Research Around the World

Sub Saharan Africa and European early childhood education research


 There are two sites that I want to contrast; the European and the Sub Saharan Africa early childhood education research sites.


The European Early Childhood Education site is has a research journal named European Early Childhood Education Research Journal (EECERJ) that is one of the most prestigious early childhood journals in the world. It is one of only four early years journals indexed by the Institute for Scientific Information. 

The latest research topic from the EECERJ is the study of 'belonging'. Here is a summation of he article titled, An investigative case study into early childhood educators’ understanding about ‘belonging’. This study addresses the understanding of belonging from eight early childhood educators in the area of social/emotional belonging and cultural/ political belonging.


The early childhood development virtual university (ECDVU) addresses early childhood care and development (ECD) leadership needs in the majority world. Reports are generated in a three year program. The Reports are purposefully designed as a team project intended to introduce the participants to working cooperatively as well as to familiarize the country team with existing sources of data regarding children, families and women in their country. 

The latest research topic is the study of fathers and their engagement with their children. Here is a summation of the Nigeria article titled, Involving Fathers in Early Childhood Care and Development: In Africa and also in the Western world, the society sees it as the responsibility of women to oversee young children’ matters and the activities that affect them. This situation is being created by cultural norms. This is the major part that creates the conditions in which men have little to do with young children. Nyerere (1998) reported that cultural norms that affect fathers’ participation in childcare practices could affect development and the general well-being of children, including the quality of family life. The objective of this study is to investigate the current roles of fathers and explore ways to increase the involvement of fathers and other males in childcare.


Both of these sites have grate information. The biggest difference that I experienced in the two sites is that the research articles are attainable on the Sub-Saharan Africa site and the articles have to be paid for on the European site.

What surprised me on the Sub-Saharan Africa site is that the country, being so male dominant and female submissive, has some of the same concerns that we do as far as fathers engaging and being involved with their children. 






Reference

European Early Childhood Education
https://www.eecera.org/journal/

An investigative case study into early childhood educators’ understanding about ‘belonging’

https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10.1080/1350293X.2018.1412016?src=recsys

Sub-Saharan Africa Early Childhood
http://www.ecdvu.org/ssa/documents/Nigeria_Country_Report.pdf

Involving Fathers in Early Childhood Care and Development
http://www.ecdvu.org/ssa/documents/major_projects/Hua%20-%20MP%20Final%20-%20UVic%20LP.pdf