Educators all over the world seem to accept the idea that early childhood education has educational value for all pre-school children regardless of family circumstances. Students of the history and the sociology of education point out that the need to provide "day care centres" for children of the poor, who roamed the streets while their parents went to work, triggered interest in educational provision for the "deprived," "underprivileged" children in a community.

In 2016, key stakeholders from the Ministry of Education in Belize visited The School of Education (SOE) at Mona, Jamaica to discuss how the SOE could assist them to achieve their strategic goal to advance early childhood education in Belize. Beyond the need to develop the competences of teachers and Education Officers to improve quality standards of Early Childhood Education (ECE), the discussion highlighted the dearth of locally generated Belizean research in ECE to inform decision making.

No-one can deny the significance of quality early childhood education in our increasingly global and technological society. Among the many issues involved in providing the highest quality developmental experiences for young children is the role of information and communication technology (ICT) in early childhood education. This paper explores how ICT can be used in early childhood education. After an overview of the status of early childhood education internationally and in Jamaica, developmentally appropriate practices for using ICT in early childhood are described.

In this article, I reflect on my experiences as a novice teacher-researcher. This activity, a requirement for a Doctor of Philosophy degree, was my initial attempt at systematic self-analysis of my work in kindergarten at a public primary school in Montserrat.

Through case study methodology, this article outlines a contextual pedagogical framework for the development of an M.Ed in ECE programme. It describes the considerations made in the development of the programme and then juxtaposes them against best practice guidelines as outlined by extant literature on the principles of andragogy and higher education programme development. The findings suggest that higher education programmes need to be aligned to the needs of students and the contexts in which they are situated.

This paper describes the process undertaken to assess the cultural resonance and dissonance of INSIGHTS into Children’s Temperament in preparation for adapting the intervention for dissemination in Jamaica. INSIGHTS is an evidence-based intervention that enhances the social emotional development of young children and the behaviour management skills of their teachers and parents. To obtain stakeholders perspectives regarding an adaptation, 32 Jamaican educators atended a two-day INSIGHTS workshop conducted by the developer of the intervention.

In the six years (1966-1972) the Bernard Van Leer Foundation funded the Project for Early Childhood Education (PECE) in Jamaica, with a view, inter alia, to: (i) upgrading the teaching competence of Basic School teachers through in-service training, (ii) developing, experimentally, instructional materials for use in the programme. Their concern was that no hindrances to a child's development occur as a result of con­tinued presence in an impoverished environ­ment, and furthermore, that where children are forced for socio-economic reasons to live in such a context, an attempt at compen­satio

Despite the increased popularity of STEM education worldwide, there is much haziness about what constitutes STEM education. This theoretical paper seeks to stimulate discussion on what STEM is and how it should be implemented. It positions an integrated STEM approach as foundational to education but advocates a shift from the compartmentalized focus on the silos of subject disciplines to one that is phenomenon-based.

The Early Childhood Commission (ECC) in Jamaica has national oversight responsibility for early childhood education services provided for children between the ages of birth through five years. In 2008, 98 per cent of 3-5 year old children in early childhood education programmes were served in fee-collecting (community owned institutions, partially subsidized by the government) basic schools (Davies, 2008).

Increasingly, a number of information and communication technology (ICT) initiatives have been deployed at all levels of the education system in Jamaica in an effort to enhance and support the development of Jamaican students. An assessment of the impact of these initiatives is key in defining the way forward for the role of ICTs in education. In this paper, we explore insights from early observations from the planning and implementation of a One-Laptop-per-Child (OLPC) project at the early childhood and primary levels in two Jamaican schools.