspective that the person is formed as an individual through the social group, a circumstance commonly expressed by individuals as a desire for group membership. This desire for membership and ‘to belong’ captured a key theme arising from my data.
Child care is a societal institution that separates children from adult sociocultural communities through this organisation of the centre’s physical and social space. Lofland and Lofland (1995) argue that, when we review the different institutions in Western society, we often find that their encompassing or total character is symbolised by the physical barrier to social interaction with the outside and this is often built right into the physical setting. Young children and their caregivers in group care situations are physically separated from adult social activities, and this is encapsulated in both the cultural and social arrangements of the childcare centre.
Separation from adult communities
Rogoff (2003) proposes that one of the most powerful variations in children’s lives in different cultural communities is the extent to which they are allowed to participate in and observe adult activities. Variations in children’s opportunities to learn from ongoing mature activities relate closely to many other differences in cultural patterns of child rearing (Rogoff, 1990). Segregation of children from mature community activities as seen with childcare institutions is taken for granted in middle-class settings, but it is rare in many other communities. Rogoff (2003) maintains that today most children and youth in contemporary Western societies have very limited opportunities to witness adult work, let alone contribute to their families and communities (Morelli, Rogoff & Angelillo, 2003).
Jordan (2003) acknowledges the impact of such separation and argues that, as early childhood centres play a major role in preparing children for their roles in society, it is difficult to justify the cultural and social organisation of these institutions. She makes the important point that children in child care spend large parts of their days divorced from the ‘real world’ yet are expected to learn to use the tools of their cultures. Jordan contends that it is the teachers’ responsibility to act as mediators for children of cultural understandings, on the basis that they are the ‘senior semioticians’ (Vygotsky, 1934/1986) in this cultural arrangement. Yet I see the divorced nature of early childhood centres from adult communities as disadvantaging teachers and children alike. The social arrangement of child care actually prevents both parties from engaging in authentic cultural life.
What do sociocultural theories tell us about how to do child care?
As an aside, I would argue that an anomaly exists between the promotion of sociocultural theories as guiding frameworks for practice and the realities of what can be achieved in early childhood education and care practice. Sociocultural theories propose that context is central and relationships and social others, especially more experienced cultural members, are integral to children’s development and enculturation into their communities (Fleer, 1995, 2003; Göncü, 1999; Graue & Walsh, 1998; Moll, 1990; Nicolopolou & Cole, 1993; Rogoff, 1995, 1998; Stone, 1993; Vygotsky, 1978a, 1978b). Yet young children are cared for in environments that, by their very physical structure, suggest that children need separate and special attention apart from adult activities (Dencik, 1989, 1998; Sommer, 1992). The theoretical gaze in New Zealand appears to be ‘sociocultural’, but early childhood care and education practices remain individualised and separatist because of the cultural and social organisation of childcare centres. Initially I tried to ignore this anomaly but came to realise that this tension between theory and practice suggested the need for an interruption and critique of contemporary, Western childcare practices.
To elaborate on this point, sociocultural theories hold that psychological phenomena are formed as people engage in collective, socially organised activity (Leont’ev, 1978; Vygotsky, 1978a). This implies that serious attention must be paid to the concrete social structures in which people (both children and adults) develop (Ratner, 2002; Tolman, 2001). We are currently in a historical situation with new possibilities for diverse socialisation practices, but at the same time are living in culturally diffuse times that create ambivalence about how to enculturate young children (Sommer, 1992). Child care is an institution that is part of, but also reflects, the larger social system; and any proposal for reconceptualisation would also have to examine the economic, political, historical, social and cultural factors that influence this institution (Ratner, 1997, 2002).
A difficult task for teachers
To recap, a review of recent research in New Zealand has identified a gap between the rhetoric of sociocultural theories propelling early childhood care and education practices, and what is possible within the structural and cultural arrangement of group child care. This gap has led me to ask how teachers in childcare settings enculturate children within an environment that separates both children and teachers from the wider community. I propose that this is a difficult task for teachers who are attempting to abide by sociocultural understandings of learning and development that emphasise the importance of cultural and social embeddedness. Furthermore, governmental visions articulated in the Strategic Plan see early childhood education and care being promoted as sociocultural in its approach, as receiving increased political and social attention (Ministry of Education, 2002). Yet early childhood policy and governmental vision has lofty aims:
The early years of a child’s learning will make a significant difference to the way they develop and go on to learn throughout their lives. Getting it right at this vital stage will build lifelong foundations of success not only for children but also for New Zealand. (Ministry of Education, 2002, p. 1)
Key themes arising from my data
Two interdependent and recurring themes appeared throughout my data. The first was the importance of the relationship between teachers and children, while the second concerned children’s desire for group and cultural membership. In spite of, or maybe because of, the separation of children and teachers from the wider communities, the children in my study demonstrated spontaneous and frequent attempts to reconnect with adults and their lives, and also with the wider social and historical community.
Connecting with teachers’ lives
The following interaction is representative of many similar child-initiated conversations. Jacob’s tenacious and focused questioning allowed him to delve into Elizabeth’s (teacher) personal relationships.
It is rest time and Jacob is seated in the home corner with Elizabeth [teacher]. He asks her for a story. Elizabeth begins to read a book and Jacob immediately responds with, ‘No … no … I mean a story about you. No, tell me a story about you.’ Elizabeth proceeds to tell Jacob about her family, her interests, her age, her home life, and so on. Jacob is engaged and interested. He urges her to tell him ‘more and more’. While Elizabeth talks, he stops her frequently to ask questions like, ‘How old is your best friend? How old is your dad’s girl friend?’ Melissa [teacher] joins the children and announces that, when it is a bit quieter, Jacob can choose the tape to listen to during rest time. In spite of this promise, Jacob urges Elizabeth to continue with her story, although he now asks his questions in hushed tones. (PH2 Day 6 p23 103-105) (Phase 2 of the data collection, Day 6, p. 23 of observational notes, lines 103-105)
Leont’ev (1978, p. 51) argues that ‘…under whatever kind of conditions and forms human activity takes place, whatever kind of structure it assumes, it can not be considered as isolated from social relations or from the life of society.’ The distinctness of human activity of the human individual is represented in the system of relationships of society. Leont’ev adds that outside of relationships human activity simply ceases to exist. The key function of Jacob’s questioning was to access personal information about his teacher which no doubt strengthened their relationship, yet at a broader level he was also exploring others’ family structures and the mechanisms structuring these relationships. This knowledge would assist his ongoing enculturation into institutional and societal culture.
Connecting with others’ families
Children also elicited information from parents at the centre. In this situation Tama and Michael used Paul’s father as informant to find out how things were done at their house.
Tama asks Nick [Paul’s father], ‘When is Paul’s birthday?’ Nick replies, ‘September 30.’ Tama eyes Paul’s sandwiches, leans over and says, ‘Yum, yum…’ Michael asks Nick, ‘Who made Paul’s sandwiches?’ Nick replies, ‘I did.’ Michael asks, ‘Why?’ Nick replies, ‘Because that’s what I do in the mornings.’ Michael continues, ‘Where’s his Mummy?’ Nick replies, ‘In the shower.’ Michael seems amused that Paul’s father rather than mother makes Paul’s lunch. (PH1 Day 2 p7 149-153)
Connecting with contemporary culture
While in this situation, Jacob appeared intrigued by an older child’s knowledge of contemporary culture.
At one of the lunch tables the children are discussing movies. The children discuss movie characters and the movies they have seen. Jacob [seated at the other table] turns around so that he can listen in. His eyes widen and he strains to hear what is being said. Jacob picks up his chair and positions it so that he has his back to the children seated at his table but can see Zane, the main contributor and also instigator of the conversation. Zane is seven years old and visiting the centre. Jacob begins a barrage of questions, asking Zane about a movie character. Donna [teacher] attempts to get both boys back on task and calls out, ‘Now who is still eating? Who needs to eat the rest of their dinner?’ Zane ignores her questions and continues the discussion spurred on by Jacob’s interest and undivided attention. (PH2 Day 3 p8 83-89)
Throughout this conversation Jacob demonstrated an interest and enthusiasm that was unusual for him, based on my many former observations of his interactions during lunchtime. Seven-year-old Zane presented as a rather sophisticated contributor in this early childhood setting, and Jacob was immediately attracted to this more experienced peer. Interestingly, the teacher responded to Zane’s topic of conversation (popular culture) and Jacob’s fascination by attempting to contain it, and tried to return the two boys to the task at hand.
Connecting with adults’ work
Children were drawn to visitors such as Zane who brought with them glimpses of life outside the centre. In this example Tama and Rebecca were fascinated by my clothing and noticed that I dressed differently from the early childhood teachers.
Tama runs over to me and exclaims excitedly, ‘I saw you yesterday but in different clothes.’ Tama and Rebecca discuss the skirt I am wearing, commenting in detail on its length, design, texture, shape and colour. The two girls finger the fabric then, Tama says, ‘My mummy has black stockings like you.’ She strokes my stockings, leans against my arms, sucks her fingers on one hand and plays with her hair with the other. She relaxes into my body and closes her eyes. (PH2 Day 5 p14 1-16)
Clothes are artefacts in that they embody cultural codes regarding roles in society. As I collected data during my lunch hour I would arrive at the centre dressed in my ‘work clothes’. The girls discerned that my clothes were different from the teachers’ yet similar to their own mothers’ working clothes. Their observations suggested that they were learning to distinguish between social roles and the associated dress codes. When Tama observed that my stockings were like her mother’s, she leaned contentedly against me (an unusual gesture for Tama). I was touched by this action and the obvious feelings the similarity between my clothes and her mother’s evoked in her.
Implications of my study's findings
Keeping in mind the importance of relational aspects of enculturation, children’s constant yearning to be part of adults’ authentic lives led me to reflect upon the implications of a socialising institution that separates children and their teachers from the wider community. Guided by sociocultural theories I concluded that community care arrangements contain the potential for children to contribute to their own learning opportunities, yet child care more often than not involves children’s social and cultural segregation from the mature activities of their communities. Furthermore, when young children cannot enter community activities, adults are required to design specialised child-focused settings (Morelli, Rogoff & Angelillo, 2003; Rogoff, 2003). Yet I repeatedly found that children attended most closely to events and conversations that were not designed specifically for their participation, and I was unable to reconcile child-focused settings and activities with this observation. Nor was I able to reconcile current socioculturally based models of learning which emphasise the importance of collaborative participation in communities with the segregated nature of childcare centres.
Learning by just being there involves picking up values, skills and mannerisms in an incidental fashion through close involvement with a socialising agent and cultural models of learning (Azuma, 1994). Ward (1971) describes this as the silent absorption of children into community life through the natural participation in its daily rituals and tasks. Yet this requires children’s access to involvement in community activities, and access is dictated by the extent to which caregivers organise specialised child-focused activities or expect children to learn from intentional participation in ongoing shared endeavours. In communities where children have access to aspects of adult life they learn from opportunities to observe, and in fact adults expect young children to learn through watching (Morelli, Rogoff & Angelillo, 2003; Rogoff, 1981). In these contexts children are given responsibility for managing their own attention, motivation, and involvement in learning through observation and participation in ongoing mature, adult activities.
In some communities, children’s learning involves ‘intent participation’ in almost the full range of activities of their communities, with keen observation, initiative, and responsive assistance (Rogoff, 2003). Children are able to observe and listen to the ongoing processes of life and death, work and play, authentic cultural events of their communities. In these societies children are legitimate peripheral participants (Lave & Wenger, 1991) in the mature activities of their community, watching what is going on and becoming increasingly involved. Learning occurs as an outcome of children just being with adults while they undertake community tasks and activities.
The significance of collaborative learning has been highlighted in concepts such as ‘communities of learning’ (Palinscar, Brown & Campione, 1993); ‘communities of inquiry’ (Lindfors, 1999; Wells, 1995, 1996); ‘communities of understanding’ (Anning & Edwards, 1999); and ‘communities of practice’ (Wenger, 1998). Jordan (2003) notes that each concept emphasises a particular aspect, yet all the models promote learning and inculcation into culture as the outcome of members’ involvement in their communities (Rogoff, 1998). Wenger’s ‘community of practice’ in particular cites learning as the outcome of ‘…people interacting with each other in a variety of pursuits, tuning relations with each other and with the world’ (Wenger, 1998, p. 86) while Well’s (1995) ‘community of inquirers’ emphasises the importance of members engaging in authentic learning. What happens, however, when communities do not support all of its members to participate in collaborative, authentic learning situations?
Children want to be with adults
Children did not want to be excluded from the adult world, and the centre’s separation from wider community activities presented challenges for the teachers attempting to establish authentic relationships with large numbers of children and their families. Teachers were faced with the task of forming a community with large groups of children, and this complex network of relationships had little in common with mother–child dyads mainly studied by researchers (Singer, 1996). Furthermore, my study supported Singer’s findings when she discovered the exact opposite to what is generally accepted in developmental psychology. Children do not require or desire exclusive attention. Children want a feeling of togetherness and to connect with more experienced cultural members of the community, and this is evidenced by their ongoing interest in the life and work of adults (Beach, 1988; Rheingold, 1982). My study supported and provided many examples of this phenomenon, seen initially in children’s intense curiosity about teachers’ personal lives but also in their need to discuss and understand significant life events such as illness, mortality and tragedy.
Finding support in sociocultural approaches
Sociocultural and activity theories with their roots in Marxist ideologies offer an explanation for children’s interest in adult lives. Marx (1983) argued that when individuals (children) are alienated from labour (or work) they are also alienated from each other, and deprived of the enjoyment of meeting their own subsistence needs (Elhammoumi, 2001). Rogoff (1990) maintains that, in societies where children are integrated in adult activities, children are situated within the community as central to the action. They observe what takes place and interact with real community experiences occurring within the daily life of the ‘adult world’. In these communities there is no need for child-focused activities, as children are always meaningfully engaged. I also found that children were most interested in events and activities that were not designed specifically for their instruction, and in adult conversations in which they were not directly addressed or included. Azuma (1994) terms this form of learning osmosis, as learning occurs in an incidental but highly effective fashion. Azuma found that children picked up cultural values, skills and mannerisms through simply being with adults, which provided them with an unintended cultural model of learning.
Cannella (1997) argues that notions of early childhood professionalism exclude children from the world of those who are older, and claims we have taught children to stay away from ‘adult’ conversations and activity. She argues that, ‘Professional discourse silences children as it is used to create a “pretend” world for them, a world that has nothing to do with their real lives’ (p. 152). As my study progressed I asked, ‘How do young children respond to this situation?’; ‘How do teachers socialise and enculturate children in a separatist setting?’
Insights into the socialisation process
A significant insight was that enculturation occurred during ‘authentic moments’ or at times when children and teachers were engaged in ‘real life’ interactions and conversations. These moments were often teachers’ spontaneous responses to children’s interests or needs and, although brief, acted as ‘connectors’ that linked the child with the teacher and also the group. Furthermore, I observed that teachers were most alive, the children most interested, the group most involved, and the teaching seemingly effortless during these moments. More often than not it was children who initiated authentic links with teachers and parents (when available). My observation of this phenomenon is supported by others’ research (see Rogoff’s and Singer’s work) who have found that effective and apparently effortless enculturation occurs as an incidental outcome of children participating with adults in community life. I learned most about the individual–social relationship when observing these moments of connection as they appeared to bridge the psychological–social divide through highlighting children’s need for social connection mediated by their intense interest in adult and community activities.
As I write my final conclusions and discuss the implications of my findings, I remain cautious about offering critique that calls into question the newly acquired rights of young children and their teachers, for I recognise that early childhood discourses and practices have evolved in response to specific social and historical circumstances. In this I agree with Jackson’s (1993) claim that it would be ironic if we dispensed with the notion of the special status of the child as reactionary cultural baggage just at the very moment that women and young children are beginning to acquire some hard-won rights (May, 2003). I understand that, in order to protect and emphasise the specific qualities and needs of young children, we separate this age group from others to signify they deserve our special attention. Nevertheless, this study has left me questioning the cost of beliefs and discourse that award young children special rights and status yet perpetuate practices that position young children and their teachers as apart from their social communities. Wenger (1998) reminds us that we must remain reflective about our discourses, so I return to the sociocultural theories underpinning this study to deconstruct aspects of the social and cultural arrangement of caregiving practices and conclude by offering an alternative conceptualisation of young children and their teachers.
Implications for teachers
My observations led me to agree with contemporary socioculturalists who argue that our traditional ways of thinking about socialisation are inadequate and we have no new theoretical concept to grasp the meaning of families and children (and I would add early childhood teachers) in a changing society (Dencik, 1989; Rogoff, 2003; Singer, 1996; Sommer, 1992). In this regard, I see early childhood teachers as struggling to cope with a cultural lag as they attempt to use sociocultural understandings as the basis of their caregiving and teaching practices, yet the structural arrangement of public child care impedes the successful implementation of sociocultural-based curricula.
I would also propose that the early childhood community at large has taken a certain amount of ‘theoretical licence’ in adopting sociocultural concepts and making them ‘fit’ their own situations and settings. This was a concern articulated by Cullen (1996) when Te Whāriki, the New Zealand national early childhood curriculum (founded on sociocultural principles of learning and development), first emerged as a guiding curriculum document for early childhood education in New Zealand. Cullen supported the sociocultural underpinnings of this document yet queried teachers’ ability to grasp complex theoretical concepts and apply them to teaching practices. More recently Cullen and others have expressed similar concerns in relation to early childhood assessment practices in New Zealand. They write:
Currently, the National Early Childhood Exemplar project, directed by Margaret Carr, is developing exemplars based on the learning stories approach as a further resource to encourage quality. As with Te Whāriki, these directions, while encouraging professionalism and diversity, place heavy demands on the knowledge base and professional skills of teachers (Anning, Cullen & Fleer, 2004, p. 14).
I support Cullen’s concern with regard to teachers’ lack of theoretical understanding, yet would add that the working conditions of early childhood teachers—in terms of their isolation from adult communities and the structural arrangements of group childcare practices—need to be considered in regard to their ability (or inability) to successfully implement sociocultural-based curricula.
Sociocultural approaches promote cultural, social and historical embeddedness, yet in applying such approaches to early childhood practice and research we separate rather than embed children and their teachers, at the personal, community and institutional levels (Wenger, 1998). My concern is that we are setting teachers an impossible task when asking them to enculturate children into society using a theoretical approach that promotes community connectedness and involvement, yet the act of group care itself separates teachers from their own communities. I question the authenticity of group care situations and believe the physical structure results in a rather contrived social situation that teaches children how to survive child care but may have little to do with other aspects of their cultural life. At its worst this separation or dislocation breeds a type of ‘centre neurosis’ or malaise in teachers and parents who are required to feign interest or enthusiasm in a void of stimulation, and in an environment that fails to ignite their own interests or meet their need for companionship and connectedness to other adults. As for children, at its worst child care is an institution that enculturates them into a sterile world that bears little relationship to their own or others’ ‘real lives’.
Reconceptualising early childhood practice, research and theories
Much has been written about the notion of ‘child embeddedness’ (Bronfenbrenner, 1979; Donaldson, 1978, 1992) to encourage a conceptualisation of children as nested within social and cultural contexts, and as unable to be divorced from micro and macro social relationships. I propose that we now need to conceptualise teachers and caregivers in a similar fashion and develop thinking around ‘teacher/caregiver embeddedness’.
Teacher embeddedness
Conceptualising teachers as embedded in their communities and creating a discourse of ‘teacher embeddedness’ will help to address Leavitt’s (1994) concerns that teachers are exhausted by the isolation and constant demands of caregiving and this impacts upon the quality of their relationships with children. Furthermore, my study has found that enculturation relies upon teachers’ ability to respond emotionally to children, and to appropriate cultural tools and practices in a way that connects children to their social and cultural contexts. Yet teachers are constantly challenged by this task in a child-centred world. Fleer (2001a, p. 11) asks if our reified and ‘…very precious ideals have masked their culture-specific beginnings?’ And challenges us to reify new cultural tools so that we can think differently and change our ‘community of practice’.
Child connectedness
Just as discourses such as ‘child-centredness’ and ‘child embeddedness’ have evolved in response to time and need, we now need a new way of thinking about child care and early childhood education. It is time to reconnect children and, most importantly, teachers with their wider communities and recognise that ‘children-and-teachers’ are a joint unit that cannot be separated from wider society. To do so is to acknowledge both children’s and teachers’ need for inclusion in adult communities. This conceptualisation of ‘connectedness’ recognises and understands young children as cultural members in their own right, which means they are not only merely included but are in active relationship with society (Dahlberg, Moss & Pence, 2002).
My study highlighted the integral contribution of teachers to young children’s enculturation, and learning and development, which is wholly congruent with sociocultural understandings of the importance of the contribution of more experienced cultural members, and the organisation of social environments. I am at a loss then to explain why we have failed to pay the same attention to teachers’ interests, abilities and states of mind as we have to children’s, especially when each is contingent upon the other.
Implications for early childhood practice
In New Zealand we have recognised the centrality of relationships within the early childhood education and care centre; that is, between child and teacher, parent and teacher, teacher and teacher (Ministry of Education, 2004) but have been much slower to acknowledge the relationship between early childhood centres as institutions and the wider community. Fleer (2001a) argues that a change in thinking must take place to ensure that we no longer reproduce ourselves in the next generation of teachers, but rather speak openly about the cultural tools and models we are using. Only then will we move ‘…beyond social reproduction’ and progress practice reified in outdated early childhood discourse (p. 11). For at present ‘…we have failed to do sufficient justice to the complexity of the times in which we live, the changes occurring in the world and their implications for early childhood and its institutions’ (Dahlberg, Moss & Pence, 2002, p. 10).
Endnotes
The author’s thesis, ‘They just want to be with us.’ Young children: Learning to live the culture. A post-Vygotskian analysis of young children’s enculturation into a childcare setting, is available from the Victoria University of Wellington, PO Box 600, Wellington, New Zealand.
The author can be contacted on margaret.brennan@vuw.ac.nz.
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Australian Journal of Early Childhood Volume 32 No 1 March 2007, pp. 1-9.
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