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Welcome to the Office of Early Childhood Education
National and public adviser on ECE, the OECE is a sector body representing teachers and all types of licensed services driving safer, higher‑quality education for every child
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- Provides membership support to ECE services, teachers, researchers, and community partners
- Actively contributes to sector analysis, research, and policy development
- Advances evidence-based best practices that prioritise children’s interests and wellbeing
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Teacher Member Posts
Can Women Understand How Boys Tick?
Should Boys Have a Male Teacher?
I don’t believe we as women understand how boys really tick. If boys had a male teacher would this help their achievement and reduce problem behaviours?Female kindergarten head teacher.
Dr Alexander replies
Female teachers can support boys as well as male teachers at early childhood level.
Boys Liking Feminine Things
Gender expectations on boys.
Young boys can love pretty and feminine things. They like to dress up in pretty clothes and be princesses, fairies, and play female roles.
But parents may worry that it could be an early sign of femininity and see that teachers who allow boys to dress-up in girls’ clothes are setting them up for ridicule.
Heuristic Play and Treasure Baskets
Heuristic Play.
In the modern world where many toys are made of shiny coloured plastic and have buttons to press with flashing lights and noises, it is often easy to forget that simple things can interest and stimulate young children.
In fact these simple things can often be better for them as they have a wider range of textures an
Eczema
Eczema is quite common among young children. Some children grow out of it but this knowledge doesn’t help children, parents and teachers who are daily coping with it. There are times when it will flare up, and when infection happens, and there may be no apparent reason for this. Learn to manage rather than letting it manage you.
A child wi
Service Provider Member Posts
Building the Real Quality of Your ECE Service
Beyond Regulatory Standards and Expectations to Building Quality.
There seems to be so much to do in trying to provide a quality service, does there not?
Is all your work worth it or could a change in focus and method achieve better results?
To help you to think critically on this consider the following:
Who defines what quality is? A
How to do a Press Release Right
Education Press Release.
If you are planning to invite a local reporter along to your event or send an education press release out to manage what the media reports about something that has happened at your service, it pays to do a bit of planning beforehand to increase your chances of success.
Here are some tips to get you started on the ri
Values-based Interviewing as Part of the Staff Safety Check
Values-based Interviewing.
It is usual to conduct a formal interview with potential job applicants and to cover skills, experience and knowledge during the interview. This ‘technical’ interview is important to ensure that the applicant has the skills, competencies and knowledge to meet the job description and person specifications.
F
Redundancy and Making a Position Redundant
Redundancy and the process for making a position redundant.
There may not be the work for an employee because child enrolments have dropped, your service is restructuring, or you can not longer afford to keep an employee on.
Whatever the reason, there are certain processes to follow to ensure you do not run into legal problems.
This arti
Research Library – Today’s Featured Articles
Infants and Toddlers in Non‑Parental Education and Care: Insights from the Children’s Commissioner Inquiry
The report offers evidence‑based recommendations to strengthen ECE for infants and toddlers, covering funding settings, flexible provision, child health, ratios and group-size, qualified and skilled workforce, teacher education, and everyday care practices.
Index for the NZ Research in ECE Journal, 2011, Vol 14
The titles, authors and abstracts for papers published in the NZ Research in Early Childhood Education Journal, Volume 14, 2011 are shown below. To view
Early Childhood Educators’ Workplace Well-being
FULL REFERENCE: Jones, C., Hadley, F., Waniganayake, M. & Johnstone, M. (2019). Early childhood educators’ workplace well-being: A case for using self-determination theory to understand and support workplace well-being in early childhood services. NZ International Research in Early Childhood Education Journal. 22(2), pp. 9 – 17.
Log-in to read the full research paper below. Or order a pdf copy of the article from the main NZIRECE Journal page.
ABSTRACT: Current conceptualisations of Early Childhood (EC) educator workplace well-being are problematic due to large gaps in the workplace well-being literature. Gaps include a dearth of research examining healthy well-being, limited qualitative studies to understand the complexity of workplace well-being and a focus on hedonic well-being (happiness at work) without the inclusion of eudaimonic well-being (meaningful work). Moreover, attention in the literature is mainly given to external conditions influencing well-being such as poor pay and working conditions. This article begins with a critique of EC workplace well-being literature and then provides an argument that asserts Self-Determination Theory (SDT) has the potential to provide a more suitable conceptualisation of EC educator well-being. Key principles of both SDT and Early Childhood Education and Care (ECEC) are provided to highlight the suitability of using SDT to understand and also support the healthy well-being of those working in prior to school settings in the Australian ECEC context.
KEY WORDS: Self-determination theory, well-being, work-place stress, job satisfaction.
INTRODUCTION: Defining early childhood workplace well-being
Defining Early Childhood (EC) Educator workplace well-being is problematic. Well-being is a broad and complex concept and hence difficult to define. The need for a clearer definition of well-being and a greater understanding of how stressors emerge and why certain conditions act as buffers to poor well-being is needed (Corr, Davis, LaMontagne, Waters, & Steele, 2014; Cumming, 2017; Hall-Kenyon, Bullough, MacKay, & Marshall, 2014) to support EC educator wellbeing.
The majority of studies on EC educator well-being have focused on a deficit model of physical and psychological health that has concentrated predominantly on stress and burnout (Cumming, 2017; Hall-Kenyon et.al., 2014). However, there is evidence in the EC well-being literature of the potential benefits of a more positive focus on well-being (through the lens of positive psychology theorists) in terms of understanding and supporting workplace well-being (Hur & Buettner, 2016; Nislin et al., 2015; Nislin et al., 2016).
From a Good Idea to a Robust Research Design: A Discussion of Challenges in Designing Early Childhood Research
Designing an ECE Research Study. By Claire McLachlan.
Abstract: Designing and carrying out research in the area of early childhood education is one that is attempted by many, including experienced and beginning researchers, postgraduate and undergraduate students as well as by people working in a range of different early childhood servi
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