The recently released final report of the NITL, Teaching Reading (Department of Education, Science and Training, 2005), acknowledged the importance of the years before formal education and recommended that ‘programs, guides and workshops be provided for parents and carers to support their children's literacy development. These should acknowledge and build on the language and literacy that children learn in their homes and communities' (p. 40).

Alongside this valuing of what is learned in home environments and communities is the recommendation that ‘the key objective of primary teacher education courses be to prepare teachers to teach reading' (p. 20), and that teachers ‘provide systematic, direct and explicit phonics instruction so that children master the essential alphabetic code-breaking skills required for foundational reading proficiency' (p. 38). Just what this means for those working in before school settings, the early years of school and teacher education programs remains to be seen, but it seems we may be following trends evident in the UK and the US.

Recently in the UK, for example, scripted approaches to phonics and ‘robust monitoring systems' were endorsed (Department for Education and Skills, 2005, p. 2); and, in the US, the implementation of the No Child Left Behind Act (2001), with its focus on standards and teacher accountability, has created spaces for teacher resistance to standards orthodoxy and attempts by teachers to opt out of what they perceive as increasing surveillance of their work by State Departments of Education (Larson & Gatto, 2004).

The National Standards for Child Care Services (NSCCS) review is currently underway and it too is grappling with issues of standards, accountability and quality in Australian long day care, outside school hours care, family day care and in-home care. Its aims are to:

• review processes for setting and implementing national standards to identify strategies for the future reflecting contemporary evidence;
• examine current approaches to the promotion of quality in child care across Australia in regard to national standards, State and Territory
Government regulations and quality assurance systems; and
• develop options and recommendations for national approaches to children's services standards-setting reflecting wise, quality practice and supporting continuous improvement in child care including long day care, outside school hours care, family day care and in-home care. (http://cli.ed.qut.edu.au/research/projects/nccs/aims.jsp).

Part of the NSCCS review involves consultation with key stakeholders including Federal, State and Territory Government representatives, parents, service providers, peak bodies/key groups, academics and unions. The review will identify options, costs and benefits for the implementation of systems and processes assuring quality in Australian childcare services.

Against this backdrop, we are delighted to present the first issue of the Australian Journal of Early Childhood for 2006 which is characterised by a variety of contributions from Australia and New Zealand, and begins with a thought-provoking paper by Jennifer Sumsion that has pertinent connections to the NSCCS review.

Taking the Australian political scene of 30 years ago as a starting point, Sumsion exhorts all those in early childhood services to become involved in political activism as a means of dealing with the hallmarks of life in the twenty-first century—economic rationalism and market forces. Sumsion goes beyond rhetorical arguments to contend that political activism is feasible through a combination of critical imagination, critical literacy and critical action. Being proactive by creating possibilities, ‘reading the world' and seeking to transform it is a far cry from hastily-prepared responses to the latest crisis, yet one that offers realistic possibilities for actual change.

Fisher, Thomson and valentine report on the lessons learned during the implementation of an integrated whole-of-government early intervention service initiative. This type of initiative is indicative of the intense, high level of cooperation, collaboration and coordination required to ensure service networks remain focused on their goals and objectives, and produce tangible outcomes for children and families. The authors highlight factors facilitating and hindering interagency programs—issues that are very important for early childhood education and care services, because programs of this type may be the way of the future as early intervention and prevention become key features of government policy and institutional practices.

Also on the topic of early intervention, and diametrically related to the NITL, Elias, Hay, Homel and Freiberg report on an interesting study of a preschool-based literacy intervention in a disadvantaged community. Implementation of a parent–child book reading program was found to impact positively on teacher-perceived literacy readiness in Year One. This study is a must-read for those already implementing home reading programs and those considering introducing such schemes. The results are compelling, stressing the importance of culturally-inclusive, motivating and relevant literacy concepts and resources.

There has been much of value associated with Te Whāriki, the New Zealand bilingual early childhood curriculum, and a recent project has gathered data to create a resource that assists teachers in reflecting on assessment practices used in Te Whāriki. Drawing on data from this project, Hatherly deepens our understanding of how narrative assessment, through the use of stories, creates communities in which children and their families become engrossed in a range of literacy practices that are inextricably linked to their daily lives. Children are highly motivated to engage in literacy practices as are adults who, surprisingly, are not restricted by self-consciousness about their own literacy competence.

Early intervention and prevention underpin the work of Mohay and Reid, who report on a study investigating the relationship between childcare staff attitudes to disability, training and experience and the influence of these variables on inclusion in childcare services. This study accentuates the importance of appropriate staff professional development in creating more positive attitudes towards inclusion and greater confidence in dealing with the issues.

The paper by Nupponen raises the always important issue of leadership in early childhood education, linking it to quality and self-reflection. As working environments become increasingly diverse and complex, leaders of long day care centres must have opportunities to access professional development options that not only sustain them in the short term but also nurture them to develop the vision and skills that are required in the twenty-first century. Learning leadership on the job has advantages but also challenges, many of which are identified by Nupponen in her extensive consultation of relevant literature. Leadership, training and professional development, and the relationship to quality practices will no doubt feature in the NSCCS review.

For teacher educators concerned with excellence in learning and teaching, the article by Stephenson identifies what many in the tertiary sector struggle with on a daily basis: how to move beyond a ‘teach from the front' approach, to something that engages students meaningfully as co-constructors of their own knowledge. Using a range of strategies, including her own reflective teaching journals, Stephenson provides insight into one of the courses she teaches, depicting how she troubles her own teaching and what ‘real' teaching feels like to her. This has immediate and genuine resonance with all who are seeking authentic learning and teaching experiences, irrespective of the context.

We hope that you find this issue, which covers a range of diverse topics, stimulating. Further, we hope that at least one idea from this set of papers will provoke reflection and subsequent action, and further reflection, and so on.

Sue Grieshaber and Kerryann Walsh
School of Early Childhood
Queensland University of Technology

References

AJEC, Vol. 31 No. 1, March 2006

Did you like this article? Share it with others online!  - What does this mean?               You can subscribe to ECA's Australian Journal of Early Childhood article index news feed here Learn more about RSS news feeds If you liked this article, you can 'social bookmark' it with others who might be searching for good content on early childhood. This means you can share your favourite webpages with others, or just keep an online list of your bookmarks so you can access them on any computer. Read more about social bookmarks More about digg>> More about del.icio.us>> More about google>>    More about yahoo>> More about stumbleupon>> More about reddit>> Close this window