Leadership in Early Childhood

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Recommended: Introduction on educational leadership

Leadership is a sociocultural construct underpinned by the beliefs and values of a society (Waniganayake, Cheeseman, Fenech, Hadley, & Shepherd, 2012). Leadership in early childhood have shifted the focus from one designated leader into a more collective approach – distributed leadership, which is not about delegating. As Cheeseman (2012) states, in early childhood settings, attention is often directed at administrative and management leadership (Waniganayake et al., 2012); however it is important to have a designated leader in the areas of development and implementation of curriculum and pedagogy – being the educational leader as a requirement of the National Quality Framework – whilst at the same time see educational leadership as a shared or distributed responsibility. Role of the educational leader is to ‘guide other educators in their planning and reflection’ (ACECQA, 2013 as cited in Cheeseman, 2012) as well as to mentor and shape the application of educational theory into practice. With this is mind, it is important to remember that such vital role will vary depending on the context of a setting, but as an educational leader need to be socially as well as educationally responsible (Duignan, 2006). An ideal educational leader would be someone with qualifications in the early childhood education (Brown et al., 2012; Cheeseman, 2012; ACECQA, 2013) with access to current research about curriculum and an in-depth knowledge of curriculum approaches and theories of learning and development. This way, they are then able to communicate, inform and share valuable information with other educators as they lead through challenging yet highly achievable goals and expectations. An educational leader will need to consider the following lis...

... middle of paper ...

...tional leadership: Key challenges and ethical tensions.
New York: Cambridge University Press.

Rodd, J. (2006). Leadership in early childhood: The pathway to professionalism.
Crows Nest NSW: Allen and Unwin.

Sinclair, A. (2007). Leadership for the disillusioned: Moving beyond myths and heroes to leading that liberates. Crows Nest NSW: Allen and Unwin.

Siraj-Blatchford, I. & Manni, I. (2006). Effective leadership in the early years sector:
The ELEYS study. London: Institute of Education, University of
London.

Waniganayake, M., Cheeseman, S., Fenech, M., Hadley, F., & Shepherd, W. (2012).
Leadership: Contexts and complexities in early childhood education.
South Melbourne: Oxford University Press.

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