In Gunilla Dahlberg and Peter Moss’s (2005) view the expansion of early childhood education and care opens up new possibilities - for the children, for families, and the communities (Preface). Dahlberg and Moss’s view is supported by the OECD (2001) report which indicates that providing services for young children and their families has moved up the policy agenda in many countries. For example, according to the report, countries that spent less for public expenditures like the USA and the UK are now spending more. While countries like Denmark and Sweden, that previously spent more for their public expenditures, expanded further - by introducing entitlements to provision for children from 12 months of age and upwards. Overall according to the OECD (2001) report the increased policy interest has ‘fostered several major developments in the field, including rapid expansion of early childhood provision, increased focus on quality improvement, attention to coherence and integration, and higher levels of public investment in the system as a whole (ibid: 45).
The reality is that not all OECD member countries live up to the report indicated above, due to some governments failing to meet their end of the bargain monetarily; however, I agree that great strides have been made in the field due to the expansion, which has been of benefit to the children, their families and the educators. For example, the ‘increased focus on quality improvement’ as indicated in the OECD report ensures that children are educated and cared for in a professional environment; hence allowing the parents to focus on their occupations with less worry. For the educators the expansion brought to light the necessity of professionally learn programs thus giving credibility to child care workers as educators, rather than child minders. The expansion also gave us leverage of negotiating for better terms and conditions, thus contributing to the slightly improved wages and benefits that some of us enjoy – especially for those that work in unionized centres. Another important aspect of the institutionalization of childhood is that children, from poor countries have also gained through early childhood and care initiatives - by international organizations. Therefore, I believe that certain aspects of institutionalization of childhood are a force for good.
References
Dahlberg, G. & Moss, P. (2005). Ethics and politics in early childhood education. London: Peter Lang Publishing, Inc.
Hello Ilyambabazi,
ReplyDeleteOne of the things I find compelling about the institutionalization of early childhood is the discussion of the child it has brought to the public arena. Thinking with Hannah Arendt (Biesta, 2007), it seems that the child's appearance in the public sphere of early childhood has given the child an image and a voice in society that extends beyond the image of the child as someone's child (some parent's child). While- as you point out in your other posts- the child's move from the private realm of the home to the public realm of the institution remains problematic as other bodies, of state and economy, begin to speak for the child- it also opens a space for public conversation. I wonder if the institutionalization of childhood opens a space for the voice of the child in society. Can the institution create a space where we might be able to hear diverse perspectives about the roles, subjectivities and identities of childhood?
It is clear in your posting that, if the institutionalization of childhood opens new conversations, it also introduces powerful dominant voices in those conversations. Some part of those conversations seem to have made an effort to distance childhood and education from the political sphere. The dominant discourse of childhood seems to question if politics have a place in early childhood rather than acknowledging the Foucauldian (Dahlberg &Moss, 2005) idea that everything is political. Through your blog and my own studies with Arendt, I have come to question if the fields of early childhood and education have attempted to set themselves apart in some other realm that is neither the private realm of the home and the family, nor the political public sphere where difference and diversities of opinion might come together for discussion. This a-political realm seems to parallel the idea of the institution as a factory that produces objects rather than people. How do we recognize the reality of the institutional settings we work within without reducing the people we work with to products of the institution? How do we create spaces for conversations and the singularity of voices within the single perspective of the institutionalized system?
I look forward to reading more on this topic,
Lucy
Biesta, G. (2007). Education and the democratic person: Towards a political conception of democratic education. Teachers College Record, 109 (3), 740-769.
Dahlberg, G. & Moss, P. (2005). Ethics and politics in early childhood education. New York: RoutledgeFalmer.
Hi Lucy,
ReplyDeleteI will be responding to your quote below,which was in response to the Institutionalization of childhood discourse.
"Through your blog and my own studies with Arendt, I have come to question if the fields of early childhood and education have attempted to set themselves apart in some other realm that is neither the private realm of the home and the family, nor the political public sphere where difference and diversities of opinion might come together for discussion."
As I read your response the concept of democracy came to mind. Can democracy truly be attainable in the arena of knowledge? The following quote by Dehlberg and Moss (2005)seems to speak to your quote and my question: "Democracy, in short is impossible where some claim the truth and priviledged access to knowledge. Participation also means understanding the preschool in a particular way, as 'a social and political place and thus an educational place in the fullest sense'.
Reference
Dehlberg & Moss (2005). Ethics & Politics in Early Childhood Education. New York: Taylor & Francis Group.