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Relational pedagogy in early childhood education. What does the literature tell us?

Research project: Relational pedagogy in early childhood education. What does the literature tell us?

Researcher: Dr Theodora Papatheodorou

Synopsis:

Relationships are crucial throughout life and transcend time, geographical, cultural and discipline boundaries and it is even more so at children’s early stages of life. Indeed, relationship formation is at the heart of early childhood care and education curricula and practices and well-ingrained in the consciousness of early years educators.

While philosophical and cultural notions of existence in the world converse with evidence from neuroscience about child development and the values and practices of early years educators, the field of early years education is at an early stage in conceptualising and empirically exploring the relational and social nature of pedagogy. It was only in the early 2000s that relationships started to be investigated from a pedagogical perspective and the term relational pedagogy emerged in the field of early childhood education.

A literature review has been conducted aiming to compile an annotated bibliography and to map the field of relational pedagogies since the early 2000s. Two research questions were posed:

1. What literature is currently available about relational pedagogies in early childhood education?
2. What does current literature tell us about the conceptualisation and application of relational pedagogies in early childhood education?

• To locate the relevant literature the following inclusion criteria were established:
• Publications from 2000s onwards only
• Children’s age up to 8 years old
• Early childhood educational provision of different types
• Conceptual papers, empirical research papers, practice-focused papers, books and edited volumes
• Conceptual papers of relevance to education in general.

Papers which focused on older age groups in education were excluded.

The literature review revealed that the field of relational pedagogy is still at its infancy, but encouragingly more publications have appeared during the last five years. Conceptually, relational pedagogy is explored and advocated from an ontological perspective, meaning that human experience is understood in relation to others, underpinned by a dynamic mutuality, affectivity and ethics of care that are realised through dialogical encounters.

From empirical research, relational pedagogy is understood in terms of early years educators’ accepting and caring attitude; establishing personal relationships and connection before exercising professional roles; enabling children’s socialisation and learning; providing reassurance and validation; being knowledgeable; exercising common knowledge and relational agency; knowing children’s interests and working closely with families. Creating joyful experiences that enable dialogue, mutuality, and reciprocity are key features of relational pedagogies.

The existing literature revealed that there are recurrent overlapping as well as divergent themes, illustrating the multi-layered and multi-faceted complexity of relation formation, revealing the challenges in articulating a relational pedagogy epistemology at a conceptual and applied practice level. However, articulating a relational pedagogy epistemology is crucial for understanding the nature of relationships developed in a professional capacity as opposed to relationships established in a personal capacity in familial and friendship context.

Relationality in a professional capacity may overlap with personal relationships, but it is different too. Relationality in a professional capacity is subject to certain personal and institutional conditions and circumstances and requires a range of competencies which could be developed and enhanced though training. Such competencies, however, can often be indeterminable, requiring a high level of awareness and alertness on the part of the early years educators.

Acknowledgements: With thanks to Bogdan Dragomir and Monica Fearn, Graduate Research Interns at Norland, who assisted with literature searches papers.

Funding: The Graduate Research Internship was funded by Norland Foundation.

Publications

• Papatheodorou, T. (2023) “Relational Pedagogies in Early Childhood Education” In Oxford Bibliographies in Education. Ed. Susan Faircloth. New York: Oxford University Press. Available at: https://www.oxfordbibliographies.com/display/document/obo-9780199756810/obo-9780199756810-0301.xml?rskey=QO74Qg&result=1&q=Papatheodorou#firstMatch

Conference papers

• Papatheodorou, T. (2022) Relational pedagogies in early childhood education. Conceptualisation, implications for practice, and the challenges for evaluation, Webinar at Aristoteleio University, Thessaloniki Greece, 7 May 2022 (Title in Greek: Σχεσιοδυναμική παιδαγωγική στην προσχολική αγωγή και εκπαίδευση: Θεωρητική προσέγγιση, πρακτικές εφαρμογές και η πρόκληση αξιολόγησης)
• Papatheodorou, T. (2023) Beyond Human Relationality – Exploring relationality with nature in early childhood education. Paper presented at the RCEN 2023 conference. London (15-17 June)

Quality(ies) of home-based childcare

Research project: Quality(ies) of home-based childcare

This research project is a collaboration between Norland College and the Early Childhood Research Group, Anglia Ruskin University 

Lead researchers: Dr Theodora Papatheodorou, Norland and Dr Paulette Luff, Angila Ruskin University

Research team: Mandy Edmond, Selvie Hayward, Jessica Bradley (Norland) and Dr Kay Aaronricks (Anglia Ruskin University)

Project duration: 2020 – ongoing

Note: The Qualities of Home-Based Childcare project was initially conceptualised by the lead researchers in Spring 2020. Due to COVId-19, the project was postponed and commenced in summer 2021 with a revised methodology to ensure adherence to COVID-19 guidelines.

Synopsis:

Home-based education and care is an under-researched area, compared with centre-based provision, and less is known about its qualities. This project was conducted to explore the qualities of home-based childcare, based on the reported experiences of registered childminders and trained nannies, posing the following research questions are posed:

• What are the key qualities and characteristics of home-based childcare, offered by childminders and nannies?
• What are the perceived benefits, as perceived by childminders and nannies?
• What are the professional training and continuous professional development opportunities for childminders and nannies?
• What would make possible an expansion of home-based childcare, as part of national policies and financing arrangements?

The study was carried out in two phases. An initial scoping study was conducted to build a comprehensive picture of what is known and what is not known about home-based child care. In the second phase primary data was collected, by means of an online survey and focus group discussions, used in a sequential manner.

Outputs

• Papatheodorou, T. Luff, P. Aaronricks, K. Edmond, M. Hayward, S. and Jessica Bradley (2022). Qualities of home-based Childcare, Research project report. Bath: Norland (unpublished)

Publications

• Papatheodorou, T. and Luff, P. (2023) ‘Characteristics and qualities of home-based childcare: exploring the views of trained childminders and nannies’, Norland Educare Research Journal, 1(1), article number 8. Available at: https://doi.org/10.60512/repository.norland.ac.uk.00000008
• Papatheodorou, T., Rose, J. and Luff, P. (2023) ‘Editorial – Home-based educarers: powerful agents who cannot be neglected!’, Norland Educare Research Journal, 1(1), article number 1. Available at: https://doi.org/10.60512/repository.norland.ac.uk.00000021

Conference papers

• Papatheodorou, T. (2023) Home-based educarers – Knowledge brokers and social capital bridgers. Paper presented at the 6^th World Teaching and Education Conference, Zurich (7-9 July)
• Aaronricks, K., and Luff, P., Pedliham, R. and Papatheodorou, T. (2021) Childminders and nannies beyond the walls: What is distinctive about home-based childcare? Paper presentation at Norland Annual Conference (28 June 2021)
• Luff, P. and Papatheodorou, T. (2022) Exploring the centrality of relationships in home-based childcare.  Paper presentation at Norland Annual conference, (28 June)
• Papatheodorou, T., Luff, P. (2022) Home-Based Child Care: What’s in it? What are the Challenges? Could it be an alternative model of childcare? Paper presentation at the 74 OMEP international conference, Athens Greece (12-15 July)
• Papatheodorou, T. and Luff (2022) Relational Foundations of home-based childcare, Paper presentation at the Virtual RCEN conference, organised by the University of Sacramento-USA (11-13 June)

Acknowledgements

With thanks to Holly Forster and Marianna Misca, Research Interns at ARU, who supported the initial phase of the scoping study

Funding:

• The project was funded by Norland Foundation
• The ARU Research Interns were funded by ARU
• The Norland Graduate Research Intern was funded by Norland Foundation

For more information, please contact:

Dr Paulette Luff: [email protected]