The heightened interest in childhood both on a national and international level has come with developments that we can all celebrate, some of which I indicated earlier; however, from the perspective of Gunilla Dahlberg and Peter Moss (2005) the increased interest in preschool services by nations and international bodies is mostly of a very particular kind. According to them it is stirred by the prospect of preschools being sites for producing predefined outcomes, mainly through the application of technical practices to the efficient governing of children (p. 4). This perspective seems to speak to the linear way that we base the children's education on e.g. milestones, reading ages, cognitive strategies, stages or skills etc. What do we suppress when the focus is only on what the child needs to accomplish? The video below I found to echo Dahlberg and Moss’s perspective on the economical, technological and moralization aspect of early childhood education and care:
“Investment in learning in the 21st century is the equivalent of investment in the machinery and technical innovation that was essential to the first industrial revolution. Then it was physical, now it is human capital. ...Our children are our future as a civilised society and prosperous nation. ... We must start now by getting integrated early years education and childcare and primary education, right” (as cited by Anne Edwards, 2004; p. 262). This quote I also found to speak to the aspect of the video that is emphasising on 'a child who is flexible, who is developmentally ready for the uncertainties and opportunities of the twenty-first century. Dahlberg and Moss term this way of being as 'a new normality of the child'(2005;p.7).
The discourse of ‘readiness’ comes with great anxiety for the children, the families and the educators. However, the parents as the primary care givers of the children are more impacted by the challenges that come with it. Some of the parents, especially those who enrol their children at infancy are very anxious when the children have to let go of things that comfort them. For example, winning a child off their milk bottle although they are still attached to it. Parents may not agree with this; however, they have to abide by the readiness philosophy, in some cases to maintain their childcare space; but most importantly they also understand that their child’s ability to ‘fit’ into the other levels of educational environments (this being a given) require them to have acquired certain skills. The fact that there is no room for consensus between the perspectives of parents, and educators' perspectives, makes me question the validity of our ethics, if they can only apply to our 'truths' and not those of the parents.
Hughes and MacNaughton question the commonly proffered solution - improving communications between parents and staff. Instead, according to them, they argue that 'communication cannot improve relationships between staff and parents unless it addresses the politics of knowledge underpinning them' (as cited by Dahlberg & Moss 2005; p. 164).
The following quote by Burman (2008) I found to speak to the discourse of parent involvement in the education or well-being of their children: “It can be argued that children as the starting point or supposedly raw material for social development - are the victims of the asocial model of the bourgeois individual of modernity. Thus the ‘special’- ness of children seem to be at the expense of being apart from the very social structures concerned with protecting or promoting them” (P. 96).
References
Burman, Erica (2008). Developments: Child, Image, Nation. U.K. Routledge
Dahlberg, G. & Moss, P. (2005). Ethics and politics in early childhood education. London: Peter Lang Publishing, Inc.
Edwards, Anne (2004). Understanding context, understanding practice in early education.
YouTube video: Smart beginnings – The benefits of early childhood
I wish to speak to the following quote in your writing:
ReplyDelete"Hughes and MacNaughton question the commonly proffered solution - improving communications between parents and staff. Instead, according to them, they argue that 'communication cannot improve relationships between staff and parents unless it addresses the politics of knowledge underpinning them' (as cited by Dahlberg & Moss 2005; p. 164)."
The examination of what it means to "improve communications between parents and staff" makes me think to the idea that in order to improve communication, one party must be the listener and the other a provider of knowledge. When we think of parent involvement , do we we truly value the role of the parent or is it a chance to have parents come in and learn from educators, seen as the expert? Gaile Cannella speaks to how the creation of programs such as Head Start and the involvement of parents creates these problematic relationships.
"At the beginning , some groups of parents influenced and even controlled programs. However, as administrators and politicians realized thta parents were constructing curriculum, they created restrictions. parental control was reduced. Not unlike the parent education focus of the day nurseries, Head Start was designed with the assumption that parent behaviors must be changed. Parents were to learn about hygiene, nutrition, and how to communicate with and provide learning experiences for their children" ( Cannella, 1997, p.111)
How does the role of parent involvement threaten the designed curriculum of ECE? Is it is discomfort or resistance to question the truths we teach by that prevent us from valuing the role of parents participation?
Cannella, S, G, (1997(. Deconstruction Early Childhood Education: Social Justice& Revolution. New York, NY: Peter Lang Publishing, Inc.
Hi Ilayambabazi, I've enjoyed reading your blog and am interested in the quote you chose, “communication cannot improve relations between staff and parents unless it addresses the politics of knowledge underpinning them” (Mac Naughton, p. 164).
ReplyDeleteWithin any relationship there is tension, and in seeking how to better communicate with parents, it is helpful to turn to French thinker Jean-Francois Lyotard. He argued “for the virtues of disagreement or dissensus for creating change and emancipation: for from his perspective ‘consensus is the end of freedom and of thought…” (as cited by Mac Naughton, p. 165). This is a space for the negotiation of difference and the possibility of the engagement in the political through what Mouffe terms ‘agonistic pluralism’ (Moss, p.234). Agonistic pluralism recognizes political conflict that occurs between those situated between different paradigmatic positions and accepts the possibility of rational consensus can be negotiated (Moss, 2007, 235; Dahlberg & Moss, 2005, p. 153). But as Mouffe continues, “A functioning democracy calls for confrontation between political positions, so too much consensus leads to apathy and a reluctance to participate in politics” (as cited by Mac Naughton, p. 153). Agonistic pluralism, as differentiated from ‘antagonism’ is defined as, “a struggle between enemies, while agonism is a struggle between adversaries” (Moss, 2007, p. 235). But, there is another important difference between antagonism and agonism. Antagonism seems to suggest a hostile struggle whereas contained within the space of agonism, is a profound respect for the Other. As it is a space of complexity, uncertainty and conflict, we might be tempted to “come to the Other with [my] typical ways of knowing, and make sense of the Other by applying them. If I can know the Other then I banish uncertainty and ambivalence for order and predictability” (Mac Naughton, p. 77). To sit in this space of uncertainty accepts Mouffe’s concept of agonistic pluralism as a way to engage in difficult/democratic conversations, not as harmonious form of engagement but as a rational, political negotiation without a predetermined consensus.
Mac Naughton, G. (2005). Doing Foucault in Early Childhood Studies Applying poststructural ideas. New York;Routledge.
Moss, P. (2007). Meeting Across the Paradigmatic Divide. Educational Philosophy and Theory, 39 (3), 234-235. Doi: 10,1111/j.1469-5812.2007.00325.x
Hi Ilayambabazi, I've enjoyed reading your blog and am interested in the quote you chose, “communication cannot improve relations between staff and parents unless it addresses the politics of knowledge underpinning them” (Mac Naughton, p. 164).
ReplyDeleteWithin any relationship there is tension, and in seeking how to better communicate with parents, it is helpful to turn to French thinker Jean-Francois Lyotard. He argued “for the virtues of disagreement or dissensus for creating change and emancipation: for from his perspective ‘consensus is the end of freedom and of thought…” (as cited by Mac Naughton, p. 165). This is a space for the negotiation of difference and the possibility of the engagement in the political through what Mouffe terms ‘agonistic pluralism’ (Moss, p.234). Agonistic pluralism recognizes political conflict that occurs between those situated between different paradigmatic positions and accepts the possibility of rational consensus can be negotiated (Moss, 2007, 235; Dahlberg & Moss, 2005, p. 153). But as Mouffe continues, “A functioning democracy calls for confrontation between political positions, so too much consensus leads to apathy and a reluctance to participate in politics” (as cited by Mac Naughton, p. 153). Agonistic pluralism, as differentiated from ‘antagonism’ is defined as, “a struggle between enemies, while agonism is a struggle between adversaries” (Moss, 2007, p. 235). But, there is another important difference between antagonism and agonism. Antagonism seems to suggest a hostile struggle whereas contained within the space of agonism, is a profound respect for the Other. As it is a space of complexity, uncertainty and conflict, we might be tempted to “come to the Other with [my] typical ways of knowing, and make sense of the Other by applying them. If I can know the Other then I banish uncertainty and ambivalence for order and predictability” (Mac Naughton, p. 77). To sit in this space of uncertainty accepts Mouffe’s concept of agonistic pluralism as a way to engage in difficult/democratic conversations, not as harmonious form of engagement but as a rational, political negotiation without a predetermined consensus.
Mac Naughton, G. (2005). Doing Foucault in Early Childhood Studies Applying poststructural ideas. New York;Routledge.
Moss, P. (2007). Meeting Across the Paradigmatic Divide. Educational Philosophy and Theory, 39 (3), 234-235. Doi: 10,1111/j.1469-5812.2007.00325.x
Posted by Maureen to Institutionalization of Childhood at April 10, 2011 10:54 AM