Practitioners’ constructions of love in early childhood education and care

Abstract

Love is rarely mentioned in Early Childhood Education and Care and there is no agreed definition for love in this context. In order to explore love in settings practitioner views on the topic should be sought. Unstructured interviews were carried out with senior practitioners in five contrasting settings. A range of qualitative methods were applied to the constructions over an extended period, and a thematic analysis was carried out at the last. Practitioners talked about wide-ranging aspects of practice in response to the narrative prompt about loving children, including the importance of showing to love through touch, familial and non-familial love, loving to be with children, and love as incorporating teaching lessons for the future. A definition of love is needed to facilitate professional discussions about love in settings, away from children's own homes.

Pedagogical love in Finland and Australia: a study of refugee children and their teachers

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Child care and COVID: Precarious communities in distanced times

“…Educator/caregivers “read” classroom dynamics and individual needs and emotions in nuanced ways and use touch (Carlson, 2006; Sapon-Shevin, 2009; Seidel, 2001; Souto-Manning, 2010), proximity and other pedagogies of care to comfort, challenge, guide, listen and instruct. Such practices represent pedagogies of love (Darder, 2017) and create “the beloved community” (Cousins, 2017; Sapon-Shevin, 2019). As in earlier stories shared by Dana, the following narrative underscores the frustration, sadness and sense of loss she feels as she is rendered helpless to comfort children and help them learn through emotional experiences as they would in her classroom community.…”

Pedagoji̇k Sevgi̇ Eği̇li̇mleri̇ Ölçeği̇ni̇n Uyarlanmasi: Geçerli̇k Ve Güveni̇rli̇k Çalişmasi

“…Çünkü eğitimde sevgi, özellikle öğrencilerin sosyal ve duygusal gelişiminde önemli bir rol oynar (Dowling, 2014;Manning-Morton ve Thorp, 2015;Özmen, 1999). Çocukluğun erken dönemlerindeki sosyal ve duygusal gelişimin ise çocukların öğrenmelerini, kariyerlerini, suça bulaşmalarını, akıl sağlığını hatta kişiliğini de etkileyebileceğini gösteren araştırmalar vardır (Cousins, 2017;Durlak ve ark., 2011;Jones, Greenberg ve Crowley, 2015). Günümüzde eğitim daha çok akademik çıktılara yoğunlaşmış olsa da duyuşsal ve sosyal çıktıların eksikliği daha fazla hissedilmeye başlanmıştır (Kara, 2004).…”