Abstract

Early childhood educators with higher qualifications are more likely to demonstrate quality in their practice; but few studies have explored the underlying factors that contribute to this relationship. Drawing on Pierre Bourdieu’s theory, this article proposes that the relationship arises from social, as well as educational, inequality. Educators with higher qualifications are more likely to have the cultural, social, and economic capital necessary to develop a habitus (unthinking disposition to act in certain ways) consistent with the dominant understanding of quality practice. The doxa (shared understanding) of quality in the early childhood sector is itself shaped by two institutions through which these forms of capital are transmitted: schools, and middle-class families. Policy efforts to raise educators’ qualifications are insufficient to address these deeper inequalities. All educators require opportunities to critically reflect on how their habitus shapes their practice, and to shape the doxa of the early childhood field.

摘要

具有较高资历的幼儿教育工作者更有可能在实践中表现出质量；但很少有研究探讨促成这种关系的潜在因素。本文借鉴皮埃尔·布迪厄的理论，提出这种关系源于社会和教育的不平等。具有较高资历的教育者更有可能拥有必要的文化、社会和经济资本，以发展与对质量实践的主流理解一致的习惯（以某种方式行事的不加思索的倾向）。多萨（共同的理解）幼儿部门的质量本身是由这些形式的资本传递的两个机构塑造的：学校和中产阶级家庭。提高教育工作者资格的政策努力不足以解决这些更深层次的不平等。所有教育工作者都需要机会来批判性地反思他们的习惯如何塑造他们的实践，并塑造幼儿领域的doxa 。