By: Diane Kashin, Ed.D, RECE This is the third blog written during self-isolation imposed by the spread of COVID-19, intended to support early childhood educators committed to continuous professional learning. It is the second in a series focused on the pedagogical approaches from Ontario’s pedagogy for the early years: How Does Learning Happen? (2014). The … Continue reading
By: Diane Kashin, Ed.D, RECE When I went into self-isolation, I was worried about what I would do to keep myself motivated and busy. I wondered whether I could keep blogging in this time of COVID-19. I wrote one post, Early Childhood Education: Making Sense of Our Life’s Course but didn’t know what to write … Continue reading
By: Diane Kashin, Ed.D, RECE Exactly two years ago, I was in Reggio Emilia, Italy attending a study tour, enjoying the deep thinking, dialogue, food, drink and ambience with cherished friends. Exactly one year ago, I was diagnosed with breast cancer. With my last treatment coinciding with the end of 2019, I was very hopeful … Continue reading
By: Diane Kashin, Ed.D, RECE and Cindy Green, BSc, RECE. Block play is centuries old. Blocks were part of a historical movement that focused on building a child-centred culture that began in the late 1700s (Dietze & Kashin, 2019). There was John Locke (1632-1704), the English philosopher who recommended the use of alphabet blocks for … Continue reading
By: Diane Kashin, Ed. D, RECE. In my last blog post, I wrote about the pedagogical approaches described in How Does Learning Happen? Ontario’s Pedagogy for the Early Years (2014). I believe, that of all the approaches, reflective practice and collaborative inquiry, has the most capacity to impact the others. This post will provide some … Continue reading
By: Diane Kashin, Ed. D, RECE. When I was a teenager, my career goal was to be a high school history teacher. At a time of declining enrolment, the goal could not be achieved and instead I chose a different path after university. I found office jobs which I hated and wasn’t that good at, … Continue reading
By: Diane Kashin, Ed. D, RECE. This past year has been a difficult one for me. Early in 2019, I was diagnosed with breast cancer. Between surgery, chemotherapy and radiation treatments, my year was about healing and recovery. Normally, I would have been traveling and presenting workshops to the early learning community. I missed this … Continue reading
By: Diane Kashin, Ed. D, RECE. Professional identity is the concept which describes how we perceive ourselves within our occupational context and how we communicate this to others. I have been fascinated by this concept for many years, as in days gone by, I often struggled with my identity as an early childhood educator as I … Continue reading
By: Diane Kashin, Ed.D, RECE and Cindy Green, BSc, RECE. We have written about our long-standing relationship in previous posts and how we connected when we were working at the same community college, teaching early childhood education, many moons ago! We became critical friends, before we knew the term. In our context, we were pedagogical … Continue reading
By: Diane Kashin, Ed.D, RECE and Cindy Green, BSc, RECE. As we age, it is healthy to give advice and to feel that our long careers in the profession of early childhood education has been meaningful. We have both retired from full-time work teaching early childhood education at the same community college. There, the working … Continue reading
Technology Rich Inquiry Based Research 