International perspectives on the pedagogies of educational transitions

Abstract

There has been a great deal written recently about children starting school, particularly primary school. All of the stakeholders in these transitions to school have been considered, along with matters of readiness – for child, family, educators, schools, and communities; adjustment and adaptation; continuity and change in curricula and learning; and the opportunities, aspirations, expectations and entitlements encompassed in the transformation of roles involved. As the children move from their prior-to-school experiences – preschool, child care, home, other out-of-home care – to school, they experience many changes. One of these is often a change from a primarily play-based pedagogical approach in the prior-to-school setting to perhaps a more structured, even formal pedagogy in school. But what about the pedagogies of the transitions themselves? Children do not stop learning and teachers do not stop teaching as children are in the process of transition to school. There are pedagogies of transition employed. This book explores these pedagogies through the work of an international alliance of transitions to school researchers from five countries – Iceland, Scotland and Sweden (European) and Australia and New Zealand (Antipodean). This alliance is named Pedagogies of Educational Transitions - POET.