Creating Spaces to Entertain New Perspectives: The Role of Play in the In-service Professional Development and Learning of Directors and Teachers in Early Care and Education Centers

Abstract

This article explores fundamentals of the professional development of teachers and directors from the context of an early childhood education center. The center environment represents a community in the making, with the possibilities to construct, co-construct and to re-construct learnings and competencies of teachers, directors, young children and their families.  The author analyzes the characteristics of adult teacher play and with those of young children’s play. Several influences are identified that impact adults’ and children’s ability to play. The article offers several strategies to open dialogue and maintain teachers’ exploration of different perspectives of staff and leadership, creating spaces or opportunities for teachers and director to deepen their practice and ability to collaborate with team colleagues, forming a community of practice and “enter[ing] into a style of teaching which is based on questioning what we’re doing and why, on listening to children, on thinking about how theory is translated into practice and how practice informs theory, is to enter into a way of working where professional development takes place day after day in the classroom (Curtis y col., 2013, p.21).”