Contextualised, Not Neoliberalised, Approaches to Families in Five Countries: Quality and Practice

Marg Rogers (), Fabio Dovigo, Astrid Mus Rasmussen, Khatuna Dolidze and Laura Doan
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Marg Rogers: School of Education, University of New England, Armidale, NSW 2351, Australia
Fabio Dovigo: Department of Human Sciences, University of L’Aquila, 67100 L’Aquila, Italy
Astrid Mus Rasmussen: Department of German and Romance Languages, School of Communication and Culture, Aarhus University, 8000 Aarhus, Denmark
Khatuna Dolidze: School of Business, Technology and Education, Ilia State University, Tbilisi 0162, Georgia
Laura Doan: School of Education, Thompson Rivers University, Kamloops, BC V2C 0C8, Canada

Social Sciences, 2024, vol. 13, issue 12, 1-20

Abstract: Partnerships with parents in early childhood education and care services are a hallmark of quality education. Educators in Western countries work within a highly regulated environment, where government documents, such as frameworks, standards, and curricula, direct most of their work, time, and energy. Despite this, data from our mixed methods online survey from Australia, Canada, Denmark, Georgia, and Italy revealed a strong resistance to the homogeneity these documents prescribe. For the quantitative data, we used cross-tabulation and descriptive statistics. For the qualitative data, we used deductive thematic analysis using a parent–educator partnership framework. Educators described parents in their service as partners in their child’s education. This included efforts to share information, consult, negotiate, and build partnerships; problem solve; and monitor, report and manage the partnership. The educators talked about the uniqueness of their approaches to parents and families within their contextualised services. They then revealed how these unique features impacted their notions of quality and practice in these services. This will be of interest to policymakers, educators, and teacher educators.

Keywords: early childhood education; early childhood educators; neoliberalism; parents; partnerships; quality; family involvement in ECE; parent/EC educator relationships; families in ECE (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: A B N P Y80 Z00 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2024
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