I work in an inner city early childhood setting and have noticed that the children often seem to have little understanding of where they are or knowledge of their local spaces, places near their homes or the centre. My reading around the importance of connection to place as an important component of well-being has made me curious about pedagogy of place in early childhood. With children having little opportunity to explore their surroundings or to develop the intimate understanding of the places they belong, how can this early connection and sense of belonging develop?
Here's what's available in RG that can be helpful.
Best regards,
Debra
https://www.researchgate.net/search.Search.html?type=publication&query=Pedagogy%20of%20Place%20in%20Early%20Childhood&tabViewId=57841465eeae39bb9270d201&previous=researcher
The following resources and attachments might be useful.
Catling, S. (2006). Younger children’s geographical worlds in primary geography. In Daniela Schmeinck (Ed.) Research on learning and teaching in primary geography (pp.9-35). Karlsruher Padagogische Studien.
http://trove.nla.gov.au/work/35286552?selectedversion=NBD43851794
Wiegand, P. (1992). Places in the primary school: Knowledge and understanding of places at Key stages 1 and 2. London: The Flamer Press.
Have you connected with Alan Reid and colleagues in the Education faculty of Monash? Alan leads a research centre that focuses on environmental education and between them I am sure they will have things they can recommend.
Try to plan a walk with your preschoolers o around the block or in the neighborhood..
Be sure to have a co-teacher along and that each child holds onto a rope as you walk slowly. Having a destination such as a park or playground is a bonus.Talk about and haw the children notice and tell you and each other all the houses, stores, empty lots, fire hydrants, bumpy sidewalks , signs, flower beds, fences, etc. as they slowly walk .. Maybe the streets are have trees, such as a pin oak, tall ash tree, or a weeping willow tree whose leaves almost brush down to the ground . Are there empty lots? bicycles parked on sidewalks? Learning about space and how it is occupied requires such keen noticing skills and good estimations of distances.
Back from their journey, children can draw pictures of the spaces they "traveled". . and things they saw on that walk. be sure to have hats for children if the sun is hot outside. and bring along plenty of re-usable water bottles if it is hot outside, even for a short walk. Can the children count how many steps it took to get to a corner from the Child care center? A walk can be a wonderful way to hone estimation skills as well as learn about space and distances.!.
I have done similar work in a middle school setting with Black boys. Perhaps it will provide some guidance for a mode of inquiry for your project.
Article The writing on the wall: enacting place pedagogies in order ...
My colleague Deb Moore has done research in this area. http://www.tandfonline.com/doi/abs/10.1080/21594937.2014.925293?journalCode=rijp20
Also, Margaret Somerville and Monica Green.
Another colleague Iris Duhn has done some research on this
http://www.eev.vic.edu.au/files/Duhn(2012).pdf
http://www.tandfonline.com/doi/abs/10.1080/13504622.2011.572162
Regards!
Hi Donna
Time for a 'critical' response? A colleague brought your question to my attention!
I think you need to be careful about both the concept of place and its potential applications as 'pedagogy'. Given your question, I find myself asking - is local 'neighbourhood' a better starting point and term? Or location/locale of being/becoming, even dwelling. I can think of many reasons why 'place' in early years education needs to be problematized, if not challenged. I list a few only.
1. How are you intending to use the term? And for what purposes, and what rationale? Is your intention for place more 'social' and urban and hence children's (geographically/demographically bounded) neighbourhood, including homes, play grounds, shops, gardens, etc that might be more practically relevant for kids to 'get to know/experience? Alternatively, is it more 'natural' outdoor spaces and derivatives of nature (landscapes, seascapes, riverscapes, etc) in which you and your kids are interested? So place is enigmatic, as are its pedagogies, senses of, possible attachments and relations/connections and disconnections. Is the term 'emplacing' helpful, or not, as a purpose.
2. In just about all the literature I've read (a lot!!!)place is typically assumed as a personal/social/cultural 'good' or 'right' (normatively/axiologically). All 'places' have underbellies. Too often these 'dark' places are ignored, or evaded/avoided. For example, the 'place' I currently live in (on the fringe/edge of a small city which has a high incidence of incest, child abuse,...............unemployment.............
3. In all of the literature I have read, conceptions of place/pedagogy also ignore the concepts of displacement, such as non place and unplace that are now features/characteristics of post/high modernity. We, and screen culture/digitalized children, 'live' in an increasingly abstract, technospace with its pedagogies (and a reason why more and more children are 'displaced'/don't know /disconnected from their immediate environment in which they routinely live and interact (families, schooling, etc). So children's 'geographies' are quite different 'intergenerationally' to what they were, even 10 years ago! Is a critical place pedagogy demanded?
4. These are all ingredients of a critique of the possible imposition of adultcentric conceptions/practices of 'place' and its pedagogies that might well contradict the 'intrinsic' playful, discovery, exploration 'motives' and experiences of children in their various environments/neigbourhoods/locations/locales of interrelationships, etc. In the literature, there is increasing interest in 'children's methodologies' including hearing/seeing/playing from/with children.
Much more could be said here but, if interested in the above, see my articles which I think are available somewhere on research gate, or contact me directly.
For example,
Children's conceptions of nature.
Slow ecopedagogy and environmental activism.
Remarkable tracking, experiential education of the ecological imagination.
Moral spaces, intergenerational influences, and the social ecology of families.
The technics of environmental education.
I've also attached a flyer of a recently released text by Skelton et al. on children's geographies as spaces/places/environments.
All the best.
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