Contemporary Issues in
Early Childhood

ISSN 1463-9491

Volume 1 Number 1 2000

CONTENTS

[click on author's name for abstract and full text]
 

Editorial 1–2
Valerie Walkerdine Violent Boys and Precocious Girls: regulating childhood at the end of the millennium 3–22
Di Catherwood New Views on the Young Brain: offerings from developmental psychology to early childhood education 23–35
Gaile S. Cannella The Scientific Discourse of Education: predetermining the lives of others – Foucault, education and children 36–44
Douglas H. Clements ‘Concrete’ Manipulatives, Concrete Ideas 45–60
Richard Johnson Colonialism and Cargo Cults in Early Childhood Education: does Reggio Emilia really exist? 61–77
Christine Woodrow & Marie Brennan Marketised Positioning of Early Childhood: new contexts for curriculum and professional development in Queensland, Australia 78–94
COLLOQUIA
Carmen Luke What Next? Toddler Netizens, Playstation Thumb, Techno-literacies 95–100
Felicity McArdle Art and Young People: doing it properly 101–104
BOOK REVIEWS
Deconstructing Early Childhood Education: social justice and revolution (Gaile Sloan Cannella),
reviewed by J. Amos Hatch 105 VIEW FULL TEXT
Gender in Early Childhood (Ed. Nicola Yelland),
reviewed by Carmel Diezmann 108 VIEW FULL TEXT
Theorizing Childhood (Allison James, Chris Jenks & Alan Prout), reviewed by Sharon Ryan 110 VIEW FULL TEXT

Editorial

This first issue of Contemporary Issues in Early Childhood represents the culmination of attempts to provide early childhood educators with a context for presenting work that engages in alternative perspectives from those used traditionally in the field. As editors, we are delighted to have the opportunity to make available online and fully-refereed, current research and thinking that has emerged over the last decade. What makes this journal unique is that it contains current research and thinking that utilises different theoretical perspectives from those most frequently adopted in early childhood education. Some of the articles and colloquia published in Contemporary Issues in Early Childhood critique issues that many early childhood educators have accepted as unquestionable. We view this journal as an opportunity to showcase current challenges. It will exemplify the disquiet of some with traditional approaches and voice the reasons for such concern. It will also present some of the creative approaches that are being used to provide theoretical and practical ways ahead.

For some practitioners and academics using alternative approaches in the early childhood field publication and dissemination of ideas has been problematic as there are few avenues for the presentation of such work. There have been a number of edited collections, or themed issues of particular journals that have provided welcome, but limited, opportunities for those wanting to share approaches in new and contemporary ways. Contemporary Issues in Early Childhood fills this void as it provides a context for extending the dialogue about current issues by incorporating a wide range of theoretical and practical alternatives. We seek submissions that adopt such perspectives and that can also take advantage of the technology available with online publications. While the purpose of the journal is to display current work that involves practical and theoretical alternatives, we are specifically encouraging teachers and postgraduate students to contribute to this ongoing quest.

In each issue of Contemporary Issues in Early Childhood the content will contain a variety of formats that include articles, colloquia and book reviews.

In this first issue, Valerie Walkerdine explores the issue of adult sexuality and considers recent anxiety about children, the status of childhood and the status of adult sexuality in relation to its object, that is, young children. Di Catherwood presents new information about brain research in very young children and discusses how this research can aid understandings about ways in which very young children learn. The article concludes with some issues for consideration for those who work with young children and their families. Gaile Cannella discusses the hierarchical power that adults exert over the child and posits that we need to consider new (educational) discourses in order to deliberate the structure and shape of the education system. Doug Clements challenges the accepted doctrine of traditional pedagogical sequences in mathematics education and presents an alternative conceptualisation of manipulatives that requires us to think of new ways in which to view the notion of concrete materials for learning. Richard Johnson uses the Reggio Emilia doctrine to problematise larger issues in early childhood. In his analysis of Reggio Emilia, Johnson uses cargo cult theory in conjunction with notions of colonisation, tourism and normative practices of the early childhood field. In the final article, Chris Woodrow & Marie Brennan discuss how the ideology of the market has influenced a newly mandated curriculum document for children in the year before compulsory schooling in an Australian state. The analysis extends to the associated professional development for principals and teachers.

Colloquia have been included in order to facilitate discussion about topical issues in early childhood education. In this issue we have two colloquia. In the first Carmen Luke examines popular culture and reviews the various contexts and concepts of childhood historically. She then raises and discusses four critical issues that should concern us, as educators in contemporary times. Felicity McArdle makes an argument for interrogating the discourses associated with young children and art education. She examines her disquiet about what constitutes appropriate practice in her field and describes the research that she has embarked upon which explores the varying contexts and practices associated with the teaching of art in the early childhood years.

This issue also contains three book reviews that focus on recent additions to the field. J. Amos Hatch reviews Gaile Cannella’s (1997) Deconstructing Early Childhood Education: social justice and revolution, Carmel Diezmann examines an edited collection entitled Gender in Early Childhood (Yelland, 1998) and Sharon Ryan reviews Theorizing Childhood, by James et al (1998).

We have attempted in this first issue to bring together a variety of people and pieces of writing that exemplify ways in which traditional practice is being challenged. We feel that the diverse, eclectic and exciting contributions showcase new directions for early childhood for the new millennium and we feel optimistic about travelling the road ahead with you.
Susan J. Grieshaber & Nicola J. Yelland

Violent Boys and Precocious Girls: regulating childhood at the end of the millennium

VALERIE WALKERDINE University of Western Sydney, Australia

This article explores the regulation of childhood at the end of the twentieth century by focusing on the figures of the proto-violent boy and the proto-sexual girl in relation to the figure of the dangerous and predatory male adult. These figures, who represent the Other to normal childhood, are explored with respect to popular culture, examining computer games on the one hand and popular song and dance on the other. It is argued that conceptions of childhood for the next century need to engage with the specificity of the sites in which subjectivities are constituted and to move away from the simple dichotomies of normality and pathology

New Views on the Young Brain: offerings from developmental psychology to early childhood education

DI CATHERWOOD University College Worcester, United Kingdom

This article presents a broad review of recent developments in perspectives and research on early cognition. An overview of methodologies used to explore infant memory and categorisation is provided, with a discussion of the manner in which studies using these procedures have served to overturn Piagetian viewpoints on infant cognitive competence. In addition, research into the way in which the brain grows and responds to early experience is described, with a consideration of how neural networks are established and shaped by early learning. The general conclusion is that there is now available a range of radically new approaches to understanding the growth of the human brain and mind that is potentially of immense value to early childhood educators.

The Scientific Discourse of Education: predetermining the lives of others – Foucault, education, and children

GAILE S. CANNELLA Texas A&M University, College Station, USA

A discourse of education has emerged that legitimizes the belief that science has revealed what younger human beings are like, what we can expect from them at various ages, and how we should differentiate our treatment of them in educational settings. Recent poststructuralist, critical, and postmodern work has called to question the notion of predetermined, universal childhoods that require particular forms of educational experience determined by scientific discovery and by human beings who are older. The purpose of this article is to further problematize the discourse of education that has justified the construction of younger human beings as the ‘other’ and legitimizes the continued regulation of their lives through the institution of education. This particular problematization is based on and limited by the work of Foucault and addressed from two positions: (1) rules that govern the discourse of education; and (2) disciplinary technologies that produce docile bodies as objects that yield to the discourse.

‘Concrete’ Manipulatives, Concrete Ideas

DOUGLAS H. CLEMENTS State University of New York, Buffalo, USA

The notion of ‘concrete,’ from concrete manipulatives to pedagogical sequences such as ‘concrete to abstract,’ is embedded in educational theories, research, and practice, especially in mathematics education. In this article, the author considers research on the use of manipulatives and offers a critique of common perspectives on the notions of concrete manipulatives and concrete ideas. He offers a reformulation of the definition of ‘concrete’ as used in psychology and education and provides illustrations of how, accepting that reformulation, computer manipulatives may be pedagogically efficacious.

Colonialism and Cargo Cults in Early Childhood Education: does Reggio Emilia really exist?

RICHARD JOHNSON University of Hawaii, Honolulu, USA

The Reggio Emilia, preschools in Italy, have been called one of the best preschool education systems in the world. This is witnessed by the proliferation of people who have made a pilgrimage to Reggio to study this system and bring it to the USA. This article uses Reggio as a now familiar cultural icon in an attempt to problematize larger issues in the field of early childhood education. Beginning with a brief overview of some of recent Reggio discourse the author interprets this phenomenon using Foucault in an attempt to illustrate the extent to which “power reaches into the very grain of individuals ... inserts itself into their actions and attitudes, their discourses, learning processes and everyday lives’ (1980, p. 39). Assisting with this interpretation, the popularity of Reggio is positioned against cargo cult theory and the normative, hegemonic practices of colonization.

Marketised Positioning of Early Childhood: new contexts for curriculum and professional development in Queensland, Australia

CHRISTINE WOODROW Central Queensland University, Rockhampton, Australia
MARIE BRENNAN University of Canberra, Australia

The field of early childhood education is experiencing similar conditions to the rest of the Australian public sector, characterised by a climate of accountability for quality outcomes, emphasis on management at the local level and strong centralisation of control over curriculum and teacher appraisal within a context of significant reduction in public sector government spending. The ideology of the market underpins many of these reform directions, with particular consequences and effects in the early childhood area. This article uses as a focal case study the newly mandated Preschool Curriculum Guidelines for the state of Queensland, Australia, and their accompanying professional development of early childhood teachers and school principals. The outcomes for the professional development have been highly controlled and pre-specified through government departmental scrutiny by a competitive tendering process among potential private providers – all of whom include publicly funded universities as they themselves compete for additional money to justify their new role as entrepreneurs in an increasingly marketised system of higher education. The study focuses on the processes of control for the professional development associated with the new curriculum, with an emphasis on exploring the rhetoric and practices of ‘partnership’ underlying the approved models. The findings of the early phases of the study indicate a limited range of positioning available for early childhood teachers, school principals, and those involved in the delivery of the professional development. The guidelines and professional development activities appear to have expanded the relationships within the care and education sector while constraining the range of positions and relative autonomy of early childhood teachers. This is a significant finding in that this is the first time there have been statewide mandated Curriculum Guidelines and statewide professional development required of early childhood teachers.

What Next? Toddler Netizens, Playstation Thumb, Techno-literacies

CARMEN LUKE University of Queensland, St Lucia, Australia

This article considers how traditional mass media and new information technologies change our thinking about childhood, and the very experience of childhood. It asks questions such as: How does the merchandise of the marketplace, the media and new technologies construct and segment childhood? What should early childhood educators and parents consider in the selection of instructional or entertainment CDs or websites? Four major issues are raised in relation to the ‘information revolution’ and early childhood: concepts of development; media and information technology literacy; critical criteria for software selection; issues of equity and access.

Art and Young Children: doing it properly

FELICITY McARDLE Queensland University of Technology, Kelvin Grove, Australia

This short article discusses the ways in which teachers and artists may work with young children, particularly in the visual arts. It considers how their views of the child and art shape, and are shaped by, the various competing texts available to them.

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