Content uploaded by Jane Hewes
Author content
All content in this area was uploaded by Jane Hewes on Feb 09, 2019
Content may be subject to copyright.
WINTER/HIVER 2019 37 Vol. 44 No. 1
JOURNAL OF CHILDHOOD STUDIES ARTICLES FROM RESEARCH
Animating a Curriculum Framework Through Educator Co-Inquiry:
Co-Learning, Co-Researching, and Co-Imagining Possibilities
Jane Hewes, Patricia Lirette, Lee Makovichuk, and Rebekah McCarron
Dr. Jane Hewes is associate dean and associate professor in the Faculty of Education and Social Work at ompson Rivers University.
As co-principal investigator on the research team that is writing and developing Play, Participation, and Possibilities: An Early
Learning and Child Care Curriculum Framework for Alberta, she brings expertise in participatory research methodologies, interest
in critical, postfoundational early years’ pedagogies, and a commitment to valuing the knowledge that childcare educators bring to
professional learning. Email: jhewes@tru.ca
Dr. Tricia Lirette is a long-time faculty member in the early learning and child care diploma program at MacEwan University
and currently holds the position of department chair of human services and early learning. She is co-principal investigator on the
research team that is developing the Alberta curriculum framework. Her other research interests include child and family policy and
applying the lens of institutional ethnography to inquiry in ELCC.
Lee Makovichuk, MEd, is assistant professor with the department of Human Services and Early Learning at MacEwan University.
Her work as a co-writer and co-researcher of Play, Participation, and Possibilities: An Early Learning and Child Care Curriculum
Framework for Alberta and pedagogical mentoring work with early childhood educators has been inspiration for her doctoral studies.
Rebekah McCarron graduated from the MacEwan University early learning and child care diploma program in 2014. As an
educator at the University Child Care Centre Society in Calgary, Alberta, she works with a group of kindergarten-aged children and
their families. Together, they have been exploring the theories of physics using loose parts (including large loose parts outside).
In 2012, the government of Alberta, inspired by the
ground-breaking work in New Brunswick, invited
researchers at MacEwan University in Edmonton and
Mount Royal University in Calgary to create an early
learning and child care (ELCC) curriculum framework.
e framework was intended to guide the everyday
practice of early childhood educators working with
children from newborns to age 5 in centre-based child
care and family day home programs. Leading the
development of the framework, the research team at
MacEwan University began with the understanding that
early childhood curriculum is shaped by the pedagogic
decisions educators make on the ground and in the
moment, and focused on broad holistic goals rather
than the delivery of predetermined content (Bennett,
2004). We knew that engaging practicing educators
in co-creating the framework would be critical to its
relevance to the eld and its success over time. Taking
up the methodology of participatory action research
(MacNaughton & Hughes, 2008, p. 154), we invited over
50 educators in four local early childhood programs to
co-author stories of teaching and learning (Carr, 2001)
to include as sample narratives in the framework. is
dialogic, participatory process of documenting curriculum meaning making in action brought with it great
hopefulness and the possibility that academics and early childhood educators might create a “pedagogical meeting
e shi toward a pedagogical foundation for
professional practice in early childhood along
with the introduction of curriculum frameworks
in early learning and child care, calls for
approaches to professional learning that move
beyond transmission modes of learning towards
engaged, localized, participatory models that
encourage critical reection and investigation of
pedagogy within specic settings. In this paper,
we describe ongoing participatory research that
explores educator co-inquiry as an approach
to animating a curriculum framework. A story
of curriculum meaning making that opened a
hopeful space for critical pedagogical reection
and changed practice serves as a basis for deeper
reection.
Key words: professional learning; pedagogical
dialogue; early childhood care and education; co-
inquiry; curriculum framework
WINTER/HIVER 2019 38 Vol. 44 No. 1
JOURNAL OF CHILDHOOD STUDIES ARTICLES FROM RESEARCH
place” (Moss, 2013), going forward together as co-learners, co-researchers, and co-imaginers of curriculum meaning-
making possibilities.
Play, Participation and Possibilities: An Early Learning and Child Care Curriculum Framework for Alberta1 took
shape over two years and is organized around ve core concepts, four broad holistic goals, and ve dispositions to
learn, as shown in Figure 1. e image of the child as a mighty learner emerged in the process of co-creating the
framework and captured the imaginations of educators, families, and policy makers alike.
Figure 1. Play, Participation, and Possibilities.
e framework is rmly grounded in sociocultural pedagogies and gestures toward the postfoundational,
introducing notions of equity, social justice, gender, and diversity. Following the initial development, multi-year
government funding (2012–present) aorded an incredible opportunity to explore the process of animating the
curriculum framework in everyday practice, with the active participation of educators alongside researchers.
e holistic goal of well-being—focused on nurturing emotional health and positive identities, creating a sense of
belonging, and promoting physical health—was an entry point for many educators working with the curriculum for
the rst time, and it features in the story of curriculum meaning making in this paper.
Building on international scholarship about professional learning in early childhood education and care (Edwards
& Nuttall, 2009; Eurofound, 2015; Pacini-Ketchabaw, Kocher, Sanchez, & Chan, 2009), we searched for theoretical
frameworks that moved beyond transmission modes of learning toward engaged, localized, participatory models
that encourage critical reection and investigation of pedagogy within specic settings (Patterson, McAuley, &
Fleet, 2013). Using pedagogical documentation as a provocation to question, challenge, validate, and theorize
practice, we engaged with participating educators in co-inquiry processes (Perry, Henderson, & Meier, 2012) to
deepen and complexify thinking about co-constructing curriculum in the here and now with young children and
their families.
In this paper, we describe co-inquiry as a strategy for animating early childhood educators’ use of Play, Participation,
and Possibilities in curriculum planning and meaning making, for creating supportive social contexts for pedagogical
WINTER/HIVER 2019 39 Vol. 44 No. 1
JOURNAL OF CHILDHOOD STUDIES ARTICLES FROM RESEARCH
conversations that invite multiple and diverse perspectives, and for considering critically and thoughtfully what
it means for families to be meaningfully engaged in children’s learning. Valuing the notions that educational
theory is embedded in and emerges from educational practice and that curriculum is already happening in early
childhood programs, our intent, as researchers and educators, is to explore processes of professional learning
that theorize practice and deepen understanding of early learning pedagogy, using the common language of
[curriculum framework]. We draw inspiration from Marg Sellers’ (2013) notion of children “curriculuming” and
Liselotte Olsson’s (2009) view that the continuous shiing, combining, and transforming of materials, time, space,
and participation of children, families, and educators produces assemblages full of potentiality for curriculum
meaning making.
We draw on a story of educator meaning making that emerged early in the process of animating the newly created
framework as an opportunity for deeper reection on the co-inquiry processes, practices, and tools that support
curriculum meaning making in action. We work with the understanding that curriculum in early childhood is
socially co-constructed with children, families, and educators and that this process of making meaning is messy,
iterative, deeply theoretical, and informed by both individual and collective intuition.
The value of professional learning that begins educators’ everyday practice
Through talking, thinking, listening, pausing, imagining possibilities, and reecting on what
is seen, individuals access the data of their own experience and contribute to knowledge
generation. Given supported structural contexts, caring, thoughtful and knowledgeable
collaborators can use stories of experience as the yeast of professional learning. (Fleet &
Patterson, 2009, p. 17)
According to Curtis, Lebo, Cividanes, and Carter (2013), professional learning in the early childhood eld has
been “dominated by short, fragmented one shot workshops on a variety of topics delivered by experts who oer
strategies and techniques outside the context of the daily teaching and learning with children” (p. 13). Deb Curtis
and her colleagues call this approach “drive through professional learning” ( p. 13, italics in original). Another
perspective is added by Linda Mitchell and Pam Cubey (2003), who call for professional learning that is grounded
in practice and provides opportunities for educators to:
• consider their own work as a starting point “investigating real life examples of pedagogy within
their own settings” (p. xi)
• work on issues that can make a difference in their practice
• reect critically on taken for granted practices, questioning, and challenging taken for granted
practices in ways that encourage new insight and shifts in thinking
• consider multiple, diverse perspectives and theories through pedagogical dialogue about their
work
• gain awareness of the value of their work.
Similar to the process of learning for young children, professional learning can be understood as “a process of
meaning-making or theory building in relationship with others who are called on to listen to the theories” (Moss,
2013, p. 39). Inviting educators to explore and revisit ideas over time leads to what Alma Fleet and Catherine
Patterson (2001) refer to as “professional empowerment through spirals of engagement” (p. 10).
WINTER/HIVER 2019 40 Vol. 44 No. 1
JOURNAL OF CHILDHOOD STUDIES ARTICLES FROM RESEARCH
The value of an outside voice in facilitating pedagogical dialogue
Pedagogical dialogue (Rinaldi, 2006) requires “active, open, and sensitive listening” (Abramson, 2012, p. 154) that
is enhanced through facilitation by a pedagogical leader. is role is described in various ways in the literature,
including as an external or outside voice (Fleet & Patterson, 2001), a facilitator (Abramson, 2012), and a critical
friend (Curtis et al., 2013; Fleet & Patterson, 2001). In Reggio Emilia, the role is played by the pedagogista. In this
research, we have adopted the term pedagogical mentor.
Shareen Abramson (2012) describes a facilitator as a “coach, model and catalyst” (p. 154) who is interested in
growing and learning along with the teachers; the facilitator’s role is to lead a collaborative inquiry process, “doing
action research with documentation,” and creating a space where educators grow in their ability to “demonstrate
an attitude of acceptance for divergent interpretations, raise new questions, and suggest alternative viewpoints
regarding a child or situation” (p. 154). According to Arthur Costa and Bena Kallick (as cited in Curtis et al.,
2013), a critical friend is “a trusted person who asks provocative questions, provides data to be examined through
another lens, and oers critique of a person’s work” (p. 19). Critical friends raise new questions that challenge or
expand thinking and provide positive feedback in a process Curtis and her colleagues call “a dance of challenge
and support” (p. 19).
Engaging educators as researchers: Professional learning as teacher research
Teacher research, or practitioner inquiry, is increasingly recognized as a valuable source of professional learning
and a tool for educational change (Fleet, De Gioia, & Patterson, 2016; Henderson, 2012; Patterson et al., 2013;
Stremmel, 2007). Teacher research contributes to our understanding of teaching and learning in early childhood
settings, improving the likelihood that educators’ voices will be heard and respected (Hatch, 2012). Describing
teacher research as “the engine of professional development,” Henderson (2012) found that engaging teachers as
researchers results in “immediate and specic strategies for action” and an increase in teachers’ ability to “relate
their ndings with voice and condence” and reect critically on “emotional reactions and pedagogical intentions”
(p. 2).
Teacher research is also described as a strategy for resisting the typical transmission mode of professional
development. ere is increasing understanding that a linear conception of professional development (individuals
in isolation moving along a predetermined sequence of steps toward development) is overly simplistic and fails to
prioritize socially constructed knowledge (Fleet & Patterson, 2001). Barbara Henderson (2012) argues that “when
early childhood teachers undertake teacher research as collaborative action at their sites, it changes the nature
of professional development and shis teachers’ identities as professionals … up-ending the way professional
development is traditionally organized” (p. 1). Positioning the educator as a researcher can result in a “socially
constructed space where professional development happens continually” (Henderson, 2012, p. 2). Further insight
comes from Gunilla Dahlberg and Hillevi Lenz Taguchi’s notion of the “investigative teacher” who has
a divided yet integrated professional responsibility, which partly has to do with joining in a
dialogue and in communicative action with the child or the children’s group, and partly has
to do with a reective and investigative attitude towards the child’s working process and their
own work. (as cited in Moss, 2013, p. 25).
In this paper and in our research, we emphasize the importance of children remaining at the forefront of teacher
research. Children’s voices are heard and made visible through their own words and gestures, photos, drawings,
and other artifacts collected by teacher researchers. is rich data, in the form of documentation, reminds us that
WINTER/HIVER 2019 41 Vol. 44 No. 1
JOURNAL OF CHILDHOOD STUDIES ARTICLES FROM RESEARCH
children are not just the subjects of the research, they are agentic participants and co-researchers (Makovichuk,
Hewes, Lirette, & omas, 2014). We encourage educators to investigate focused research questions arising
from collaborative reection on documentation. In this way, we strive to enact teacher research as participatory,
democratic, and inclusive in nature (Henderson, Meier, Perry, & Stremmel, 2012, p. 5).
Pedagogical documentation as a starting point for curriculum meaning making
ere is growing recognition in the early childhood literature that narratives produced by teachers in the form
of pedagogical documentation, learning stories, or pedagogical narratives are a productive material form of
teacher research (Carr, 2001; Carr & Lee, 2012; Henderson et al., 2012; Pacini-Ketchabaw, Nxumalo, Kocher,
Elliot, & Sanchez, 2015; Rinaldi, 2006). Pedagogical documentation is a recognized and viable tool for sustained
collaborative and dialogic practice, a process, Alice Wong (2009) asserts, that “makes visible, legible and sharable
traces of children’s learning, which becomes tangible material that can be shared and interpreted by others” (p.
26). Multiple readings of pedagogical documentation make teachers aware of the partiality of their own theories,
and can precipitate the kind of crisis that motivates change and creates openness to the unexpected and uncertain
(Rinaldi, 2006, pp. 181–183).
rough critical reection and intentional practice, pedagogical documentation creates openness to change,
making it possible for educators to participate in generating new knowledge about practice. In the words of
Dahlberg and Lenz Taguchi:
through documenting what the child does and what one as the teacher does together with the
child, one can see an increase in consciousness about the consequences of their [teachers’]
actions, and thereby also gain a basis for change and development in their own work. (as cited
in Moss, 2013, p. 26)
Pedagogical narrations (Pacini-Ketchabaw et al., 2015) invite multiple views of the child, multiple voices, and
multiple interpretations. According to Veronica Pacini-Ketchabaw and her colleagues (2015), educator stories can
be “intimately connected to curriculum making” (p. 123) through a discourse of meaning making. e importance
of an active, engaged educator who can accommodate diversity, complexity, and multiple perspectives is becoming
increasingly evident. e discourse of meaning making encourages individual judgments and uncertainty and
views consensus and unanimity as neither necessary nor desirable (Pacini-Ketchabaw et al., 2015). It requires that
individuals draw on concrete experiences and make ethical, philosophical choices and judgments that involve
critical, reective thinking about pedagogies. In this research, we take up this notion of pedagogical documentation
as a discourse of meaning making, a process that calls on us to contextualize everyday practices within a particular
social location and time and to make meaning of our experiences in dialogue with others (Pacini-Ketchabaw et
al., 2015, p. 123). We focus our eorts on educator research that intends to produce transformation, enabling early
childhood educators to develop an understanding of themselves, their classrooms, and their practice through the
act of reective inquiry (Stremmel, 2007).
Animating Play, Participation, and Possibilities in practice through collaborative (co)-
inquiry
John Dewey rst introduced the notion of teaching as inquiry in 1933, believing that educators construct knowledge
socially, “through inquiry, with the assistance of colleagues and faculty who help them rene and clarify their ideas
about their learning and teaching experiences” (Abramson, 2012, p. 149). Processes of co-inquiry have proven
eective as a source of professional learning and improving practice (Abramson, 2012). As a low cost and practical
WINTER/HIVER 2019 42 Vol. 44 No. 1
JOURNAL OF CHILDHOOD STUDIES ARTICLES FROM RESEARCH
strategy, co-inquiry helps educators see the signicance of their work, gaining fresh insights and further skill
in articulating their practice and explaining their curriculum decisions (Abramson, 2012, p. 154). Participation
in a co-inquiry process supported by a pedagogical mentor results in educators feeling more passionate about
their work (Abramson, 2012, p. 156). Educator testimony from our research conrms that co-inquiry supported
by pedagogical mentoring was oen accompanied by educators’ growing sense of pride in their daily work and
feelings of being rearmed and reignited in their role. Educators felt that their work was more visible, and in turn,
more valued by others.
Following the release of Play, Participation, and Possibilities in 2014, phases two and three focused on introducing
co-inquiry processes (Perry et al., 2012) for animating the framework with the four programs that participated
in its co-creation during phase one. Phase three expanded to include four additional child care programs in
small communities in northern Alberta. e research team recruited ECE faculty from local colleges as onsite
pedagogical mentors. e process of onsite pedagogical mentoring included regular weekly visits to observe and
document educator practice for purposes of reection and dialogue. Pedagogical mentors engaged individuals and
teams of educators in planned and spontaneous pedagogical conversations about pedagogical documentation and
curriculum meaning making, providing diverse entry points and opportunities to engage with the concepts, holistic
goals, and dispositions to learn in the framework. ey helped each program to host a professional community
of learners event and a family event featuring their work with the framework. Pedagogical mentors came together
monthly for pedagogical dialogue with one another and the research team, both in person and with the support
of an online platform.
As the project unfolded, early childhood educators in leadership roles in several participating centres stepped
forward, eager to take up the role of pedagogical mentoring. Inspired by Louise omas and Jocelyn Nuttall (2014),
who remind us that educators will engage in active negotiation of this new subject position in multiple ways, we
set out to leave the possibilities of this new position open. Hoping to explore the relationality and complexity of
the role as the project progressed, we asked those who volunteered to play this role to “nd their own way in” and
to “walk alongside educators” as they explored the use of Play, Participation, and Possibilities in everyday practice.
Stories as a provocation for curriculum meaning making
Consistent with the notion that meaningful professional learning begins with educator practice, we quickly found
that using sample narratives and learning stories (Carr, 2001; Carr & Lee, 2012) contributed by participating
educators was a provocation to deeper pedagogical conversations and a source of professional learning among all
of the project participants. ese “little stories” (Cotton & Griths, 2007) of children’s care, play, and learning in
specic early childhood communities began to circulate widely. ey sparked one-on-one conversations as well
as team dialogue, and were used by the research team at conferences and professional learning events to open a
space for multiple readings using the curriculum framework concepts, holistic goals, and dispositions to learn.
e processes of “story living and telling, and reliving and retelling” (Henderson et al., 2012, p. 8) and revisiting
pedagogical documentation served to bring educator decision making into focus for critical reection.
e working model of co-inquiry shaping our research with educators is an investigative cycle that involves three
intertwined, recurring, and overlapping dimensions of educator practice:
• Co-learning (observing and documenting) alongside children, families, and colleagues
• Co-researching (reecting and interpreting) through making connections to the curriculum
framework and external sources of knowledge and theory
WINTER/HIVER 2019 43 Vol. 44 No. 1
JOURNAL OF CHILDHOOD STUDIES ARTICLES FROM RESEARCH
• Co-imagining possibilities for further experiences (planning and taking action) and engaging
playfully with children.
e model, inspired by the work of Abramson (2012), is a exible frame for emergent, organic, and nonlinear
curriculum planning and meaning making. We draw on the notion of the “missing middle” in emergent curriculum
planning (Stacey, 2009). Typically, educators observe for interests and plan next steps, oen in the moment and
without taking the time to reect. Taking time to “muck about” in the middle has proven inspiring for researchers
and educators alike. In this model, curriculum evolves from children’s everyday experiences and relies on educators’
skillful observation and close listening to what children are doing, or wanting to do. Educators are active, reective,
critical thinkers in this planning process. Figure 2 is a working model of the co-inquiry processes we are using to
support curriculum meaning making with Play, Participation, and Possibilities.
Figure 2. Co-inquiry: A working model.
As we engaged with educators in the co-inquiry process, we introduced two tools into the cycle to support
curriculum meaning making: talking the documentation and curriculum cross-checking. Talking the documentation
was shared with us by the research team at the University of New Brunswick and emerged from the co-creation of
the New Brunswick Curriculum for Early Learning and Child Care (2008). Taking it up in our work with educators
has supported participants to practice articulating and making visible their localized tacit knowledge of children’s
play and learning and to consider the diverse perspectives that others might bring to the conversation. Talking
the documentation begins with educators’ documented observations of children engaged with ideas, others, and
materials. Revisiting these ordinary moments of children’s active exploration in a collaborative dialogue with others
provides a forum for thinking deeply, asking questions, and being tentative about reections and interpretations.
e goal of talking the documentation is to build a broad repertoire of possibilities—to expand our thinking
WINTER/HIVER 2019 44 Vol. 44 No. 1
JOURNAL OF CHILDHOOD STUDIES ARTICLES FROM RESEARCH
about the range of possible meanings that this experience might have for children, as well as our theories about
what meaning these experiences might have for children, what children might be doing, and what children might
be wanting to do. Within the project, we explored talking the documentation in several ways, sometimes as an
open, free-owing process and oen with the following set of guiding questions adapted from a reective protocol
developed by Project Zero at Harvard (see Cadwell, 2003) designed to structure dialogue about pedagogical
documentation:
• What do you see?
• What questions does this play raise for you?
• What do you think the child (or children) is working on, trying to accomplish or communicate?
e second tool we used extensively in animating the curriculum framework with educators was curriculum cross-
checking. Dorothy Strickland describes curriculum cross-checking as a strategy that allows children’s “needs and
interests to guide instruction and then uses the curriculum documents to reference particular goals, expectations
or standards that have been met” (as cited in Heydon & Iannacci, 2008, p. 166). In this project, we introduced
curriculum cross-checking as a tool to interpret children’s playing and learning in relationship to curriculum
framework goals and dispositions. Curriculum cross-checking begins with educators’ observations of children.
It is a way for educators to draw on the curriculum goal descriptors to describe what they see the children doing
using a common language. Curriculum becomes a living, evolving process that invites educators to think further
about ways to extend and explore ideas, thoughts, and feelings. In Rachel Heydon and Luigi Iannacci’s (2008)
words, “cross-checking repositions curriculum as something co-created and negotiated … whereby curriculum
emerges from relationships rather than from requirements” ( p. 166).
Beginning with tea
Next, we oer a story, to borrow Iris Berger’s (2010) words, “as an inspiration and a possibility to enlarge our shared
thought and our shared understanding of what early childhood education is and what it can be about” ( p. 72). As
a source of participatory curriculum meaning making, the story aords multiple vantage points from which to
view practice and children. Following Berger, we oer it not as a story of “best practice,” but as an instance of how
beginning with children as a source of curriculum inspiration in daily work can lead to practice transformation.
As Berger reminds us, each story of children’s actions “oers a possibility to meet a new child … it aords a kind
of listening that allows children to appear” (p. 71, italics in original).
is story took place early in the second phase of the research project in the Tanager Room in the MacEwan
University Child Care Centre Lab School2, a community made up of 12 toddlers and their families and a team
of three educators (Rebekah, Jennifer, and Bejuna). It involved the lab school educators, in particular Rebekah
McCarron, and a member of the research team, Lee Makovichuk, who was acting as a faculty pedagogical
mentor to the university child care educators. At the time, the centre had an established practice of pedagogical
documentation and provided regular weekly time for educators to work on documentation, which tended to focus
on creating portfolio entries for individual children. e curriculum framework research provided resources to
support collaborative pedagogical dialogue, with regular opportunities for educators to step out of ratio and meet
with Lee Makovichuk to revisit pedagogical documentation in relationship to curriculum framework goals and
dispositions.
Engaging families in curriculum meaning making was a priority, and we were intentional about seeking their
WINTER/HIVER 2019 45 Vol. 44 No. 1
JOURNAL OF CHILDHOOD STUDIES ARTICLES FROM RESEARCH
participation in creating the learning story samples during the development of the framework. By this time in
the project, families in our lab school were familiar with the positive orientation of the learning story and looked
forward to receiving stories about their child. Valuing the co-creation of the stories by educators, children, and
families and the relationship between the learning story and the learner’s identity (Carr & Lee, 2012), we were
reluctant to anonymize the stories. We received ethics approval to use children’s rst names and images in scholarly
publications and professional learning events. Families’ participation in making meaning of the stories was linked
to their explicit consent and ensured that families, educators, and researchers alike were comfortable with the
images, dialogue, and interpretations.
Choosing a starting point for a story is always dicult. We begin in early fall, just aer the centre had been freshly
painted. e empty walls provoked conversations about how children experienced the long, narrow hallway
entrance into the centre. e centre director, educators, and faculty mentor began to talk about what they could do
to set up points of interest for children coming and going. inking about the toddlers, they hung mirrors at the
children’s eye level and put a tea set on a small table under the director’s oce window as a provocation to see what
children might do. e director had a perfect vantage point and became fascinated with watching the toddlers as
they stopped to play on their way in and out of child care.
Meanwhile, the educators noticed pieces of the tea set were nding their way into the toddler room in the morning.
Following conversation about how the children might be using play with the tea set as a transition into child care
each day, the team decided to bring a tea set into the Tanager Room. Rebekah begins:
When we the brought the tea set into the room, we also brought in a small stove and set
them up together by the sand box, and this was quickly noticed by children. Tea parties began
happening soon after! Children all engaged in moments of pouring sand, also known as tea,
into the small cups or into bowls.
e toddlers engaged immediately in sustained social pretend play. Lee noticed these interesting interactions,
and the deep and rich play in the toddler room, when she came to observe. She saw these moments as rich in
potential and as fertile ground for curriculum meaning making with children, but was unsure about whether the
educators were noticing these moments or seeing them in the same way. She was nding it dicult to arrange to
meet with this team of educators outside of the playroom to talk about the connections between their work and
the curriculum framework.
“We have to get to the diapering routine”
Rebekah remembers:
As a new educator, my entry into the Tanager Room created a new team dynamic. Half of
this group was new to the program in September. It took several months to feel as though
we came together as a team and as a community with the children and families. Just as we
began to feel this group cohesion, I recognized the weight I was feeling about the daily routines
with toddler-age children. At the time, I felt that the efforts that we put into planning play and
learning experiences seemed to get lost in the work of relationship building and routines.
Lee remembers inviting the team out to talk about what they were doing and hearing “we have to get to the
diapering routine”:
I spent a lot of time observing in that room. They spent time in the routines, they offered
WINTER/HIVER 2019 46 Vol. 44 No. 1
JOURNAL OF CHILDHOOD STUDIES ARTICLES FROM RESEARCH
choices. They were in the moment with children in diapering, changing, getting ready for
outside.
She would hear comments like “We get to meet today, I’m so excited” and then it wouldn’t happen. Lee brought
this dilemma to the research team. Together, we wondered if their hesitation was brought on by the intensity and
weight of daily routines. Lee wondered how she could support them in conceptualizing the curriculum in the
Tanager Room more holistically.
When the children were playing with the tea set, I was feeling that this team of educators were
caught up in the daily routines. As much as the educators need to be in the room with the
children, I wanted them to take a moment to really see what was happening, to make sense
of what the children were doing. They were talking about routines in a different way than
planning for play. I wanted them to see that what they were doing in routines was curriculum.
That’s when I said to myself, “we have to make this happen.”
Following the conversation with the research team, Lee wondered if a conversation about the holistic goal of
well-being, focused on providing “safe and caring environments where emotional and physical health, positive
identities, and sense of belonging are nurtured and protected” (Makovichuk et al., 2014), would open a space
for deeper discussion. She went to the centre director to ask for help in getting both Rebekah and Jennifer out
of the room. Jennifer surprised Lee by arriving at the meeting with a video clip of the tea party play. As part of
the co-inquiry process in curriculum meaning making, the educators in this room were using photos and video
documentation to revisit ordinary moments of care, play, and learning for reection and further planning. is
short video became a provocation for co-inquiry over the next several weeks.
Lee writes:
I invited Rebekah and Jennifer to discuss their observations, their feelings, and the tensions
between the importance of their daily work with children and the value of taking a step back to
reect. In a 30-minute meeting, we looked at the holistic goal, well-being, in Play, Participation,
and Possibilities in relationship to Jennifer’s video documentation of the children and the tea
set. As we talked the documentation, and cross-checked with the goal, we discussed what the
children might know and could do. It was an “Aha!” moment for the Tanager Room team!
“What you were seeing changed and how you saw yourself in it changed”
e opportunity to reect and interpret with others using the common language of the curriculum framework
produced new insights, and reenergized practice. As Lee describes it:
I could see a visible change in both Rebekah and Jennifer after the conversation, an excitement
that I had not seen in months. I remember Jennifer saying that she knew curriculum was
happening already.... I wondered what would transpire from this opportunity for them to revisit,
reunderstand, what the children were doing in their play.
e educators began to talk about what they were seeing in relation to the goal descriptors (e.g., “children develop
a sense of self, growing in their capacity to express feelings, concerns, and needs; children develop a sense of other,
caring for others, [and] experiencing trust and compassion with children and adults” [Makovichuk et al., 2014, p.
94]). Rebekah writes:
Watching the video together, right away we noticed the children negotiating different roles and
WINTER/HIVER 2019 47 Vol. 44 No. 1
JOURNAL OF CHILDHOOD STUDIES ARTICLES FROM RESEARCH
rules; the children were showing us their abilities to problem solve, work together, and share.
Our observations led us to change one aspect of the lunch routine: we introduced communal
serving bowls on the lunch table. We decided as a team that we would begin by serving each
child a small portion, then place the communal food bowls in the centre of the table and see
what unfolded.
is small shi in the lunch routine led to a big shi in thinking that resonates with the notion that collaborative
reection on documentation can produce change in practice. Rebekah recalls:
A story about Ainsley reveals just how mighty these children already are. It was the rst day
using the communal serving bowls. Upon hearing Noah ask for blueberries, Ainsley pulled the
bowl of blueberries close to her. Jennifer momentarily paused, holding her breath, waiting,
and wondering: Would Ainsley keep the berries for herself? Would she share the berries
with Noah? In amazement, Jennifer watched as Ainsley reached all the way across the table,
offering the bowl to Noah, saying, “Here blueberries!”
Later, Rebekah reects:
This small change to the lunch routine has made a signicant shift in how we think about our
participation at lunch, from overseeing and serving, to modelling and supporting children’s
lunchtime interactions. The children’s use of communication, team work, how they are
developing awareness of one another’s food likes and dislikes, and especially how much they
already know about the social conventions of serving and sharing food with one another has
really surprised me!
e connections to the framework deepened as educators found more and more language in the goal of well-
being to describe and validate the signicance of these small everyday experiences with young children. Rebekah
continues:
We’ve also noticed children eating more food and staying at the lunch table longer. It has
become a more communal and social time, an opportunity to share our stories and ideas
together while also experiencing a sense of belonging. It has also opened avenues for
communication with families as the educators are learning more about each family’s social
and cultural practices around sharing food.
“It was already there, we just had to look at it through a dierent lens”
As the educators continued to reect on the goal of well-being, multiple possibilities for expanding and extending
curriculum became visible to them. Rebekah adds:
After the initial excitement with the change in our lunch time I began wondering: What’s next?
Are they done with this, or is there another direction they want to go? I continued observing
and documenting, but really took some time for reecting. Through that reection I started
noticing shifts in myself as an educator. This change to our lunchtime routine has made me
really slow down more during a busy transition time in our daily schedule. I have become much
more aware of how much learning is happening during one of our most mundane daily tasks.
rough ongoing pedagogical conversations, revisiting documentation, further curriculum cross-checking, and
more time spent reecting and mucking about in the middle, the educators began to make multiple links between
WINTER/HIVER 2019 48 Vol. 44 No. 1
JOURNAL OF CHILDHOOD STUDIES ARTICLES FROM RESEARCH
the concepts in Play, Participation, and Possibilities, their new lunchtime routine, and the environment, materials,
and experiences they were selecting for the classroom.
Rebekah describes what happened next:
During the new lunch routine, Jennifer, Bejuna, and I recognized that the children were having
some difculty negotiating the larger serving spoons. We added spoons of all sizes and bowls
into the sand area. One day I noticed Maude cooking. She had bowls of sand lined up and was
taking sand from one to the other and mixing it together. “It’s cake!” she said, as she took a
pinch of sand from a third bowl. Later on that week, Selina and Stanley both made cookies
from rocks and wood rings. Noah made some spaghetti with meatballs and zucchini using
sand, ribbon, rocks, and wooden rings. The ideas of cooking, or preparing food, began to be
very prominent during children’s play in the sand box and kitchen.
“I began seeing their family life in their play—I didn’t see those
connections before”
e children’s imaginary play with preparing, serving, and sharing food
led naturally to experiences preparing real food. Rebekah describes how:
We started by cutting bananas for lunch. A group of us peeled,
cut, and sliced bananas with plastic knives and then put them
into a large bowl. After cleaning up, we put the big bowl of
bananas with the rest of our lunch. While cutting the bananas
we shared a conversation about how we all open and eat our
bananas differently.
Experiences with real food opened further opportunities to communicate
with families. Rebekah developed a new research question: “How do I work
with families in the education and care of their children?” In pursuit of this
question, and inspired by the well-being goal descriptor “Children learn
about food and nutrition, exploring a range of cultural practices of eating
and sharing food” (Makovichuk et al., 2014, p. 96), she actively sought out
knowledge from the families about their social and cultural practices of
preparing and sharing food. It became possible to open up conversations
with families at the end of the day using anecdotes from their child’s play
(e.g., “I noticed your child pretending to drink tea at the sand table, do you
do this at home?”). is led to planning for toddlers to participate in food
shopping, as well as expanding the children’s play through oering locally
relevant cultural artifacts, such as chopsticks, and various types of tea sets.
As an extension of this play, the educators and children prepared cookies
and invited their families for a tea party.
“I really didn’t know I had anything to say”
Rebekah was asked to share her story at several professional learning
events. She continued to have pedagogical conversations with Lee as they
progressed through a writing and rewriting process to prepare the story
Figure 3. “It’s cake!”
Figure 4. Cutting bananas.
WINTER/HIVER 2019 49 Vol. 44 No. 1
JOURNAL OF CHILDHOOD STUDIES ARTICLES FROM RESEARCH
to be shared with other educators. Lee comments that
“working through the story repeatedly meant revisiting
our co-constructed meaning of the story to articulate
what unfolded to others.” Reecting on the process and
recognizing its partiality, Lee comments: “You can’t pay
attention to everything in the moment.”
Rebekah reects:
In my education, I have learned that I hold an
image of the child, and that it should be—IS—a
strong, resourceful, and capable child. But,
what does that truly mean? Now in experiencing
this notion, it has changed for me; my image of
the child and what that means has deepened.
The children surprise me every day with their
capabilities to seemingly “act older than their age” when in truth, they aren’t acting; they are
simply being who they are. And they are amazingly capable beings as they communicate their
ideas and feelings, as they care for one another and themselves, and as they explore with
such focus and genuine interest.
As researchers, we noted the meaning of this experience for Rebekah’s sense of professional identity and her ability
to articulate practice. She continues:
While I noticed my evolving image of a child, I feel that I also experienced a major change in
my image of myself, as an educator. I make many decisions each day. I make decisions in
how I communicate my messages to children, the tone I use, the words I draw on to respect
them as people in the room. When I chose new or familiar materials for the children’s play
and learning, these are decisions that communicate how I view them as learners and players.
When children encounter problems and I offer them time and space and close observation,
I communicate that I view them as strong, resourceful, and capable people, who sometimes
need my help, or not. What I do does matter, and this realization has forever changed me.
Educator insights and reection make visible some of the many ways possible to make meaning of this story,
keeping curriculum alive and open (Pacini-Ketchabaw et al., 2015, p. 128). Lenz Taguchi (2007)reminds us that “in
the very ‘textualizing’ of practice, it is, in fact, talked and written into existence—both as practice and as theory—
and in that sense made accessible and even palpable, for being rewritten, retalked, and thereby re-performed and
transformed” (p. 279). Retalking this story for this article once again foregrounds the educator’s ability to observe,
listen, question, and make connections that inform curriculum planning and change practice through the team’s
collaborative study of the documentation. rough her telling and retelling, Rebekah creates new meaning—
seeing herself beyond the metaphor of the “labourer” (Coulter & Wiens 2002, as cited in Berger, 2010, p. 73) as a
thinker, actor, and storyteller (Berger, 2010)—and embraces her life in the classroom as a co-learner, co-researcher,
and co-imaginer of curriculum possibilities (Makovichuk et al., 2014).
Closing
Animating the use of a curriculum framework in everyday practice is not a “tick box” process. It is nonlinear, messy,
Figure 5. A tea party for families.
WINTER/HIVER 2019 50 Vol. 44 No. 1
JOURNAL OF CHILDHOOD STUDIES ARTICLES FROM RESEARCH
iterative, deeply theoretical, and yet highly intuitive, drawing on local, situated knowledges and relationships. It
is about living with curriculum as always already happening with/in the daily experiences of young children and
their families in child care. It is not about “training” in specic competencies. Our preliminary ndings suggest that
this approach to curriculum requires an initial period of intensive, responsive, sustained pedagogical mentorship
provided by well-educated, experienced mentors with expertise in early childhood pedagogy, as well as dedicated
time for educators, outside of the playroom and also outside of their program setting, for dialogue and reection
with supportive pedagogical mentors, colleagues / team members, and the broader professional community. is
process of pedagogical mentoring and co-inquiry led to productive reection, concrete changes in practice, a
growing sense of pride in daily work, and an enhanced sense of armation, valuing, and visibility of the work.
e co-inquiry process has helped us to move beyond program planning to working with curricular resources
informed by early learning pedagogies in a way that has the potential to transform practice and reinvigorate
relationships.
We continue to explore how critical reection on taken-for-granted notions of the image of the child and childhood,
and our own work, has material results for daily practice and the ongoing social organization (Smith, 2005) of
work with young children. Following Carla Rinaldi (2006, p. 184), we seek to better understand the conditions that
invite dialogue with the power to transform practice and to set curriculum meaning making in motion.
WINTER/HIVER 2019 51 Vol. 44 No. 1
JOURNAL OF CHILDHOOD STUDIES ARTICLES FROM RESEARCH
Acknowledgments
e authors thank the children, families, early childhood educators, and program directors at MacEwan Child
Care Centre Lab School, Terra Child and Family Support Centre, Jasper Place Child and Family Resource Society,
Child Development Dayhomes, and Intercultural Child and Family Centre, who contributed so generously to
co-imagining new possibilities for animating curriculum in early learning and child care. We acknowledge our
faculty colleagues and co-researchers – Nancy omas, Margaret Mykietyshyn, Rebecca Dupont, and Mary Lynne
Matheson – for their thoughtful participation as pedagogical mentors. We are grateful for the support of Pam
Whitty and the early childhood research team at the University of New Brunswick and for permission to use the
goals from the New Brunswick Framework for Early Learning and Care in the Alberta framework.
References
Abramson, S. (2012). Co-inquiry: Documentation, communication, action. In G. Perry, B. Henderson, & D. Meier (Eds.), Our inquiry,
our practice: Undertaking, supporting, and learning from early childhood teacher research(ers) (pp. 147–157). Washington, DC:
National Association for the Education of Young Children.
Bennett, J. (2004). Curriculum in early childhood education and care. UNESCO Policy Brief on Early Childhood. Retrieved from http://
unesdoc.unesco.org/images/0013/001374/137401e.pdf
Berger, I. (2010). Extending the notion of pedagogical narration through Hannah Arendt’s political thought. In V. Pacini-Ketchabaw
(Ed.), Flows, rhythms, & intensities of early childhood education curriculum (pp. 57–76). New York, NY: Peter Lang.
Cadwell, L. (2003). Bringing learning to life: e Reggio approach to early childhood education. New York, NY: Teachers College Press.
Carr, M. (2001). Assessment in early childhood settings: Learning stories. London, UK: SAGE.
Carr, M., & Lee, W. (2012). Learning stories: Constructing learner identities in early education. London, UK: SAGE.
Cotton, T., & Griths, M. (2007). Action research, stories, and practical philosophy. Educational Action Research, 15(4), 545–560.
doi:10.1080/09650790701
Curtis, D., Lebo, D., Cividanes, W. C. M., & Carter, M. (2013). Reecting in communities of practice: A workbook for early childhood
educators. St. Paul, MN: Redleaf.
Early Childhood Research Team, University of New Brunswick. (2008). New Brunswick curriculum framework for early learning and
child care ~ English. Retrieved from http://www2.gnb.ca/content/gnb/en/departments/education/elcc/content/curriculum/
curriculum_framework.html
Edwards, S., & Nuttall, J. (Eds.). (2009). Professional learning in early childhood settings. Rotterdam, e Netherlands: Sense.
Eurofound. (2015). Working conditions, training of early childhood care workers, and quality of services: A systematic review. Retrieved
from https://www.eurofound.europa.eu/publications/report/2015/working-conditions-social-policies/early-childhood-care-
working-conditions-training-and-quality-of-services-a-systematic-review
Fleet, A., De Gioia, K., & Patterson, C. (2016). Engaging with educational change: Voices of practitioner inquiry. London, UK: Bloomsbury.
Fleet, A., & Patterson, C. (2001). Professional growth reconceptualized: Early childhood sta searching for meaning. Early Childhood
Research and Practice, 3(2), 7–19.
Fleet, A., & Patterson, C. (2009). A timescape: Personal narratives, professional spaces. In S. Edwards & J. Nuttall (Eds.), Professional
learning in early childhood settings (pp. 9–25). Rotterdam, e Netherlands: Sense.
Hatch, A. (2012). Teacher research: Questions for teacher educators. In G. Perry, B. Henderson, & D. Meier (Eds.), Our inquiry, our
practice: Undertaking, supporting, and learning from early childhood teacher research(ers) (pp. 117–125). Washington, DC:
National Association for the Education of Young Children.
WINTER/HIVER 2019 52 Vol. 44 No. 1
JOURNAL OF CHILDHOOD STUDIES ARTICLES FROM RESEARCH
Henderson, B. (2012). Teacher research: Eects on professional development and professional identity. Voices of Practitioners, 7(1), 1–6.
Henderson, B., Meier, D. R., Perry, G., & Stremmel, A. J. (2012). e nature of teacher research. In G. Perry, B. Henderson, & D. Meier
(Eds.), Our inquiry, our practice: Undertaking, supporting, and learning from early childhood teacher research(ers) (pp. 3–10).
Washington, DC: National Association for the Education of Young Children.
Heydon, R. M., & Iannacci, L. (2008). Early childhood curricula and the de-pathologizing of childhood. Toronto, ON: University of Toronto
Press.
Lenz Taguchi, H. (2007). Deconstructing and transgressing the theory-practice dichotomy in early childhood education. Educational
Philosophy and eory, 39(3), 275–290.
MacNaughton, G., & Hughes, P. (2008). Doing action research in early childhood studies: A step by step guide. Maidenhead, UK: Open
University Press/McGraw Hill Education.
Makovichuk, L., Hewes, J., Lirette, T., & omas, N. (2014). Play, participation, and possibilities: An early learning
and child care curriculum framework for Alberta. Retrieved from http://childcareframework.com/
Mitchell, L., & Cubey, P. (2003). Characteristics of professional development linked to enhanced pedagogy and children’s learning in early
childhood settings: Best evidence synthesis. Wellington NZ: Government of New Zealand Ministry of Education.
Moss, P. (Ed.) (2013). Early childhood and compulsory education: Reconceptualising the relationship. Abingdon, UK: Routledge.
Olsson, L. M. (2009). Movement and experimentation in young children’s learning: Deleuze and Guattari in early childhood education.
London, UK: Routledge.
Pacini-Ketchabaw, V., Kocher, L., Sanchez, A., & Chan, K. (2009). Rhizomatic stories of immanent becomings and intra-activity:
Professional development reconceptualized. In L. Iannacci & P. Whitty (Eds.), Early childhood curricula: Reconceptualist
perspectives. Calgary, AB: Detselig.
Pacini-Ketchabaw, V., Nxumalo, F., Kocher, L., Elliot, E., & Sanchez, A. (2015). Journeys: Reconceptualizing early childhood practices
through pedagogical narration. Toronto, ON: University of Toronto Press.
Patterson, C., McAuley, E., & Fleet, A. (2013). Leading change from the inside: A braided portrait. Reective Practice, 14(1), 58–74.
doi:10.1080/14623943.2012.732938
Perry, G., Henderson, B., & Meier, D. (Eds.). (2012). Our inquiry, our practice: Undertaking, supporting, and learning from early childhood
teacher research(ers). Washington, DC: National Association for the Education of Young Children.
Rinaldi, C. (2006). In dialogue with Reggio Emilia: Listening, researching, and learning. New York, NY: Routledge.
Sellers, M. (2013). Young children becoming curriculum: Deleuze, Te Whariki, and curricular understandings. Abingdon, UK: Routledge.
Smith, D. (2005). Institutional ethnography: A sociology for the people. Lanham, MD: Altamira.
Stacey, S. (2009). Emergent curriculum in early childhood settings: From theory to practice. Curriculum in action. St. Paul, MN: Redleaf.
Stremmel, A. J. (2007). e value of teacher research: Nurturing professional and personal growth through inquiry. Voices of Practitioners,
2(3), 1–9.
omas, L., & Nuttall, J. (2014). Negotiating policy-driven and state-mandated expectations of leadership: Discourses accessed by early
childhood educators in Australia. New Zealand Research in Early Childhood Education Journal, 17, 101–114.
Wong, A. C. Y. (2009). Dialogue engagements: Professional development using pedagogical documentation. Canadian Children, 34(2),
25–30.
WINTER/HIVER 2019 53 Vol. 44 No. 1
JOURNAL OF CHILDHOOD STUDIES ARTICLES FROM RESEARCH
(Endnotes)
1 In June 2018, Play, Participation, and Possibilities: An Early Learning and Child Care Framework for Alberta was renamed Flight:
Alberta’s Early Learning and Care Framework.
2 In 2017, the MacEwan University Child Care Centre Lab School was renamed Early Learning at MacEwan (ELM).