Kindergarten kissing games...four-year-olds playing doctor...a teacher holding a crying child on his lap as he comforts her. Interactions like these—spontaneous and pleasurable—are no longer encouraged in American early childhood classrooms, and in some cases they are forbidden. The quality of the lives of our children and their teachers is thereby diminished, contend the contributors to this timely book. In response to much-publicized incidents of child abuse by caretakers, a "moral panic" has swept over early childhood education. In this book, experienced teachers of young children and teacher education experts issue a plea for sanity, for restoring a sense of balance to preschool, nursery school, and kindergarten classrooms. The contributors to this book explore how caretakers of preschool children and other adults have overreacted to fears about child abuse. Drawing on feminist, queer, and poststructural theories, the authors argue for the restoration of pleasure as a goal of early childhood education.

Make learning visible in the early years Early childhood is a uniquely sensitive time, when young learners are rapidly developing across multiple domains, including language and literacy, mathematics, and motor skills. Knowing which teaching strategies work best and when can have a significant impact on a child’s development and future success. Visible Learning in Early Childhood investigates the critical years between ages 3 and 6 and, backed by evidence from the Visible Learning® research, explores seven core strategies for learning success: working together as evaluators, setting high expectations, measuring learning with explicit success criteria, establishing developmentally appropriate levels of learning, viewing mistakes as opportunities, continually seeking feedback, and balancing surface, deep, and transfer learning. The authors unpack the symbiotic relationship between these seven tenets through Authentic examples of diverse learners and settings Voices of master teachers from the US, UK, and Australia Multiple assessment and differentiation strategies Multidisciplinary approaches depicting mathematics, literacy, art and music, social-emotional learning, and more Using the Visible Learning research, teachers partner with children to encourage high expectations, developmentally appropriate practices, the right level of challenge, and a focus on explicit success criteria. Get started today and watch your young learners thrive!

This is a short guide for teachers on how to help a school put in place a reading for pleasure policy. To support this policy the guide also takes a close look at how children read - what do they think as they read? I've also included some plans from teachers putting reading for pleasure policies in place. It's for you to use, adapt and change as you think best for the school and students you have in front of you.

By focusing on key figures in early years education and care, this book considers the influential thinkers and ground-breaking approaches that have revolutionized practice. With contributions from leading authorities in the field, chapters provide an explanation of the approach, an analysis of the theoretical background, case studies, questions and discussion points to facilitate critical thinking. Included are chapters on: - Froebel - Psychoanalytical theories - Maria Montessori - Steiner Waldorf education - High/Scope - Post-modern and post-structuralist perspectives - Forest Schools - Vivian Gussin Paley - Te Whatilderiki Written in an accessible style and relevant to all levels of early years courses, the book has staggered levels of Further Reading that encourage reflection and promotes progression. Linda Miller is Professor Emeritus of Early Years, The Open University Linda Pound is a consultant and author, renowned for her work in early years education and care.

"Racially Equitable Teaching is a call to action for early childhood professionals dedicated to closing the achievement gap. Using a critical race theory lens, the book presents outcomes that exist among current professional development paradigms, ideology and public education, specifically looking at how racial ideologies are used as tools to maintain the over-empowerment and privileging of whites. Beyond theory, Racially Equitable Teaching provides practical classroom applications for teachers and administrators in an effort to move towards racial authenticity, racial balance, and positive racial in-group messaging, challenging the current reproduction of White racial hegemony in United States public schools."--BOOK JACKET.

Reading for pleasure urgently requires a higher profile to raise attainment and increase children’s engagement as self-motivated and socially interactive readers. Building Communities of Engaged Readers highlights the concept of ‘Reading Teachers’ who are not only knowledgeable about texts for children, but are aware of their own reading identities and prepared to share their enthusiasm and understanding of what being a reader means. Sharing the processes of reading with young readers is an innovative approach to developing new generations of readers. Examining the interplay between the ‘will and the skill’ to read, the book distinctively details a reading for pleasure pedagogy and demonstrates that reader engagement is strongly influenced by relationships between children, teachers, families and communities. Importantly it provides compelling evidence that reciprocal reading communities in school encompass: a shared concept of what it means to be a reader in the 21st century; considerable teacher and child knowledge of children’s literature and other texts; pedagogic practices which acknowledge and develop diverse reader identities; spontaneous ‘inside-text talk’ on the part of all members; a shift in the focus of control and new social spaces that encourage choice and children’s rights as readers. Written by experts in the literacy field and illustrated throughout with examples from the project schools, it is essential reading for all those concerned with improving young people’s enjoyment of and attainment in reading.

Negotiating Adult–Child Relationships in Early Childhood Research presents a substantive critique of technicist and neoliberal approaches to ethics through an exploration of the complicated and often ‘messy’ situations faced in negotiating relationships in research with children. Despite growing acknowledgement of their centrality, relationships between adult researchers and very young participants have been neglected and under-theorised, and in response, this book offers a comprehensive conceptualisation of adult–child research relationships through examination of questions, including: How do power and inequity impact on adult–child research relationships? What does it mean for relationships when researchers ‘intervene’ in the field? How do bodies matter in research relationships? What does an emphasis on relationships with young children mean for the research process? Drawing on data from their own research, the authors contend that relationships are part of a wider web of social relations and space–time configurations. They propose and develop a relational ethics of answerability and social justice, inspired by the work of Bakhtin and, in addition, explore the way material bodies come to matter, the ambiguity of consent in educator-research, and the risks and possibilities of research relationships. Chapters include innovative formulations of reciprocity, ‘sensing practices’, and political-ethical responsibility. This book contributes to current debates about research with young children, offering an incisive and thorough exploration of the importance of relationships to the research process. Relevant for international audiences, this book is essential reading for early childhood students and educators, researchers, and lecturers with an interest in research with children.