The Early Years Curriculum Research Paper Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 2500 words

The Early Years Curriculum - Research Paper Example Such childhood is viewed as necessary to provide the foundation for realizing children's abilities and talents as they grow up. The EYFS assures parents that their children achieve this goal. The EYFS undertakes several tasks in ensuring that the outcomes of Every Child Matters are achieved by setting the standards, providing for quality of opportunity, creating the framework for partnership working, improving quality and consistency, and laying a secure foundation for future learning (Statutory Framework 2008). Learning through EYFS is done through a principled approach which the following are embedded: a unique child, positive relationships, enabling environments, and learning and development. The observation on curriculum took place on Nov. 7, 2008 at Odessa Primary School while the other one was at Montessori Day Nursery which opened in 1998. It was noticed that both settings recognized the areas of learning and early learning goals of the EYFS which include personal, social, and emotional development, communication, language, and literacy, mathematics development, knowledge and understanding of the world, physical development, and creative development. However the delivery of these goals differed in the two observed settings, which will be mentioned in this paper. One of the underpinning policies of EYFS is "every child matters," which seemed to have been overlooked or neglected by the Montessori Day Nursery in t... y Nursery in that staff ignored other children who bullied others and threw objects on them, such as the incident in which one boy threw a metal car and hit another boy, to which a staff treated it as we don't hit our friends, which was contrary to her appeasement of the other child as it was an accident. Based on the observation, the Montessori Day Nursery did not seem to follow in practice the overarching aim of EYFS, which is to help young children achieve the five outcomes of Every Child Matters which include, staying safe. The bullied children seemed to experience lack of safety by the bullies, in which the staff tended to treat the situation lightly. Enjoying and achieving seems a lacking element in the setting, since there were plenty of distractions while the class teacher was reading a story, affecting the quality of the experience as well as other's desire on the activity. Most staff members ignored the children's bad behavior as if nothing happened, resulting in non-absorp tion and disturbance on the part of other children who were willing to listen and learn from the story. In fact, when the boy who hit another with a metal toy car was told we don't hit our friends, the teacher started to read the book again, in which the boy started to punch and push other children to which she did not pay attention and just carried on with the reading. When asked if she planned the activities in advance, the activity sheet shown did not match the actual activities conducted since according to the teacher, the activity sheet only served to guide her. The Montessori Day Nursery however heeded to the provision set by the EYFS in relation to housing young children of varying ages, from birth to the end of the academic years in which the child has his/her fifth birthday. The

Was the postWorld War II decolonization movement too rushed, Essay

Was the postWorld War II decolonization movement too rushed, especially in Africa' - Essay Example India was completely free and given back to Indians and India became independent of British rule. By 1950, a wave in independence struggle and the need to be free was felt across colonies in Africa and this first began in Benin, where natives wanted to come out of European rule. Very soon, other African nations such as Kenya followed and by 1990, the whole African continent attained freedom from European rule (Hargreaves, 1988). The freedom movement in Africa could be compared with the freedom struggle in India although both could be generalized yet distinct features would be drawn. Whereas in India, the decolonization process developed gradually and took many years and was well planned and carried out, the independence movement in Africa has been considered as rushed and unplanned that left unstable political scenarios and a vacuum in the region. The decolonization process in Africa was a rush for distribution of power and European nations remained apprehensive about the situation that also left Africa in a state of chaos. Following the devastation of World War, France, Britain and Germany, the major colonial powers could not retain their supremacy and control over colonies and nation states so independence from colonial rule was inevitable and showed first in the independence struggle of India. Although the entire African and Asian region followed the Indian example, Africa was not actually prepared to handle independence and chaos resulted from an attempt to end colonial rule almost abruptly. Liberia, Egypt and South Africa were already free nations and Moro cco and Sudan also attained freedom. Benin and later Kenya were however places where initial uprisings took form following the Indian example. However the uprisings in Africa were bloody and not as peaceful as was in India as the European powers initially resisted such uprisings although later had to give in to Africa's demand for independence (Hargreaves, 1988). However when independence in India was more organized, and political powers were distributed evenly, in Africa, chaos resulted with pullout of European powers and there was disruption in political and economic systems, no blueprint or political plan to run the nation states and the tribal and state boundaries were also arbitrary resulting in fights between tribal leaders. As traditions and customs formed an important part of African culture, the change in leadership brought about power struggle between tribal groups and African political leaders. Yet Africa was struggling for its independence just as India did and despite its ill reputation for being a nation characterized by slave trade, it attained its freedom. Although there may be similarities with the freedom struggle in Asia, African nations were markedly showed more disrespect due to cultural attitudes of Europeans and the resistance in Africa was thus tough, forced, unplanned and all of a sudden. In fact some historians have considered the struggle for African independence as unplanned and done as an inspiration of Indian independence so without proper weighing of the advantages and disadvantages of such a struggle. This