Early Childhood Education in Social and Political Transitions

Sarah Klaus is Adjunct Assistant Professor at Georgetown University’s Center for Child and Human Development, USA, and an independent Advisor and Consultant to foundations, international agencies and NGOs. Jan Peeters is a Senior Researcher and Consultant, based in Belgium, working with Innovations in the Early Years and Fair Start Stories, the European Commission and UNICEF, including in Eastern European countries. Tatjana Vonta, now retired, was Senior Researcher and Head of the Step by Step Centre at the Educational Research Institute, an Associate Professor at the University of Primorska, Slovenia.

• PrefaceForeword Introduction: Building Democracy Through Early Childhood EducationPart I: Why Invest in Early Childhood During a Political Transformation Process Towards Democracy?1. ‘Everything was Planned’: Early Childhood Education in Former Socialist Countries before and during their Transition 2. ‘It Was Just a Magic Time’: Investing in Early Childhood to Build Democratic SocietiesPart II: Inventing a Democratic Pedagogy3. ‘Who Says We Can’t Change the World?’: Implementing the Step by Step Program 4. ‘The Teachers Believed in Us’: How Teachers, Parents and Children Experienced the Programs 5. ‘Slowly We are Getting There’: Creating Opportunities for Children Experiencing Exclusion 6. ‘Don’t Think That it Won’t Happen’: Young Children in Times of WarPart III: Extending and Sustaining Democratic Pedagogy Through Civil Society Networks and Expansion to New Regions7. ‘The Seed Beneath the Snow’: The Growth of National and Regional Professional Early Childhood Networks8. ‘Surprised and Thrilled’: Rolling Out the ProgramsPart IV: Transforming Early Childhood Education Systems 9. ‘This is Yours’: Successful Transformations of Early Childhood Education SystemsConclusion10. ‘Systems Change When People Change’: Lessons Learned from Long-Term Investing in Early ChildhoodAnnexesAnnex 1. Biographies of Interviewees and Focus Group ParticipantsAnnex 2. Methodology: Oral History Interview and Desk Review of Evaluations, Reports and Documents

In the face of insurmountable obstacles generated by poverty in low democracy states this is a book that provides hope through a remarkable insight into how the Open Society contributed to global early childhood education (ECE). Over a period of three decades from the 1990s it follows the work of the Step by Step programme. The authors have captured how systemic support for ECE can help ameliorate inequality for young children. A must read for anyone wanting to see how sustainable change is possible.