Research Around The World

The website that I chose to look at was the EECERA. I found that it was very interesting to examine this organization through the website because of all of the information that they had to share and also because of the different ways in which they had organized themselves to provide outlets for the information they had received and were desiring to share. I had the chance to first look at what the goals of their program were which I thought were so amazing that I would share them:

"The principal aims of EECERA are:

• to provide a relevant academic forum in Europe for the promotion, development and dissemination of high quality research into early childhood education;
• to facilitate collaboration and cooperation between European researchers in this field and the wider early childhood community across the World;
• to encourage the clear articulation and communication of the links between research, practice and policy;
• to offer interaction, development and support to those interested in early childhood education;
• to raise the visibility and status of European research in early childhood education throughout the World."

Some of the current international research topics that they have invested in studying consist of:

• Birth to Three
• Equity and Respect for Diversity
• Leadership and Integration
• Leadership Mentoring for Early Years Services
• Learning and Participation
• Mathematics Birth to Eight Years
• Outdoor Play and Learning
• Professionalism in Early Childhood Education and Care
• Transitions
• Young Children's Perspectives
• Working With Parents and Families

In mentioning the above areas, I think it is important to mention that EECERA has created Special Interest Groups to address these topics and I respect the way they are gaining information and disseminating it to others by leaving an open forum for research to be shared on those various topics.

I have gained great insight on how information can be shared, that it doesn't just have to come from reading someone else's research and trying to make sense of it but by through sharing in an open forum others are allowed to state their hypotheses on a given topic and others are able to provide research that is shared. That is one thing that is really important in my opinion is that information is not just given to someone with the expectation that they are to just go with that one answer but that there can be many answers to the same question and it's up to us to figure out what works best in our own environments.

One of the other things that I observed in looking at the website was that they also look at other countries' information on Early Childhood Education and keep themselves abreast to what is happening in the field.

Resources:

http://www.eecera.org/