The newly created Conservative Education Reform Network (CERN) at the American Enterprise Institute (AEI) invited a group of conservative education thinkers to sketch policy proposals that they would like to see in a new education agenda. The only requirement was that they offer suggestions that would complement the traditional conservative…

Since 2003, the Vietnamese government has prioritised curriculum reform efforts and commitment to improving the quality of the national curriculum. The Vietnamese early childhood education renovation has encountered considerable changes and challenges, particularly in the area of pedagogical approaches. Many early childhood teachers continue to…

Purpose: The purpose of this paper is to contribute to the debate on the development of a national curriculum for Australia. The paper challenges stakeholders to interrogate the question of national curriculum, its purpose, values and potential for delivering the type of education Australia wants for its citizens in the twenty-first century.…

This year is designated as Thailand's "English Speaking Year" with the aim of improving the communicative competence of Thais for the upcoming integration of the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) in 2015. The consistent low-level proficiency of the Thais in the English language has led to numerous curriculum revisions and…

The field of education is a vital component of today's society, enriching and facilitating the attainment of new knowledge. Progress continues to be achieved in this area as new methods are envisioned that increase education's value. "Transforming the Future of Learning with Educational Research" brings together diverse perspectives that…

Thematic analysis of a continuous video record of a day in the life of a New Zealand kindergarten teacher, and of a narrative reconstruction of the day during a follow-up interview, yielded a view of early childhood professional practice as focused on a "curriculum of open possibilities". This paper discusses elements of the teacher's…

Finland recently adopted two national core curricula that apply to kindergartens (ages one through six). An early childhood education and care curriculum outlines expectations for children under seven (when school starts), while a preschool curriculum establishes guidelines specifically for six-year-olds. Both curricula describe broad principles,…

This article examines the importance of education for sustainability in New Zealand early years curriculum with particular reference to its inclusion in "Te Whariki," the national early childhood curriculum. Fieldwork was conducted across two New Zealand early childhood centres during a 12 month period. The major finding was that there…

In England, since 2000, teachers of children aged three to five (the Foundation Stage) have been bound by the Curriculum Guidance for the Foundation Stage produced by central government. Initially, we were interested to learn of the responses of early years teachers to that document. We found that teachers welcomed the Curriculum Guidance, not…

The national curriculum in Japan is termed the Course of Study, the revised version of which was implemented in 2000 for kindergarten, or nursery schools, and since 2002 for elementary or primary schools. The Course of Study for Science specifies content only in broad terms, placing the greatest emphasis on process, learning to learn and…