The European project 'Early Change' (http://earlychange.teithe.gr) attempts to evaluate the quality of early childhood education (ECE) environments of six European countries, Greece, Portugal, Finland, Denmark, Cyprus and Romania. The purpose of this paper is to compare the level of two dimensions of the process quality of these environments a) Space & Furnishings, and b) Personal Care Routines. Theorists, practitioners and researchers agree that in order to provide qualitative education to young children, one of the basic needs of all children must be met; that need is the protection of their health and their safety. A high quality early childhood education program must contain a safe and stimulating environment for the child (Lindsey, 1998). Such an environment includes indoor space, outdoor space, furniture, and room arrangement, and it is considered an integral part of a high quality early childhood program. 117 early educators from the six participating countries attended the training seminars about the evaluation of ECE quality using the Early Childhood Environmental Rating Scale-R (ECERS-R). The trained educators evaluated the 8 indicators of the subscale 'space & furnishings' and the six indicators of the subscale 'personal care routines' in approximately 600 early childhood classrooms from six European countries. The results of this study highlight the similarities and differences concerning the specific dimensions of the process quality of ECE environments in six European countries, and reflect the diversity of ECE environment across these countries. The findings of this study may provide a valuable insight to researchers and educational policy makers for an enhanced understanding of the cultural diversities and the strengthening of the common values and targets of the European Union.
Objetivo: Investigar a associação entre o desenvolvimento de linguagem, a qualidade do ambiente escolar, escolaridade parental, sexo e idade de crianças na faixa etária de quatro a seis anos, matriculadas em Unidades Municipais de Educação Infantil de Belo Horizonte. Métodos: Trata-se de estudo observacional analítico transversal com amostra probabilística. Estudou-se 169 crianças de quatro a seis anos, matriculadas em cinco Unidades Municipais de Educação Infantil. Os instrumentos utilizados foram: questionário estruturado, protocolo de Avaliação do Desenvolvimento da Linguagem e Early Childhood Environment Rating Scale-Revised. Realizou-se análise descritiva dos dados e associação entre as variáveis de exposição e os eventos. Foram consideradas associações estatisticamente significativas aquelas que apresentaram valor p≤0,05%. Resultados: 47,9% e 52,1% das crianças pertenciam ao sexo masculino e feminino, respectivamente, com predomínio da faixa etária de cinco anos (62,7%). 22,5% das crianças apresentaram algum distúrbio no desenvolvimento da linguagem. Predominaram responsáveis com ensino médio completo e superior incompleto (42,6%). A pontuação da média global da ECERS-R indicou qualidade de nível entre mínimo e bom; a maior média quanto à qualidade do ambiente escolar refere-se à sub escala Interação, que corresponde ao nível entre bom e excelente. Houve associação com significância estatística somente entre o desenvolvimento da linguagem e a sub escala interação e idade. Conclusão: O desenvolvimento da linguagem apresentou associação com significância estatística com a idade e o domínio interação da escala ECERS-R. Não houve associação com significância estatística entre o resultado da linguagem e as variáveis: ambiente escolar, domínio linguagem e raciocínio da escala ECERS-R, sexo e escolaridade parental.
Climate change, energy security and China's stance -- Influences on the development of Chinese policies : historical and contemporary perspectives -- Actors in China's climate-related energy policies -- From CDM to Pilot Carbon Trading Scheme -- ECERS for the energy production sector and energy users -- Updates during the 13th five-year plan and implications for unaddressed issues -- Taking stock : achievements and the road ahead.
In the face of growing environmental challenges, including climate change and energy security, countries across the globe are developing new policies and programs to address these challenges, and China is no exception. This book analyses China's two most significant climate-related energy policies, the Clean Development Mechanism (CDM; including the later Chinese Certified Emission Reduciton - CCER) and the Energy Conservation and Emission Reduction Scheme (ECERS). This work specifically examines the strengths and weaknesses of these policies to highlight the deficiencies and advise how they can be optimised, so China can better achieve its emission reduction goals. It analyses the roles and relationships between relevant actors and identifies how successful their cooperation has been, and what factors have affected it. Importantly, the work draws on a wide range of sources from central ministries to civil society, including interviews with Chinese officials, scholars, energy company managers, environment non-govermental organisation (ENGO) personnel, media reports, and online forum discussions. In doing so, the book not only analyses the thoughts of policymakers, as many works do, but also those implementing the policies and those impacted by the policies. The book concludes by offering detailed and practical solutions to address each specific deficiency in the CDM and ECERS policies, with the aim of providing innovations and alternative approaches to improve current and future policies in China. This book will be of great interest to students, scholars, and policymakers interested in climate change, energy, and Chinese environmental policy and politics.
Existing research on trilingual education has typically focused on primary and secondary classrooms, and there is dearth of research on implementation of trilingual education in preschools. The Hong Kong government promotes bi-literacy and a trilingual policy, and the Education Bureau has in 1997 officially endorsed teaching of Cantonese, Putonghua and English to kindergarteners from the age of three, with the transfer of sovereignty from British to Chinese rule. Against this background, this thesis (i) portrays the teaching of Cantonese, Putonghua and English in kindergartens wherein vouchers can and cannot be encashed in Hong Kong; and (ii) examines similarities and differences in teaching practices among language teachers within the same kindergarten, and across "voucher" and "non-voucher" kindergartens. One voucher kindergarten was randomly selected from each of Hong Kong's three regions, and two non-voucher kindergartens were studied as special cases, in order to illustrate the range of prevalent practices. Half-day classes for four- year-olds were chosen for the study. Language lessons across five consecutive school days were video-taped in each kindergarten, and classroom language activities were analyzed using an adapted version of the Communicative Orientation of Language Teaching (COLT) observation scheme. The quality of the classroom environment and literacy curricula were assessed using the Early Childhood Environment Rating Scale-Revised (ECERS-R) and Curricular Subscales Extension (ECERS-E). Five principals and fourteen language teachers were interviewed on language policies and curriculum, the environment for language teaching, and their teaching practices and beliefs. Curriculum documents and classroom observations suggest that kindergartens attempted to align topics, vocabulary and sentence patterns of the three languages to help children make connections among the languages. Teacher-directed, whole-class teaching was the predominant mode of instruction in all three languages across kindergarten classrooms. Cantonese teachers spent significantly more time on teaching numbers and characters than other teachers, and Putonghua teachers used significantly more time on involving children to present role-play and songs to the class to teach vocabulary and pronunciation. English teachers often used the direct-instruction method to teach phonics and vocabulary. Classroom observations indicate the teaching of Cantonese, Putonghua and English in voucher and non-voucher kindergartens had more similarities than differences although teachers in non-voucher kindergartens provided significantly more lesson time than other teachers for children to give short oral answers, and teachers in voucher-kindergartens used significantly more visual resources than other teachers. Similar language teaching practices were also found among the three groups of language teachers within the same kindergarten, as they were equally affected by similar factors such as curriculum, instruction time, resources, parental demands, and principals' and teachers' beliefs. When rated with ECERS-R and ECERS-E, the quality of the learning environment of the five classrooms ranged from excellent to minimal, and non-voucher kindergartens were not necessarily providing the best environment. Although teachers believed that learning through play and interactions was the best ways to learn language, a scripted curriculum with limited language instruction time, parental pressures for more Chinese writing and English reading and writing, backwash effect of primary schools, large class size, insufficient teacher training and lesson preparation time led to significant gaps between beliefs and practice of the teachers. The findings presented here have implications for government policy and pedagogical practice in Hong Kong. ; published_or_final_version ; Education ; Doctoral ; Doctor of Philosophy
The process of Europeanisation is closely linked to the process of an emerging European Educational Research Area and an education research identity. The European Conferences on Educational Research (ECER), European Educational Research Association (EERA) and its networks are involved in new directions and strands of educational research in particular European nations as well as in processes to construct a common European Educational Research Area. ECER to a large extent contributes to such developments both as observer and actor. Against the background of diverse functions and contexts of ECER for communication on and development of educational research in Europe, the authors describe some small-scale research studies about ECER that have been carried out during the past ten years dealing with attendance motives and assessments of ECER, and provide content analyses of proposal abstracts of ECER. In doing so, they would like to present a mirror to EERA at its 20th anniversary that could contribute to further systematic self-observation and self-governance of EERA and ECERs as vivid, inspiring, powerful, discursive, democratic and scholarly high-standing conferences in the future.
The article deals with the issue of quality assurance in alternative schools in EU countries. The goal of the research in general is to compare alternative education systems in traditional EU countries and those joining during two last enlargements in terms of school environment using Early Childhood Environmental Rating Scale (ECERS). The research was carried out at two stages – theoretical and practical. For the years 2008 – 11 the author has studied the theoretical approaches to alternative education and peculiarities of legislation in 4 EU countries and Ukraine. The author visited 34 alternative schools of different kinds in Poland, France, Germany, and Bulgaria and collected data for the comparative analysis. The results were presented at ECER 2011 in Berlin. ; У статті привернуто увагу до питань, пов'язаних із забезпеченням якості альтернативної освіти у країнах Європейського Союзу. Загальною метою дослідження є порівняння систем альтернативної освіти у традиційних країнах ЄС і країнах, які приєдналися до ЄС упродовж двох останніх хвиль розширення. Порівняння шкільного середовища виконано на основі Рейтингової шкали оцінювання шкільного середовища. Дослідження проведено в два етапи: теоретичний і практичний. Упродовж кількох років автор вивчала теоретичні підходи до альтернативної освіти і особливості законодавства щодо неї в чотирьох країнах ЄС і в Україні. Автор відвідала 34 альтернативні школи різних типів у Польщі, Франції, Німеччині і Болгарії і зібрала матеріали для порівняльного аналізу, результати якого було представлено на Європейській конференції освітніх досліджень у Берліні (2011).
For the first time in many years, VETNET publishes a collection of short papers in an edited book of proceedings, which is available online and as a printed version. VETNET has had a long tradition in making ECER presentations and full papers open to a broader public. So, what's the purpose of having "a real book"? We see it as an opportunity for VETNET to increase the visibility of current research in vocational education and training - and as an opportunity for its researchers to talk about planned, ongoing and finalised pieces of work. VETNET lives, if knowledge is shared, discussed and challenged by others. The people involved are ready to cross boundaries in their theoretical and methodological thinking and acting. The papers included in the 2018 ECER proceedings from Bolzano are written by established and well-known researchers, by doctoral students and early career researchers. They tell stories about young people and adult learners in vocational education and training, about institutional actors, teachers, trainers and coaches, and about the political, economic and social conditions that shape school-based and workplace learning, and teaching and training in initial, higher and continuous VET. Altogether, the papers reflect the rich culture of VET and VET research in Europe and abroad. The proceedings align with other activities of VETNET within EERAs annual ECERs and beyond. Having the proceedings ready before the conference was an ambitious goal. We thank all the authors and co-authors for sharing their valuable insights into current trends in vocational education and training research. Bolzano, 4 September 2018
peer-reviewed ; This research applies the Early Childhood Environmental Rating Scales/Revised and the Extension four Curricular Subscales (ECERS/R/E) in a systematic way to measure standards of pre-school provision in Ireland. This exploratory study is the first application of the scales in the Irish context. The evidence based data is analysed using both quantitative (ECERSR/E findings) and qualitative (Relational Pedagogy) approaches. In keeping with The National Children's Strategy (2000) this research uses a post-modern pedagogical analysis (Relational Pedagogy). In the strategy, the Irish State's policy emphasised post-modern pedagogical principles such as the ‗whole child perspective'. This recognises the capacity of children to interact with and shape the world around them. It regards the child as an advocate in his or her own learning and seeks to listen to the voice of the child is in keeping with EU and Nordic approaches. This philosophy (RP) guides new ECEC quality and curriculum frameworks, namely Síolta and Aistear and Regulation 5 in the 2007 revised Child Care (Pre-School Services) Regulations. These are in essence the new Irish pre-school standards, though not a curriculum and are soon to be implemented. Furthermore, qualitative phenomenological research was used to understand the ‗lived experience' of the pre-school practitioner. This method involved interviews and observations and informs the interpretation of the findings. The research population is small but significant, 26 pre-schools throughout Ireland. The findings reveal a minimal standard in many aspects of pedagogy. Pre-math and pre-science provision standards are inadequate. The title Parish Pedagogies comes about as the findings vary from Parish to Parish with no national standard evident. The parish as a unit of organisation is relevant as one third of the cohort have expanded through Parish support systems.
Investing in young children is the responsible thing to do. All children deserve a chance to grow into healthy, educated, and competent people, no matter where and when they were born. While parents bear most of the responsibility for raising their children, especially in the early years of life, governments also have an important role during this critical time of human capital accumulation. For example, governments can ensure that all expectant mothers and young children have access to quality health services and nutrition. They can support parents and other caregivers in providing a positive and stimulating environment for children from birth on by promoting parenting information programs, investing in direct services such as home-based visits, funding daycare centers and preschools, or providing financial incentives to access good quality programs for infants and children. This Early Childhood Development (ECD) guide presents lessons and experiences that have been useful in informing the policy debate about ECD interventions and the design of such programs across the world. Whether the user of this guide is at the initial stage of deciding whether to expand an ECD portfolio or already in the program design stage, the content offers a range of evidence- based options to inform policy and investment choices.
