Preschool teachers' science-specific competences have been shown to influence their science instruction, which in turn appear directly related to the development of children's science competences. Initial teacher education and in-service professional development may include learning opportunities to acquire science-specific competences necessary…

This paper arises from research undertaken by educational semioticians and science educators investigating the use of student generated digital artefacts as assessment tasks in pre-service science teacher education. Part of a broader shift toward student-generated media in tertiary science, the use of such tasks is driven by the need to deepen…

This qualitative study demonstrates the kinds of pedagogical pitfalls that are included in simplistic understandings of child-centeredness in the context of media education, an emerging field of early childhood teacher education with only a little empirical research done so far. Course diaries from 15 preservice teachers were analyzed to find…

The Texas Woman's University Future Classroom Laboratory (TWUFCL) is a unique learning space designed for use by university faculty, future teachers, and local PreK-12 teachers and students. Part of the European Schoolnet's Network of Future Classroom Labs, the TWUFCL offers users the chance to explore the science of teaching and learning in a…

The overall interest is to understand how men who study preschool teaching negotiate masculinities. Earlier research shows how male teachers negotiate masculinities when being in and entering a predominantly feminine work area, such as early childhood education [see, for example, Brody, D. L. (2015). The construction of masculine identity among…

The early childhood educator workforce has widely ranging credentials and degrees, qualifications and compensation, typically varying by setting. Yet, there is a national call for aligning and strengthening requirements for preparation of the early childhood workforce to ensure that young children thrive and reach their potential at each stage in…

The aim of this study is to explore the metaphorical perceptions of pre-service teachers about Syrian asylum seekers' children. A metaphor analysis method was conducted with 160 pre-service teachers during the spring semester of the 2017-2018 academic year. Data was collected by a metaphor analysis form. Qualitative and quantitative data analysis…

This paper is a reflection on culturally relevant pedagogies of care to achieve more equitable outcomes for diverse cultures within early childhood. The authors are academics at a tertiary institute in Auckland, New Zealand. Our aim is to share our experiences as teachers in a diverse and multi-ethnic city in New Zealand. Authors draw on narrative…

This paper reports on student experiences with an interdisciplinary project entitled "The Difficult Conversation", the aim of which was to develop professional competences linked with parental cooperation in heterogeneous social contexts, ethical reflection, pedagogical tact, and judgment skills. Student experiences with the project were…

This study aimed to investigate pre-service pre-school education teachers' data representation activities in terms of their relation to real life, the appropriateness of the data that the children can collect, the conformability of the graphs required for the data representation to the children's level, and the clarity of open-ended questions…

While many within early childhood and early childhood teacher education continue to call for early educators to engage in activities that attend to children's sociocultural worlds, practicing and preservice teachers often ignore such practices and make instructional decisions that address the issues of standardization and increased academic…

In this paper, we present the results of a research programme we developed to investigate the professional identity of preschool education teachers in Greece. Our aim was to investigate parameters affecting not only the creation but also the reform of professional identity and to highlight potential differences in terms of professional identity.…

This comprehensive text gives pre-service early childhood educators a balanced, accessible introduction to early childhood education that also covers the content areas. It shows readers how to teach and care for children by identifying and focusing on five essential elements: understanding child development, play, guidance, working with families,…

This study examined the impact of early childhood in physical education (ECPE) practicum experiences on pre-service teachers' (PSTs) perceptions on the development of the knowledge base. Specifically, this study focused on how PSTs bridged the gap between knowledge learned during campus classes and practicum experiences in an early childhood (EC)…

This study aims to determine the effect of drama on social communication skills through the use of quantitative and qualitative research methods in a holistic approach. In the quantitative part of the research both the metaanalytic method and descriptive study were used. In the meta-analysis phase, 24 studies (2 articles, 19 MA theses and 3 Ph.D.…