“Reaffirming Complexity in Early Childhood Education” Research Conference

“Reaffirming Complexity in Early Childhood Education” Research Conference

New Zealand Tertiary College’s annual research conference, ‘Reaffirming Complexity in Early Childhood Education’ was held at the Greenlane Campus on 4 November 2011.

The day-long conference was attended by associate teachers, centre managers, NZTC staff and associates. The College was privileged to have Dr. E Jayne White, Senior Lecturer from the University of Waikato as the keynote speaker.

Chief Executive Selena Fox welcomed each of the speakers and said she looked forward to a day of “relevant, change-enabling research”. To set the scene she shared some inspiring quotes on learning from Ako Aotearoa (the National Centre for Tertiary Teaching Excellence), such as “the person who does the work does the learning”, “learning is like opening a door, not filling a container” and “theory without practice is empty, practice without theory is blind”.

Research Manager Leon Benade chaired the first session of the day and introduced Jayne to present on “under 2’s in early childhood education”. Jayne said that there has been little focus on under-threes in research despite Statistics NZ reporting unprecedented growth in centre enrolments for the age group. She explored the notion of toddlers being “agentic beings”- people who have the freedom to choose despite not being able to verbalise their intentions. A video was shown of a 19-month old boy choosing to play with a rugby ball instead of engaging with his teacher’s set activity. From this she challenged attendees to “look through different philosophical lenses” and to be “attuned to toddlers’ body language and maybe even to be brave enough to sit with silences”.

Mark Dashper, an ex-high school teacher, Facilitator of Secondary Education Pathways with Team Solutions and Director of Te Manu Aute (Centre for Gifted and Talented Students) spoke on “21st Century Tribes: Constructing educational social networks within traditional Maori pedagogies”. Mark investigated ways in which young people, especially Maori, could be engaged through online classrooms on social networking sites such as Facebook. The internet, he said, was becoming the “new marae” where people met together to discuss ideas and theories. Although this concept was focused more on high-school aged children, there were many insights that could be a applied to pre-school aged children, such as “learning about the learner” in order to develop “culturally responsive education”. Mark also drew attention to the recent edition of He Kupu journal, which featured powerful discussions on the use of ICT tools, such as the iPad in early childhood education.

NZTC Lecturer Dr. Juliet Smeed followed with her presentation on “nonsense” in language and literature. She detailed criticisms of nonsense and explained how children benefit from language exploration and play.

After morning tea, attendees had the option of attending either “Curriculum realities and opportunities” or “Approaches to research” sessions.

In “Curriculum realities and opportunities” NZTC lecturers Karen Miller, Geetanjali Charles, Nanisi Mabbs and Rachel Hughes shared on science, literacy, Mata Pasifika and the role of love in early childhood teaching respectively.

“Approaches to research” featured Krishna Dutta on “the triangle of young children, complex thinking and learning”, Dr. Thanh-Binh Tran on “case-study methodology in early childhood research”, while Karyn Aspden’s thesis, “Light and Shadow”, considered the importance of practicum experience within initial teacher education.

Attendees came together for the final session to hear NZTC Lecturer Cindy Weydeman and Bethlehem Tertiary Institute Lecturer, Phillip Ozanne share their experiences of being ‘neophyte’ – or first time- researchers.

Dr. Chris Naughton continued on this theme by introducing students Adele Jones, Nilma Abeyratne and Susan Kearns-Docker, who were involved in Changing Places, an Ako Aotearoa-funded research project examining the role of music in early childhood education. The suggestions and insights these students shared provoked great interest among the teachers present.

Jayne gave the closing address in which she reiterated key points and branded the day “a smorgasbord of ideas, possibilities and provocations”.

NZTC is already looking forward to its next conference in 2012 - also the year of its 30th anniversary.