Abstract:

In this paper, we discuss the notion of the curriculum as a dynamic and interactive document, rather than a static one. Its reading is a dynamic process that, above all, depends on how practitioners read certain settings in the document, i.e., how they interpret it. Therefore, we discuss the meaning of the curriculum as a social construction that is created through practitioners’ reflection on their own experiences and the experiences of others, based on the curriculum as a conceptual framework, personal beliefs, value systems, and theoretical knowledge that are closely related or unexplored without understanding the preschool culture. Direct research of educational practice and the shaping of the preschool curriculum is a continuous and responsible concern for the quality development of institutions of early childhood education and care as a whole.

Therefore, we are interested in how to better understand the educational practice in which the child is an active, constructive creator of his or her development, care, and education and the adult is a helper, who assists and supports the child’s development, care, and education.

At the heart of our thinking is the search for an answer to the question of how to design a preschool curriculum that will follow the core values and principles of the National Curriculum. How do we develop modern strategic approaches related to children’s and preschool teachers’ integrative learning, (co)construct real learning processes and knowledge creation in direct joint research of the educational process in accordance with the real institutional context and preschool culture in which children and adults live every day? How might pedagogical documentation help the preschool teacher to better understand his or her educational practice and his or her own and children’s learning processes?

Early and preschool-aged children need a variety of opportunities to engage in discovering, experimenting, and exploring cause-and-effect relationships in their own way in a quality supportive environment. The preschool teacher’s role and the readiness to develop his or her own practice by documenting and researching in a reflective way is of crucial importance in the endeavour to contribute to the improvement of the practice of working with early and preschool-aged children. Action research, as a methodological strategy used by modern practitioners, has proven to be an important segment of improving practice, with an emphasis on the processes of developing preschool teachers-reflective practitioners.

Keywords:

Action research, educational practice research, curriculum, national curriculum, professional development.