Early Childhood Education: Documentation, Planning, Teaching

This essay delves into the multifaceted aspects of early childhood education, emphasizing the significance of documentation, assessment, planning, and teaching practices. The essay highlights the importance of comprehensive documentation to understand each child individually, differentiating between fact collection and informed conclusions. Assessment is presented as a crucial step, enabling individualized and group instruction, aligned with developmental theories like Maslow's Hierarchy of Needs. The essay underscores the significance of lesson planning, based on documentation and assessment findings, to provide a structured approach to teaching. The role of the teacher as a careful observer and the creation of a supportive learning environment, influenced by theories like Attachment Theory, are also examined. The author emphasizes the role of community involvement and personal teaching philosophies, shaped by the principles of Jean Piaget and Reggio Emilia, to promote the holistic development of young children.

Early Childhood Education
Documentation, Planning, Assessment and Teaching Young
Children

Contents
Early Childhood Education..............................................................................................................2
Documentation.................................................................................................................................2
Assessment......................................................................................................................................3
Planning...........................................................................................................................................4
Teaching..........................................................................................................................................5
Conclusion.......................................................................................................................................6
References........................................................................................................................................7

Early Childhood Education
Early Childhood Education is an important way of understanding the child psychology and helps
the child grow through the childhood in the way that is best suited. It ensures that the child
develops both social and personal traits in a balanced way. The children must be made to
understand that they will be interacting with the society for the rest of their lives. Here, they are
also to develop their own taste and own choices while blending well in the society. This is not
something that can be made to understand in the high sounding words but it is the theories and
the efforts of the teachers that can make this possible. Here, in this research the main idea is
assessing the importance of documentation, planning, assessment and teaching young children
(Schewe & Woodhouse 2018).
Personal professional philosophy is a unique approach of the teachers that they develop towards
the children which is backed by theoretical evidences and literatures and practical viability.
Beliefs, concepts and attitude to the early childhood education are a dynamic concept and can be
explored by a number of ways provided it has theoretical evidences to be compatible with the
mindset of children (Richter 2017).
Documentation
Documentation plays an important role in understanding each child individually. The question
often is asked that what documentation is with regards to child education and the early childhood
development. The documentation here can be done in two parts. The first part will lead to the
other part. In part one what can be done is collect the documental evidences of the kid and keep a
record and part two is to make estimation out of it. This is going to ensure that the evidences are
in place and the estimation of the child can be done in the right way with no assumption as
assumption and no evidences can lead to wrongful judgment of the kid, which, if passed to
parents, will lead to wrong approach to the child. As a teacher, it is quite important that the
judgment is not made without evidences and without supporting it by theories. These two are the
two important component of a fine teaching approach (Jones 2015).

Without proper documentation, the next step which is assessment is not possible. Hence, the
teachers must complete the stage of documentation in the best way of possible so that the stages
that follow are also completed in the best way of possible and is in the best interest of the
children. In part two what can be done is a chronological development of the child can be shown
and the areas of weakness and strength can be detected in the assessment stage through this.
Hence, one can say that it is quite important that each scribbling of the kid in the playschool is
kept in the file and the teacher or the group of teachers is engage in successful analyzing of it
(McCartney 2018).
Photographs, description of field trip, events and other situations can be sources through which it
will be possible to show the development and decline in specific areas of children. Often the
children face problems when they are sent to the main school. The sole reason for this is that the
children are not understood in the basic level and they go on to have issues adjusting with the
schools and new mates. These cases may not be many and most of the children engage in
successful school and peer activities. Yet, it is for detecting the rare cases of struggle special kids
that the teachers are supposed to find and it is for this sole reason that early childhood education
has become a well-researched discipline and people are undertaking researches to add to the
literatures. As more research is done, it is going to have more impact on the overall development
of the children (Black et al 2017).
Assessment
The next very important step is that of assessment. Let us find out what is assessment in early
childhood education. In assessment, there is collecting of the information and also reviewing that
information. By the way of reviewing of the information, it become possible that the educational
activities are planned out to the best interest of the children. The documentation stage collects
facts but it does not form a well thought conclusion out of it. This is done when the teachers
engage in successful assessment. Without having the correct method of assessment, it is not
possible that the whole aim of educating the children in the right can be achieved (Fortson 2016).
Here are certain reasons that make assessment a very important activity in ECE:

Cognitive, motor, emotional and languages are certain areas that are important to identify and
this is possible when the documentation is done well and the information are processed in the
right way. Here it is vital that the teachers refer to relevant theories so that the conclusion that is
drawn has proof (Boutte 2018).
Individualized instructions to child are important but it is also important that the teachers are
engaged in group instruction. Engaging in individualized instruction with no limit may elaborate
the task of the evaluators or the teachers and the children may be alienated from the rest of the
group. Hence, while assessing, the teacher gets the chance to engage in individualized instruction
and is also engage in group instruction. Both have their own importance and these can be done
only in this stage. While assessing, the Maslow’s Hierarchy of Needs is going to play an
important role. According to this theory, there are five stages of need that are to be fulfilled for
the successful development and learning ability of the children (Schewe & Woodhouse 2018).
In fact, it is only after the fulfillment of these five needs in order of importance that the children
are going to develop an interest in learning. A satisfied mind and body is very important for the
learning process to be successful. This theory is so effective, that the organizations engaged in
managing human resources also apply this theory in looking after the needs and motivation of
the employees (Jones, Greenberg & Crowley 2015).
Some of the tools that can be used in having a successful assessment are High Scope Child
Observation Record, Teaching Strategies and The Work Sampling System.
The teachers must understand that the instruction and assessment activities must be aligned with
the goals and approaches. The teachers who are assessing the child must also know the child
personally and the assessment should not be done by a third person based on the reports that is
provided by the caregiver. There may be some gaps that would be remaining unfilled and this
report will not encompass all that is needed in a successful assessment process (Ponnock Torsney
& Lombardi 2018).
Planning
Planning here will essentially be lesson planning that is heavily going to depend on the first two
mentioned steps which are documentation and assessment. When the assessment is over, it is

important that the lesson planning is done because the job of the teacher is not just effective
assessment but it is also important that lesson planning is done well and it is aligned with the
preceding two steps. Lesson plan is not only going to be helpful for children but it is also going
to let the teacher have a defined approach to the work and this is going to help in systematic
approach which is quite helpful in getting the work done within the period (Diamond 2016).
Time is an important factor because the ECE is time bound and the aim of successful
development of the child is to be done within the defined timeframe so that the aim can be
achieved before the child is ready to cross that stage and step into another (Park Jung & Kang
2018).
Each stage has its own importance but the maximum effort is here in this stage. This stage
includes a thoughtful study and without evidences about a particular lesson plan the teacher
cannot really engage in that lesson planning and giving that lesson in classrooms (Slavin 2019).
There are many teachers who are of the opinion that lesson planning is the most time consuming
stage and it takes a lot of time as each point is elaborated on even if the teachers is well clear
about what they are supposed to do, without mentioning the systematic approach that is in the
minds of teachers, it is not possible to qualify a piece of document as a successful and complete
lesson plan (Park Jung & Kang 2018).
Teaching
Here, the general methods of teaching based on the findings of the subject as a whole is
important to be applied but it is also important that the teachers have their own perspective as
every child cannot be brought under the lenses of theories and findings. The observation of the
teachers’ acts as the primary source of information and it is this stage that is going to wrap up the
preceding stages. The teacher, above all, has to be a careful observer and record everything that
is displayed by the children (Ecclestone & Hayes 2019).
Learning Environment
The teachers are the first caregivers and they can play an important role in shaping up the
children. The Attachment Theory says that child gets emotionally attached to the very first

caregiver who takes care through the childhood. The first caregivers play an important role in
determining the growth and development of the child.
When the baby is crying and is picked up and comforted then there is a process of bonding that
starts between the child and the caregiver. This makes the child realize that this particular person
is a source of comfort and the child too starts to have a bond that may not last a lifetime but is
sure to have a great impact in the early childhood and shaping the early childhood which is
important foundation of further development (Diamond 2016).
The factors that are to be included in shaping my personality are include the image of the child,
learning environment, community, sustainability, curriculum approaches, and family
collaboration and partnership. I am personally influenced by the philosophies of Jean Piaget.
Learning Approaches
My personal philosophy believes that lesson plans has its own importance and it is the most
important stage where the teachers have to research on the lesson that is going to be instrumental
in dealing with the group of children and also with the individual kid. Both the areas need to be
targeted in the lesson planning. If an activity is recorded in the lesson panning, there also has to
be a reason stated which is going to elaborate why the activity is important and what results can
be hoped from the application of the activity. The evidences that are provided in this stage must
be laden with literatures and theories so that the importance of the activity and its positive results
can be reflected upon (Diamond 2016).
Image of the child
The idea of Image of the child is not by Piaget, it was given to us by Reggio Emilia. The image
that the teachers form of the child plays an important role. The teacher must be bent on viewing
the child as strong powerful, innovative and able. It is important that as a teacher I am able to
understand them and see their interest with their eyes and try to explore ideas so that they can go
forward on that path.
Community involvement

Community involvement is important as the child, on growing up, will be living within the
community and the society. Hence, for the complete and holistic development of the child, it is
important that teachers are able to involve the community in making the child feel the connection
with the people around.
Family collaboration and Partnership
My philosophy of teaching cannot be complete until I have given due importance to the family
collaboration and partnership. This can be done by parents’ teacher’s meeting. The behavior and
development of the child can be recorded in the form of documentation and presented to the
child so that the parents are aware of the point from where they have to pick up when the child
leaves the early childhood stage and goes further in school.
Sustainability
It is from the very start that the children will learn the ways of conserving the environment. From
the early childhood, teachers can engage assisting children in recycling, throwing the garbage in
the bin and planting trees.
There are many philosophers who have influenced me and one of the most prominent one is Jean
Piaget. It was Jean Piaget who understood that there is a difference in the thinking pattern of
child and adults and children are not just the small version of adults. They have a complete
different psychology and brain development which needs a separate study. Piaget has contributed
deeply in cognitive development of children.
Conclusion
Playschool teachers act as the caregiver and it is important that they are well read so that there is
no stone left unturned in making sure that the child gets all the development activities in process.
This is not something that can be made to understand in words but it is the philosophies and the
determinations of the teachers that can make this probable. Here, main ideas behind
documentation, planning, assessment and teaching young children are realized.

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