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Jeannie Clague
Director, West Bathurst Preschool, Bathurst (NSW)
I believe every child has the right to a loving and secure family, a safe environment and a broad education; the right to become an active participant in society, to stand and speak for themselves, to develop meaningful relationships and have the freedom to live life with dignity: decent housing, adequate health care and a secure job.
There are too many people in our society falling through the cracks, whose lives are blighted by poverty, unemployment, poor health and inadequate education. I find this unacceptable in the twenty-first century, when we can spend $45 million bidding for the right to host the World Cup, in a world where the sale of pet food in Japan is worth more than the entire GDP of some developing nations.
However, always the optimist, when I think about social inequality, I think of it in terms of what can I do, what do I know, what does my experience show me and, most importantly, do I have the passion? At our preschool, our experiences working with vulnerable children have not only changed our practice, but also how we think and how we feel. Tears of sadness have given way to a burning rage as we have accepted and activated our responsibilities as early educators.
It is too easy to sit in our tidy little early childhood service and look at the world through rose-coloured glasses; to think that all the children who attend are safe, are fed regular meals and tucked up in a clean bed every night with a bedtime story; in families where at least one parent works, who have nice houses and healthy food in the fridge, and most importantly who can afford to pay their childcare fees.
It is too easy not to think about children who cower under tables because of family violence, who cry themselves to sleep with aching teeth, whose family may be homeless, whose parent may be held in the terrifying grip of substance abuse, where there may be no food, and where depression and mental illness go untreated.
There is a growing body of research that tells us that one of the best and most efficient ways to arrest social dysfunction later in life is to spend money on quality early childhood programs. We all know that Australia has an embarrassingly poor record in terms of expenditure on early childhood within the OECD. We must advocate because it is the right and ethical thing to do.
We must make equity of access really mean something, and start to get those children who are most vulnerable and disadvantaged into good-quality childcare programs. For West Bathurst Preschool this has meant setting up partnerships with other agencies to refer the families that we don’t always see, opening up our service, lowering fees sufficiently, engaging with families in a non-judgmental way, and dealing constructively with the lack of transport and associated issues connected with poverty. It has meant banging on the door of government and demanding a better deal for those who cannot speak for themselves.
It has also meant laying aside our professional prejudices and working effectively with health and welfare agencies because we are the front line workers.
We hold the knowledge, the passion and the compassion. If we can’t and won’t do it, who will?
Alicia Flack-Konè
Early Childhood Teacher, Northside Community Services, Yurauna Centre, Canberra Institute of Technology (ACT)
I have been in the EC profession since 1990 as a volunteer, untrained assistant, diploma-qualified educator, and EC teacher. Currently I work in an EC environment at Northside Community Services, through Yurauna Centre, Canberra Institute of Technology, ACT in a mixed age group with Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander children.
I don’t remember when I first engaged in EC advocacy as it is something that has evolved over time. I do remember experiencing first hand gender discrimination when I was a child, then in my teens and on into my adult life. At first, as an educator my vision was ‘to show girls they can too!’ In my practice I would remind girls they were strong and could do anything they wanted. I would share visuals of women leaders around the world from various countries, and this was all with infants and toddlers. I would translate songs to empower girls or at least include them in songs.
Over time I noticed that inequities were much bigger than just gender-based, and addressing them wasn’t as simple as having conversations in the classroom. A broader context and engagement with children about religion, ‘race’, class, abilities, sexuality and culture was needed. I wanted to empower children to think critically and have the tools to stand up to what is unfair. I continued to read and found Anti-bias curriculum: Tools for empowering young children by Louise Derman-Sparks (Derman-Sparks, Staff, A.T.F., & the A B C Task Force, 1989) helped develop my thinking and give advocacy-based teaching practices ‘a go’. I also talked to my colleagues to try to find ways to share and honour the voices of children and people not heard, who were marginalised within the community at local, national and international level.
Through these resources and conversations I started to ‘take risks’ by introducing conversations, visuals and literature into my practice that aimed to challenge stereotypes, biases and injustice. I became intentional about what books I read to children. For example, I began to use books like The Rabbits by John Marsden and Shaun Tan (Marsden & Tan, 2010), This is Our House by Michael Rosen (Rosen, 2007), The Smallest Samurai by Fiona French (French, 2008) and The Rainbow Cubby House by Brenna and Vicki Harding (Harding & Harding, 2006) in my curriculum. Books like these encouraged children to think differently about the world. I also used annual events to introduce or continue on conversations. For example, Sorry Day gave me permission to talk about children who were taken from their parents, while Easter provided an opportunity to talk about other religious celebrations. Another strategy I developed was to sing social justice songs to children at rest time, such as Streets of London by Ralph McTell (McTell, 1969) and She’s got Her Ticket by Tracey Chapman (Chapman, 1988). Two parents and grandparents asked me about Streets of London and later looked up the song on YouTube at home. They were so appreciative that I was ‘teaching’ their son about social justice.
During this time I realised that I needed to actively engage with EC peers who critically examined their practice or similarly grappled with addressing inequity and injustice in their practice. I couldn’t do this work in isolation. I joined the Social Justice In Early Childhood group where I heard first hand stories of lived experiences. This gave me further insight into the injustices that occurred in our community and an opportunity to come together with other educators in solidarity. It was a great forum to hear and see how EC teachers were grappling with issues of social injustice.
What drives me to do this advocacy work? It is important to me that children feel proud of who they are and comfortable with their identity. I also want children to be able to stand up for what is fair and just, and to have the words to be able to communicate this. I have believed this for a long time and continue to practise this every day, within the classroom, the curriculum, the community and internationally. I remember in the late 1990s when I was a team leader in a preschool room in the inner city of Sydney and autism was not yet well known as a common diagnosis in the community. I was informed by the director that we would be having a family with a child who had autism. I didn’t know anything about it so one lunchtime and after work I sat at the computer and researched what I could to find out about autism. I wanted to ensure that the child starting at our centre would be supported for who they are, and would know that we welcomed them into the space and would accommodate and be flexible where needed.
I believe it is my responsibility, our responsibility, to do what we can to ensure that children feel empowered and positive about themselves; for children to belong and care about others no matter who they are or where they are from; and to have the skills to act with others or alone against injustices. My vision for a fair and just classroom, community, and world continues every day and has never stopped.
Miriam Giugni
Early childhood activist educator, Sydney (NSW)
‘My point is not that everything is bad, but that everything is dangerous, which is not exactly the same as bad. If everything is dangerous, then we always have something to do. So my position leads not to apathy but to. . . activism’ (Foucault, 1983, pp. 231–2).
For me, becoming an activist early childhood educator hasn’t been a move from one way of being to another (i.e. advocate to activist), but instead an ongoing process of ‘becoming’ because there is ‘always something to do’.
The ‘always something to do’ in my worlds focus on re-imagining how early childhood education could be conceptualised and practised. This means that I am always looking at what is happening in my practice and drawing on many different theorists to deliberately question the extent to which it seems equitable. Sometimes I am looking at pedagogies and curriculum making, and at other times I am looking at frameworks (such as the National Quality Framework). In all cases I am thinking through the politics of what has produced early childhood pedagogies, curriculum making practices and frameworks. Thinking through the politics for me means identifying the discourses through which pedagogies, curriculum making practices and frameworks have been produced. When I see the politics of a situation in new ways I can begin to re-imagine ‘what else’ and ‘how else’ early childhood education can potentially become (Giugni, 2010).
One example that I have grappled with for a number of years is the ways in which regulatory and quality frameworks are mostly produced in and through dominant Western discourses of early childhood. For example, the persistent focus on ‘the individual child’ and how she/he develops is at the centre of how we construct ‘the child’. I always think this is dangerous, because it does not necessarily fit every child. Because I live and work in ‘Australia’, I have a strong view that any kind of knowledge system should always begin with principles of an Aboriginal world view. How then might early childhood right across Australia look different if colonial knowledges were put aside and Aboriginal knowledges framed our everyday pedagogies and practices? It seems that in current regulatory and quality documents that we (non-Aboriginal) are satisfied to ‘include’ an Aboriginal perspective (and I often ask how we do that as non-Aboriginal peoples) because we are in control of how it happens and we can make it appear palatable. But if we extended our commitment to ‘inclusion’ and re-imagined the whole early childhood system through an Aboriginal world view, what politics might then arise? What might shift in terms of power and knowledge, expertise and culture?
Becoming activist is not a fixed way to live life, but rather an ongoing grappling with the politics that produce how we live and work in early childhood.
Brigitte Mitchell
Early Childhood Teacher, Baya Gawiy Buga yani Jandu yani yu Early Learning Unit, Fitzroy Crossing (WA)
I am an EC teacher with a four-year Bachelor of Education (Early Childhood) from Western Sydney University. I completed this degree while working casually in the sector after completing a Diploma of Children’s Services and Certificate III in Children’s Services traineeship. I have 18 years’ experience in the sector working with children aged birth to eight years and have been a qualified teacher for 12 years. In this time I have worked for local government and community-based centres, as well as NSW Health and NSW Department of Education and Communities settings. I have been a union delegate, branch councillor and activist for the United Voice Big Steps and Quality Matters Campaigns since 2011. I am also a member of the Social Justice in Early Childhood group and have been a member of its annual conference organising committee since 2015. At the 2015 conference I presented part of a tribute to the late Elizabeth Dau, the editor of the first and second editions of The Anti-Bias Approach in Early Childhood. I am currently working as a teacher of two and three year olds in a WA child and family centre early learning unit for Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander children.
Promoting ECE to parents
I promote the importance of ECE to parents through my everyday conversations with them or through my documentation of children’s learning. I do this by sharing my philosophy and research and theory in relation to their children’s specific context. In documentation, as in conversation, I try to simply state in words and pictures what learning is occurring and why it’s significant. I have also spoken to families regarding ECE industrial issues and/or asked them to be involved in actions such as petitions, rally days and media statements or writing.
Families are a very important and powerful part of children’s early education and care. Therefore, issues affecting their educators and their education cannot be separated, so working collaboratively to share images and knowledge with families is embedded in my practice for today and tomorrow. Families can be strong advocates for their children alongside their teachers.
Promoting ECE to politicians
I promote the importance of ECE to politicians by writing them letters, sending them Tweets on Twitter or commenting on their Facebook posts, inviting them to visit my centre, visiting their offices, signing petitions to be delivered to them, speaking at party conferences, doing media comments and stories for print and television media on industrial issues and participating with questions and comments on the Q&A program, writing submissions and encouraging colleagues, education networks, families and friends to do so too. I refer to ECE policy, curriculum frameworks, research, theory, the UNCROC and the ECA Code of Ethics and read what politicians may value or have stated prior to actions. I have found telling ‘my story’ on why an issue is important to me is a powerful way to enact change too.
Being a teacher is political. Politicians can shape future laws and policy as our local members of parliament with their positions and portfolios. We also have a responsibility to hold them to account as part of big picture change for the ECE sector as advocates for young children as per the ECA Code of Ethics.
Promoting ECE to the general public
I promote the importance of ECE to the general public by meeting or tweeting celebrities or other journalists and activists to have as public supporters of ECE issues, attending rallies and public actions by wearing promotional T-shirts, and speaking to the media in regard to contemporary issues at hand for ECE. This also includes print and TV stories or comments organised by our union. I find that talking or letting my networks know about this work provokes conversations with family and friends, which promotes awareness about ECE. I also find that general conversation about exactly what an ECE is and what its benefits are to children in the here and now and in a bigger picture way for society is also a way to promote its importance.
The general public is not embedded in the ECE profession and they vote and may have/ had young children or wish to do so. They are voters participating in a democracy and they may support measures taken relating to their future that is in ECE now. So making them aware of messages in regard to changes we as teachers want to see is vital.