Preschool in Three Cultures Revisited

Abstract

(1989). In the original study, the ethnographers fi lmed a typical day at one preschool in each of Japan, China and the United States, and then used edited video segments as cues in interviews with informants, which included teachers, administrators, parents and early childhood educators from all three countries, to elicit beliefs and values

Significance of amae as a transitional mechanism

“…Such permissive attitude may seem ineffective and inappropriate at a glance. However, as extensively explained by Tobin et al (2009), mimamoru type non-intervention is a pedagogical strategy that is intentionally deployed in providing children opportunities to deal with socially complex situations that can only be learned through experiencing. Thus, to allow amae does not mean "a passive absence of action but instead a strategic deployment of non-action" that is enforced according to the developmental goals of the child, which ends when, through constantly monitoring and assessment of the children's behaviour point to other pedagogical method (i.e.…”

“…… Life is full of problems. Our job as early childhood educators isn't to protect children from problems but instead to put them in situations where they can experience problems and struggle to find solutions (Tobin, Hsueh, & Karasawa, 2009). …”

Editorial

“…The OECD's proposed International Early Learning Study (IELS) is illustrative of the normative ways of thinking about early childhood education, whereby services are identified as a social good, supporting children's lifelong learning (based on predefined desirable indicators) and offering early intervention to those from socio-economically disadvantaged circumstances (Moss et al 2016). However, advocates of contextualised approaches to early childhood education would caution against a convergence of perspectives (Moss et al 2016), identifying a need to appreciate that culture and history are central to explaining and understanding differences (Oberhuemer 2014;Tobin 2005;Tobin et al 2009). Thus whilst considering the 'other' can offer alternative perspectives and open up new possibilities, the transfer of ideas may not always be possible or desirable.…”

“…Any analysis of theoretical and empirical explorations of early childhood education illustrate that as a community there is a long history of sharing ideas on the care and education of young children (Georgeson et al 2013;Miller and Cameron 2014). Sharing and comparing different approaches to early childhood education offers the advantage of helping to reveal what is taken for granted within our own cultures and opening up alternative possibilities (Tobin et al 2009). However, despite the advantages of sharing ideas on the care and education of young children, the increased analysis of early education services by supra-national organisations risks 'global panopticism' (Lingard et al 2013), whereby the global construction of early childhood education services acts a regulatory gaze as to the purpose of services and how they should be delivered and structured.…”

Developing qualitative coding frameworks for educational research: immigration, education and the Children Crossing Borders project

“…The CCB project methodology is based on video-cued ethnography as used by Tobin, Wu, and Davidson in Preschool in three cultures (1989) and again recently in Preschool in three cultures revisited (Tobin, Hsueh, and Karasawa 2009). Video-cued methodology was first used by Margaret Mead and George Bateson (1954) and then George and Louise Spindler when they made films not for data but for stimulating discussion and pointing out the presence of culture.…”