Abstract:
Early childhood education has been largely ignored in national efforts to address issues of gender. Early childhood educators have had little guidance as to how they might begin to work with children to achieve more emancipatory understandings of what it might mean to live as an embodied female or male in our society.
In a DEET-funded project, a number of teachers in 10 sites throughout Queensland and New South Wales participated in an action research study, Addressing the Construction of Gender in the Preschool to Grade 3 Years. This paper reports on the work of these teachers, the issues they addressed, the strategies they adopted, and their reports of success in working with children in the 4 to 8 years age range.
The paper also asserts the need for early childhood education to move from the margins to the centre of research and international dialogue on gender.
In a DEET-funded project, a number of teachers in 10 sites throughout Queensland and New South Wales participated in an action research study, Addressing the Construction of Gender in the Preschool to Grade 3 Years. This paper reports on the work of these teachers, the issues they addressed, the strategies they adopted, and their reports of success in working with children in the 4 to 8 years age range.
The paper also asserts the need for early childhood education to move from the margins to the centre of research and international dialogue on gender.