Once the Cinderella of the education system, early years education has evolved into a much more substantially funded sector with staff experiencing greater opportunities for higher-level training and education as well as increasing demands. This book reflects practitioner debates about fundamental questions such as whether or not their field of work is a profession at all. Two key arguments are presented. The first is that early years education has matured to the point that pedagogical and regulatory frameworks have been introduced and linked to a terminology of professionalism. This has opened up a space for early years practitioners as insiders of this historically undervalued sector to question the nature of their practice.  The questioning leads to the second argument: the need for a new future for early years education marked by a critical ecology of the profession. This is a future in which educators maintain an attitude of critical enquiry in all aspects of their role, assessing the genuine needs of the sector, factoring in the different political and cultural milieux that influence it, and acting to transform it.

In exploring the issues, this book begins by recording in detail the daily work of early years educators from six countries: Australia, England, Finland, Germany, New Zealand and Sweden. These case studies explore what it means to act professionally in a particular context; perceptions of what being a professional in early childhood education means (including practitioners self perceptions and external perspectives); and common features of practice in each context. It moves on to analyse the wider socio-political forces that affect this day-to-day practice and recommends that practitioners act as transformative agents informed by the political and social realities of their time.

SECTION 1:Professionalism in Local and Cross National Contexts: towards a Critical Ecology of the Profession.- 1. Early Childhood Grows up: towards a Critical Ecology of the Profession.- 2. Relationships, Reflexivity and Renewal: Professional Practice in Action in an Australian Childrens Centre.-3. Leading and Managing in an Early Years Setting in England.- 4. Acting as a Professional in a Finnish Early Childhood Education Context.- 5. The Uncertain Expert: a Case Study from Germany.- 6. A Constant Juggle for Balance: a Day in the Life of a New Zealand Kindergarten Teacher.- 7. Working with a Democratic Curriculum: the Swedish Case Study.-SECTION 2 International Perspectives on Professionalism.- 8. Radical Reconstructions? Early Childhood Workforce Profiles in Changing European ECEC Systems.- 9. Childcare Professionalism in Flanders: an inside-outside Perspective.- 10. A Need, a Desire, a Shared Responsibility: Professional Development for a New Public Education.-11. A Profession Speaking and Thinking for Itself.