This book brings together researchers from a variety of national contexts to examine and explore the conceptualisation, reconceptualisation and translation of children’s rights for infants and toddlers in early childhood education and care settings.It brings together authors from various national contexts to examine changing understandings and manifestations of infant and toddler rights in Early Childhood Education and Care. The book aims to engender trans-national dialogue through the contributions. Through such dialogue, both authors and readers are challenged to recognise the specificity of their own cultural contexts and thereby envision a more expansive view of infant and toddler rights. By drawing together reflections on infant-toddler rights from key early childhood researchers across the world, this book will extend readers understandings of rights – not only in terms of how rights are (re)conceptualised but also how to meaningfully translate the rights afforded in policy to practice.

Recognizing the various ecological contexts that support children’s development while amplifying voices from across the globe, this book challenges narrow interpretations of quality and best practice. Each author offers a unique perspective on issues germane to the field of early childhood education: perceptions of children, curriculum, teacher education, and play-based learning. An innovative, timely, and much-needed contribution, this book represents an inclusive collection of theoretical and cultural knowledge, as well as research. Such a diverse multicentric lens opens new intellectual pathways for authentic, reciprocal knowledge exchange, while ensuring that a reimagining of early childhood education remains at the core of our teaching practice, scholarship, and activism. This book invites everyone to imagine, to dare to believe, to hope, and to act—in the interests of children, in the interests of communities and families, and in the moral precepts of equity, inclusion and justice.

By regarding children as actors and conducting empirical research on children’s agency, Childhood Studies have gained significant influence on a wide range of different academic disciplines. This has made agency one of the key concepts of Childhood Studies, with articles on the subject featured in handbooks and encyclopaedias. Reconceptualising Agency and Childhood is the first collection devoted to the central concept of agency in Childhood Studies. With contributions from experts in the field, the chapters cover theoretical, practical, historical, transnational and institutional dimensions of agency, rekindling discussion and introducing fundamental and contemporary sociological perspectives to the field of research. Particular attention is paid to connecting agency in the social sciences with Childhood Studies, considering both the theoretical foundations and the practice of research into agency. Empirical case studies are also explored, which focus upon child protection, schools and childcare at a variety of institutions worldwide. This book is an essential reference for students and scholars of Childhood Studies, and is also relevant to Sociology, Social Work, Education, Early Childhood Education and Care (ECEC) and Geography. Chapter 6 of this book is freely available as a downloadable Open Access PDF at http://www.taylorfrancis.com under a Creative Commons Attribution-Non Commercial-No Derivatives (CC-BY-NC-ND) 4.0 license.

Children and young people are often discussed as if they are homogenous groups. The reality is, of course, very different, with an enormous variation within each of these groups and in any domain of experience pertaining to childhood or adolescence. Driven by personal, sociocultural, geographic, or economic circumstances, many children and young people worldwide are experiencing a totally different reality to those who fit with more mainstream patterns of childhood. This has substantial implications for their sociophysical environmental experience and our understanding of their physical environmental needs. The aim of this book is to draw attention to these alternate realities for a number of these groups of children and young people, highlighting the unique and different considerations associated with their particular circumstances in each instance, and identifying the repercussions for their physical environmental needs. Ultimately, this book creates an evidence-based discussion which can be used by designers, planners and policy makers, and those delivering services and programs to children and young people as a basis to make informed decisions on how to work with the groups of children and young people in our book for better environmental provision.

Reconceptualizing Early Childhood Care and Education is a foundational text, which presents contemporary theories and debates about early education and child care in many nations. Audiences include students in graduate courses focused on early childhood and primary education, critical cultural studies of childhood, critical curriculum studies and critical theories.

Written to commemorate 30 years since the United Nations Convention on the Rights of the Child (UNCRC), The Routledge International Handbook of Young Children’s Rights reflects upon the status of children aged 0–8 years around the world, whether they are respected or neglected, and how we may move forward. With contributions from international experts and emerging authorities on children’s rights, Murray, Blue Swadener and Smith have produced this highly significant textbook on young children’s rights globally. Containing sections on policy, along with rights to protection, provision and participation for young children, this book combines discussions of children’s rights and early childhood development, and investigates the crucial yet frequently overlooked link between the two. The authors examine how policy, practice and research could be utilised to address the barriers to universal respect for children, to create a safer and more enriching world for them to live and flourish in. The Routledge International Handbook of Young Children’s Rights is an essential resource for students and academics in early childhood education, social work and paediatrics, as well as for researchers, policymakers, leaders and practitioners involved in the provision of children’s services and paedeatric healthcare, and international organisations with an interest in or ability to influence national or global policies on children’s rights.