In early childhood education and care policy, there are two dominant discourses: 'investment and outcomes' and 'children's rights'. There is little research on how these discourses play out in educators' accounts. In this article, the authors examine the case of discourse pertaining to children's relaxation in early childhood education and care.…

In this article, the focus is on the entangled relations between digital technology, art activities, mathematics, literacy and children in Swedish preschool ateliers. As part of an ethnographic study, the researcher follows how children use digital technologies and non-digital materials (such as shells, pens, paper, wood, bubble wrap and light) to…

This qualitative case study aims to explore the ways in which communities of practice support teacher learning, decision-making, and the purposeful infusion of social justice topics that are important to children within project work. The authors draw from transformative learning theory and critical pedagogy to guide their work in supporting early…

This article generates two dialogical theorisations of young children's encounters in more-than-human worlds involving metaphor. The first theorisation devises metaphor as an entry point into the dialogues of more-than-humans and includes rare attention to metaphors as multimodal intra-action. The second theorisation provides an alternative to…

Children's right to participate in all matters and decisions affecting them has gained recognition in society. Its promotion is recommended from an early age -- namely, in early childhood education settings -- and it is described as benefiting children, adults and the community in general. Given the complex and polysemic meaning of participation,…

The influence of curriculum and policy documents on the decision-making of educators is of particular interest in the field of early childhood. Reports of competing pedagogical approaches with a 'push-down' of curriculum alongside advocacy for play-based pedagogies raise questions as to the potential of curriculum and policy documents to create…

The notion of 'belonging' is a core component of many early childhood curriculum frameworks and recognises the importance of children's sociocultural context for their self-identity and well-being. Children's risk-taking in play has also been the focus of contemporary research in examining its beneficial role for children's physical, social and…

The impacts of neo-liberal education reforms on the early childhood education sector have been a focal point of scholarly critiques in New Zealand. Interestingly, only a few studies have addressed how teacher professional identities and professionalism have changed in response to the neo-liberal context of New Zealand early childhood education. It…

A primary task for refugee families and children who are resettling in a new country is to develop a sense of belonging in that place, time and context. This article theorises the "powhiri," the traditional Maori ceremony of welcome or ritual of encounter, as a metaphor for refugee families and children coming to belong in Aotearoa New…

The last decade has revealed a global (re)configuring of the relationships between the state, society and educational settings in the direction of systems of performance management. In this article, the authors conduct a critical feminist inquiry into this changing relationship in relation to the professionalisation of early childhood education…

Amidst numerous curricular reforms across the USA that censor reading materials and promote standardized literacy policies, the authors ask in this article: What rights do early childhood teachers and students have in curriculum-making, and to the very materiality of their own classrooms? More broadly, they wonder: How do material regulations in…

The authors enter this conversation on equity, inclusion, and belonging in early care and education with abolition and ethnic studies as necessary standpoints that must be embodied to build what the world can and should be for its youngest inhabitants. Early care and education systems have been marked by damaging practices, pathologizing…

One in three children enrolled in US early childhood programs is a dual language learner. While dual language learners have been the target of sweeping educational reforms under the guise of justice, these reforms--which pathologize dual language learners as problems to be remediated rather than assets to be developed--have largely ignored the…

Few would dispute the importance of equity, inclusion and belonging in early childhood education and care, yet translation into meaningful practice rarely centres the priorities of historically divested communities. The national learning framework for early childhood in Australia is the Early Years Learning Framework, positioning the child as a…

Decades of research demonstrate that young children make meaning about race and racism. Yet there remains a dearth of scholarship about whether and how African American children are thinking across racial and ethnic difference to make sense of systemic inequities. Moreover, there are but a handful of scholars who have documented the ways that…