The landscape of early childhood education and care is changing. Governments world-wide are assuming increasing authority in relation to child-rearing in the years before school entry, beyond the traditional role in assisting parents to do the best they can by their children. As part of a social agenda aimed at forming citizens well prepared to play an active part in a globalised knowledge economy, the idea of ‘early learning’ expresses the necessity of engaging caregivers right from the start of children’s lives. Nichols, Rowsell, Rainbird, and Nixon investigate this trend over three years, in two countries, and three contrasting regions, by setting themselves the task of tracing every service and agent offering resources under the banner of early learning. Far from a dry catalogue, the study involves in-depth ethnographic research in fascinating spaces such as a church-run centre for African refugee women and children, a state-of-the-art community library and an Australian country town. Included is an unprecedented inventory of an entire suburban mall. Richly visually documented, the study employs emerging methods such as Google-mapping to trace the travels of actual parents as they search for particular resources. Each chapter features a context investigated in this large, international study: the library, the mall, the clinic, and the church. The author team unravels new spaces and new networks at work in early childhood literacy and development.
This ethnographic study examines parent and child experiences with learning resources in a range of sites, from schools and libraries to doctor's waiting rooms and supermarkets. It also investigates the ways in which governments and corporations are transforming early childhood education and creating an early learning industry.
Sophia will be entering into the 6th grade this year (2015) and has always been interested in words, phrases, analogies and idioms. One of her more quirky attributes is the ability to take an idiom and use it in an entirely new way that somehow actually fits the current situation. Sophia sees things differently than most people and this compliments her ability to churn out poetry that is sometimes good, sometimes bad, sometimes funny, and sometimes sad. When Sophia was a small child we read to her almost every night, mostly the same old children's books we have all come to love/hate, but occasionally we would read Shel Silverstein and of course Dr. Seuss, these she loved. I will never forget the time when Sophia was able to recite all of Shel Silverstein's "Hungry Mungry" after only hearing it twice. She has a gift, and while this current collection represents Sophia's efforts in its infancy, I do hope you will enjoy it. By the way if you are reading these poems out loud it helps if you imagine Seuss's "The Cat in the Hat" with a guitar singing Silverstein's "The Giving Tree." -Good Luck- John S. Fitch, Sophia's Dad
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