Discourses of Readiness, Normality/Abnormality, and At-Risk Within Developmentally Appropriate Practice Guidelines

• In Event: 66.057 - Roundtable Session 27
  In Roundtable Session: 66.057-5 - Questioning the "Knowledge to Action" Conduit: Child Development as the Foundation of Early Childhood Education

Abstract

This paper presents research in the form of a critical review and analysis of discursive language embedded in recent documents serving as Guidelines for Developmentally Appropriate Practice published by the National Association for the Education of Young Children. Included in this analysis are contextual, political, and cultural shifts since the initial DAP publication (Bredekamp, 1987). This presentation resonates with the conference theme of ‘knowledge to action’ by building on early and continuing concerns regarding the dominance of developmental psychology as a basis for “Developmentally Appropriate” early childhood practice (Bredekamp, 1987; Copple & Bredekamp, 2009). It also proposes alternative approaches to knowledge utilization through additional new analyses of related documents that emphasize both continuity and shifts in principles expressed from 1987 to 2015.

The purpose of this analysis is both to “critique” and to illuminate questions that should be asked by education researchers as public intellectuals in the field of education about the sources and consequences of recent reforms on teacher education and on notions of quality and” best practices” for young children –with an emphasis on 0-5 years, including kindergarten. Rather than targeting a critique at others, the research is meant to be a self-reflective and field-reflective interrogation of the knowledge that guides notions of true “best practice”, of highest and lower “quality” in the USA as we move further into the 21st century. What truths have been promoted, which have shifted, what now are we asking ourselves to believe and do---how are we governing ourselves as well as others?

The research draws particularly on poststructural theoretical ideas from Foucault (1977; 1980, and others) as well as the work of Deleuze and Guattari (1987) ----particularly as they wrote of the rhizome and an openness to our thought and actions with and about children and families. The notion of “regimes of truth” (Foucault, 1980) and governing/governmentality (Foucault, 1991) will be used to frame the critical discourse analysis of documents from the first DAP guidelines (1987) to the newer guidelines (e.g. Copple & Bredekamp, 2013). Select examples will be used to suggest shifts in ways in reasoning about what is good and true for young children, for their teachers and caregivers, as well as, often, for diverse communities and the nation.

Specific emphasis will be placed on notions of 1) readiness/lack of readiness and what these terms might mean within the context of nation and the language as it is used and situated within documents, 2) normality/abnormality, and 3) catching up or being left behind, or continuing to be “at risk” for failure. I will use the analytic themes to focus on specific passages in documents, and themes that run through documents, continuities and shifts over a thirty year period (1987-2017).
It is my intent to situate the thematic analyses within a broader context of shifts in national and global discourses.

Author

• Marianne N. Bloch, University of Wisconsin - Madison