This self-study employed Haiku poetry as a culturally responsive way to respond to Japanese students' critical reflection needs in a self-study research workshop. I am a Japanese self-study researcher working in the Icelandic education system. Introducing self-study methodology to teacher educators and students demands a careful approach to…

Gallagher and Sahni elaborate on their decade-long collaboration, focussing here on their latest multi-sited ethnographic study, Youth, Theatre, Radical Hope and the Ethical Imaginary: an intercultural investigation of drama pedagogy, performance and civic engagement (2014-2019) and the pedagogy and theatre work carried out at Prerna School for…

Research about love in early childhood education and care is rare. Love is difficult topic to research and write about in scholarly contexts. In order to properly explore love in professional contexts, practitioner narratives on the topic were sought through individual, unstructured interviews. A spiral-patterned methodological approach was…

In this paper, the two authors showcase the results of a research survey on the role of illustrations in the interpretation of literary texts. The survey sample included students of primary education and preschool education, who were given the poem Ucenjak (Scholar) by Niko Grafenauer and asked to answer questions regarding the character's…

This paper draws on practitioner inquiry and participatory action research methodologies to recount how five K-12 educators, who inhabit a range of positionalities and levels of teaching experience, engage in a collaborative professional development program, called Teaching Out Loud as they draw upon critical literacy theory and practice to…

Early years of a child, especially during Early Childhood Education (ECE), is a critical period facilitating the formation of gender identity and stereotypes, which could affect the appropriate development of a child. Yet, to date, most studies on gender and pedagogy in ECE have been done outside Africa, and so far none in Kenya. The aim of this…

This article explores the use of poetic inquiry in a transnational competence-building Shadow Play Project. Based on journals from four Nepalese preschool teacher educators, I present and interpret examples of data poems that portray the teachers' experiences of ownership in the project. My discussion intends to make explicit some aspects of the…

This study analyzes infant vocal responses in order to determine whether infants exposed to both linguistic and musical stimuli exhibit different types of vocalizations in response to those two different kinds of stimulation. Twenty-one infants, from 9 to 11 months of age, were observed in four weekly sessions over the period of a month. Each…

Jean Marzollo creates two beautiful texts using a child's first words, "Mama, Mama" and "Papa, Papa" as a recurring theme. Wildlife artist, Laura Regan, illustrates Marzollo's poetry with loving images of parents and children in the animal kingdom. Poetry and illustrations highlight the tenderness and care of Mama and Papa as they bond with their…

An exploratory study into the collaborative activity of creating a poem in early years education is reported. A group of 6-year-old children and their teacher making free-form poetry are followed for three consecutive lessons. The analytical interest is wide in scope, from looking at the process in terms of the verbal actions of the children and…

"Learning to Write and Loving It!" equips teachers of young children with practical strategies, assessment tools, and motivating writing activities that are based on current research and proven practice and are easily applicable to all kinds of learning environments. Included are many authentic writing samples and photos to illustrate effective,…

Slam poetry, being not just recitation or memorization, affords children the opportunity to express their own personal cultural experiences and values. Slam is a spoken word performance; a competition among poets. Audience commentary is ongoing during the performance and vigorous audience participation is essential in a slam format. The founders…

In this article, some findings from a study of teachers introducing poetry-making to children in the early years (children two to eight years-old) are reported. Empirical examples are analysed in terms of the poetic aspects that come into play when trying to construct poems and the challenges this presents to the children. Finally, some…

In this article, the theoretical framework of developmental pedagogy is presented as a tool in studying and developing children's knowing within the arts. The domains of art focused on are music, poetry and dance/aesthetic movement. Through empirical examples from a large-scale research project, we illustrate the tools of developmental pedagogy…

When response activities and comprehension strategies are combined, classroom instruction can enhance student engagement and understanding of a text, enrich student response, and improve students' awareness of their own strategic reading. This article presents some activities, adapted from the new IRA book "Children's Literature in the Reading…