Research Around the World

I chose to look into research on the Early Childhood Australia website. This year I have a girl in my class whose father is Australian and we spent several days in class learning about that country. The family was kind enough to share cultural books, as well as Australian children books. The class favorite was a book of photos of their classmate and her family in Australia, the photo of her petting a kangaroo was astonishing to them.

Early Childhood Australia publishes the Australasian Journal of Early Childhood (AJEC) it is the longest-running major journal in the early childhood field. (Australasian refers to Australia, New Zealand and the neighboring islands in the South Pacific Ocean).

You need to subscribe to have full access to the journal articles but I was able to access the index and abstracts for the most current issue, Volume 36, published on December 4, 2011. Several of the research studies were topics that are of interest in the United States such as parental views of the influence of television on the development of young children. The Australian study by Garvis & Pendegast found that very often if a TV program is rated educational parents do no further investigating on their own.

Another study by Colmer, Rutherford & Murphy looked at attachment theory and primary caregiving in early childhood settings. Utilizing the primary caregiver as a partner to intervene with families where there are disruptions to the parent – child attachment. I found this idea very interesting and a new way to look at the importance of primary caregiving and I wonder if it would work in child care settings here in the US.

Play is the focus of much research in the US and a comparison study conducted by Reynolds, Stagnitti, & Kidd conducted in Victoria, Australia found that children from low socioeconomic areas that attended school with a play-based curriculum gained more social and language skills than the children that attended a traditional school.

Noteworthy information that I found is that there are a lot of changes happening in early childhood education in Australia this year. As of January 1 of this year, the Australian Children’s Education and Care Quality Authority (ACECQA) is working to implement high –quality early childhood education and care for all children. Australia as a nation has recognized the importance of rich preschool experiences and veiws it as a way to close the widening gap between children who are doing well academically and those that are not. The Education and Care Services National Law Act 2010 was passed with an understanding that a strong cognitive and language base leads to later educational success. May we in the US get our policy makers to develop this understanding!

References

Colmer, K., Rutherford, L., & Murphy, P. (2011). Attachment theory and primary caregiving [Abstract]. Australasian Journal of Early Childhood. 36.

Early Childhood Australia website http://www.earlychildhoodaustralia.org.au/  

Garvis, S., & Pendergast, D., (2011). Warning-Television viewing may harm your child’s health: Parent perceptions of early Childhood viewing habits [Abstract]. Australasian Journal of Early Childhood. 36.

Reynolds, E., Stagnitti, K. & Kidd, E., (2011). Play, Language and social skills of children attending a play-based curriculum school and a traditionally structured classroom curriculum school in low socioeconomic areas [Abstract]. Australasian Journal of Early Childhood. 36.