This article focuses on the impact of the physical environment and construction of play culture in kindergartens. Based on a case study, we explore employees' perception of indoor physical environment and children's play. The findings revealed that gender is interwoven in the physical environments and materials. Children's play practices are…

This case study explores how opportunities for critical, place-based education can be eclipsed by the decontextualized curricula and pedagogies inherent in neoliberal, standards-based early education reforms such as universal pre-kindergarten that contain some progressive elements. Following Schwab (1973), we explore the roles of teachers and…

This paper explores dance as literacy. Specifically, it examines qualitative case study research findings and student examples from a dance artist-in-residence that explored curricular content using dance as its primary mode of enquiry and expression. Throughout the residency, students constructed meaning through their dance experiences in dynamic…

Multi-digit subtraction is difficult for students to learn. The purpose of this study is to explore how second-grade students communicate their understanding of double-digit subtraction through the use of manipulatives/tools. This qualitative study reports on six case studies of second-grade students where clinical interviews were the main source…

This article describes a dual-case study that was conducted to examine the effects of The Tools Approach on kindergarten students' use of and interest in informational text. Children in one teacher's kindergarten classroom during two subsequent years participated in a writing intervention which included learning about text features, conducting…

Research indicates that adult sensitivity to psychological states (both the adult's and the infant's) will affect the security of attachment yet the teacher's internal state has received little attention in infant care. "Perezhivanie" is a sociocultural concept that presents affect and intellect as a unit rather than separate elements.…

Intercultural competence among educators has long been recognised as important, especially in contexts characterised by growing and shifting cultural diversity such as Australia. However, the capacity to be interculturally competent has only recently been enshrined in teacher standards in Australia, and research into this field among early…

The purpose of this study was to explore how leadership approaches can inform and direct the way leadership is practiced in elementary schools. In this study, the researcher examined the impact of leadership approaches on the sustainability of the implementation of the Reading Recovery program regarding reading achievement. Early primary school…

This case study examined the effects that the processes of private speech and materialization (using line underscores as word placeholders) had on the emergent writing behaviours of one, six-year-old student who was enrolled in an auditory--oral deaf or hard of hearing (DHH) first-grade classroom situated on a large urban public school campus.…

This exploratory, qualitative multiple-site case study examined principals' expectations of teaching practices and children's learning for early elementary grade levels (K, 1st, 2nd, and 3rd). Specifically, this study investigated principals' understanding of developmentally appropriate practices regarding instructional methods, curriculum…

Drawing from Chicana feminist perspectives and Pérez ("Living Chicana theory." Third Woman Press, Berkeley, pp 87-101, 1998) theories of "sitios y lenguas" (space and discourses) the authors reposition understandings of teaching and learning through a qualitative case study of a first grade Spanish/English bilingual classroom.…

This case study explores the pedagogy and practices of an elementary school teacher who combines inquiry pedagogy and critical literacy. The authors gathered data for this analysis by conducting two interviews with a classroom teacher and observing classroom practices 12 times over a 6 month period. Through a general inductive approach to…

Some coloured and black learners in South Africa use a light orange or pink crayon to represent themselves in art. Many learners name this colour "human colour" or "skin colour". This is troublesome, because it could reflect exclusionary ways of representing race in images and language. This case study, conducted with two…

This article examines how three urban elementary school teachers adapted pedagogical strategies from a school district--adopted core reading program to increase their students' access to the curriculum. Using teacher interviews and classroom observations to construct a descriptive case study of teacher adaptation, analysis reveals that the…

The argument that teachers should become ethical intercultural teachers is increasingly recognized as legitimate. This article presents a case study in kindergarten teacher education in Finland, a country that has been at the center of global discussions about quality education. The authors question the agenda for studying and teaching in an…