In recent times, education policy and reform discourses have become increasingly politicised by neo-liberalism, with critical policy methodologies struggling to catch up. Critical policy sociologists have noted that critical commentaries rarely succeed in changing or impacting dominant education policy pathways. This article presents a framework…

In this article, I explore how neoliberal economic discourses and techniques have profoundly influenced the way that music education in early childhood has developed in recent years in the UK. I focus on two dominant models of practice that have been shaped by market thinking; the private music session (the 'branded product') and short term,…

Background: Children with disabilities stand to gain from an array of services and interventions to support their development. However, relationships between parents of children with disabilities and professionals can be fraught, with the potential that professionals undermine the role of parents and overlook their agency. Aim: The aim of this…

Teacher preparation programs in the US have addressed complex teaching practices, like mathematical discourse, by engaging preservice teachers in the practice of teaching. This qualitative study reports on the nature of conferences about the discourse between an elementary education preservice-inservice pair participating in a model that…

Interdisciplinary Anthropocene debates are prompting calls for a paradigm shift in thinking about what it means to be human and about our place and agency in the world. Within environmental education, sustainability remains centre stage and oddly disconnected from these Anthropocene debates. Framed by humanist principles, most sustainability…

The aim of this article is to present a wholeness perspective on the relation between creative imagination and children's activity when playing with toys. This is explored through a case retrieved from a 4-month experimental research project, specifically from a social fantasy play session. In order to analyse and examine children's play, the…

This article analyses the discourse and practices of quality assurance and quality control through the lens of neo-liberal governing as expressed in economic rationalities such as new public management, total quality management, public choice and human capital. As an alternative to this form of governing, an ethico-aesthetic paradigm is enacted,…

Meyers & Kroeger situate two young writers in current ideologies of childhood and literacy and argue for creating dialogic classroom spaces in which children can be recognized by themselves, other children, and teachers as literate. Duckles & Larson build on the authors' attention to the potential constraints of dominant discourses and highlight…

This article explores the face-to-face interactions between parents and teachers in parent-teacher conferences in the Swedish preschool. The article highlights how the preschool teacher introduces the conference by using a specific artifact, so-called "strength cards" with words relating to characteristic behaviour and qualities. The theoretical…

Two experiments were conducted to examine the on-line processing mechanisms used by young children to comprehend pronouns. The work focuses on their use of two highly relevant sources of information: (1) the gender and number features carried by English pronouns, and (2) the differing accessibility of discourse entities, as influenced by…

Close to 1,100 people attended the 55th Annual Meeting of the National Reading Conference at the Intercontinental Hotel in Miami, Florida from November 30-December 3, 2005. A record number of proposals were submitted this year (548), with 392 papers, symposia, and round tables accepted. This year's conference theme was inclusiveness and synthesis…