Education Commons^™

Book Sharing With Young Children: A Study Of Book Sharing In Four Australian Long Day Care Centres, Helen Adam, Caroline Barratt-Pugh

Research outputs 2014 to 2021

Research has consistently established the positive impact of sharing books with young children. Evidence suggests several important factors when evaluating book sharing with young children, including the quality of educator practice = and the nature of groupings, as well as the frequency and duration of book sharing sessions and access to books.

Other evidence suggests book sharing may be particularly important for children from low ses backgrounds attending early learning settings.

This paper reports on a larger study which investigated the factors and relationships influencing the use of children’s literature to support principles of diversity in kindergarten rooms of long …

Enchanted Animism: A Matter Of Care, Jane Merewether

Research outputs 2014 to 2021

© The Author(s) 2020. Jean Piaget, whose work continues to be very influential in early childhood education, associated young children’s animism with their ‘primitive thought’ claiming children remain animists until they reach a more advanced and rational stage of development. This article proposes a rethinking of the Piagetian view of animism, suggesting instead that children’s animism be conceived as a ‘matter of care’ which may then offer possibilities for living more responsively and attentively with non human others. Drawing on two recent research projects involving two-to-eight-year-old children, the article contends that children’s playful and speculative ‘enchanted animism’ can create a …