High-level skills
An early years teacher needs the highest level of communication
skills, a wide spectrum of knowledge and a passion for social justice, "to
care about the kids who have no one to bat on their behalf".
When it comes to job satisfaction for a graduate, nothing beats
working in early years, says Siraj-Blatchford. "It takes all your
intellectual resources to bring a shy child out of themselves. Winning a
lawsuit might be a thrill, but it doesn't last." An early years practitioner
can help transform children's lives, and watch them change and develop week by
week.
For the academic-minded, early childhood education is built on a
venerable foundation of theory and research from the likes of Lev Vygotsky, the
Russian developmental psychologist of the early 20th century, and Jean Piaget,
who came later. "We have all the brain studies, all the theorists,"
says Bernadette Duffy, head of the flagship Thomas Coram Early Childhood Centre
in Camden. Modern neuroscience is showing how, at the age when children's
brains are developing so rapidly, there is the greatest potential for teachers
to help shape that development.
Such findings support the insights of Vygotsky and Piaget, who
both highlighted the relationship between teacher and child in the learning
process. "It is through others that we become ourselves," said
Vygotsky. He described the way an adult can support a child on to the next
step: "What a child can do in co-operation today, he can do alone
tomorrow." Piaget rejected the idea of fixed intelligence. Instead, he
argued, it was actively created by the individual's interaction with the
environment.
The Reggio Emilia approach to early education, developed in
Italy, sees children as strong and powerful, not as empty vessels. They have
the need and the right to interact and communicate with each other and with
caring, respectful adults.
Early years teachers have the opportunity to do mini-research
projects, says Duffy. And the breadth of knowledge of a Mastermind contestant
can be applied while encouraging children to co-operate, think for themselves
and articulate their ideas.
"For instance, one of the children thought the tree moving
made the wind blow, so that led to a scientific discussion. Then another child
said, why does the wind blow on the beach where there aren't any trees?"
says Duffy.
Laura Graham-Matheson, a PGCE student at the Institute of
Education, with a BA from the School of Oriental and African Studies and a
master's in art history, wants to teach reception. "I think small children
are fascinating. They know so much already and they're little sponges,"
she says.
The job is "about really understanding what they need in
order to learn, and how you can encourage them to do so in a situation where
they can pick and choose what they want to do." She adds, "I'm really
interested in creativity - not just the arts. Through creativity they can
tackle the unknown."
Currently, Teach First is a secondary programme, but it has a
primary pilot. Laura House, who graduated from Cambridge last year with a
double-star first, is teaching infants at St Mary Magdalen, the all-through
academy in Islington. She, too, finds working with young children
intellectually engaging and creative.
"So much of the teaching is about reflection and improving
on your practice," she says. It demands good multi-tasking skills, and the
need to be inventive is "so fun".
Many a high-powered career has been built on a foundation of
early childhood education. Pat Jefferson, recently retired director of
children's services in Lancashire, spent much of her career in the sector.
Jefferson says she began teaching top juniors in a very disadvantaged area on
Tyneside, and "I wondered why it had become so difficult for children to
access the learning available to them. I went to work in the early years so I
could understand how children learn." Jefferson says she has applied what
she learned there, both from the children and other practitioners, in every job
she has had since.
Nearly all the experts agree that an early years Teach First can
only be a boon. "Obviously we want to get the very best people working
with the youngest children where it makes the most difference," says
Duffy.
Emotional intelligence
A dissenting voice comes from Toxic Childhood author Sue Palmer,
a campaigner against the early years foundation stage, which opponents fear is
bringing the strictures of school to the under-fives. "Working in early
years is not the same as teaching," she says. "It's more about facilitating
children's development." Palmer praises the "emotional
intelligence" of many childminders who "really understand how to be
with kids". She fears that Cambridge graduates would bring a dry,
systemising sort of intelligence and try to teach too methodically. "We
are looking for intellectual solutions to something which is not an
intellectual problem," she says.
Siraj-Blatchford says social justice demands that children from
deprived backgrounds should have access to the brightest carers and educators.
"It's not an accident that a mother's educational level is probably the
highest predictor of a child's outcomes. Why shouldn't it be true of any
primary carer?" she asks.
"There's
a tendency to assume a kind of dualism, that you're either intellectual or
caring," says Peter Moss, professor of early childhood provision at the
Institute of Education. "That idea needs to be completely scotched."
http://www.guardian.co.uk/education/2009/mar/10/early-years-education
