Knowledge Hub

The culmination of many years of work in defining and promoting quality pedagogy, ISSA’s Quality Resource Pack proposes a practice-research-policy blended approach to quality, enabled by various tools that can be used with practitioners, pre- and in-service trainers, supervisors, parents and policy makers. The package is grounded in ISSA’s Competent Educators for the 21^st Century, a policy document that proposes ISSA’s Definition of Quality Pedagogy.

The Quality Resource Pack is a comprehensive set of tools, which aims to:

• Facilitate the process of building a shared understanding around quality practices among practitioners, managers, parents, children and policy makers.
• Support and provide guidance to preschool and primary school practitioners in improving their everyday practice by enriching and expanding their competences through self- and group reflection, video recording, peer learning and cooperation, being part of professional learning communities and engaging in continuous dialogue with parents and communities
• Inspire pre- and in-service training providers with strategies and instruments to nurture sustainable mechanisms for continuous quality improvements.

Given its complex and systemic approach to quality, the pack provides the opportunity to address a wide range of target audiences, such as: educators (individuals or professional communities), pre-service and in-service training institutions, parents (individuals or associations), communities, policy makers, education authorities, pre-school/school administrators, evaluators, researchers, mass media, as well as the general public. Specific ways of addressing different audiences, as well as ways of introducing the resource pack or its individual resources, need to be carefully explored by those working with the resources.

The resources in ISSA's Quality Resource Pack have been developed using the expertise of ISSA members with generous support from the Open Society Foundations.

The Quality Resource Pack includes guidebooks and tools that complement each other, but can also be used separately. Some of them can be freely accessed, and some of them are subject to purchasing a license to use them. All the resources in the Quality Resource Pack are:

• The ISSA Principles of Quality Pedagogy (ISSA, 2010)
• Putting Knowledge into Practice: a Guidebook for Educators on the ISSA Principles of Quality Practice (ISSA, 2012)
• The Professional Development Tools for Improving Quality of Practices (in Kindergarten) (ISSA, 2012
• The Professional Development Tools for Improving Quality of Practices (in Primary School) (ISSA, 2012)
• Instrument for Assessing Quality Practices in Early Childhood Education Services for Children from 3 to 10 Years Old (ISSA, 2013)
• An Online Video Library on Quality Pedagogy (2012)
• Professional Learning Communities (2016)
• Leaflets for Advocacy Initiatives for Quality Practices (ISSA, 2014)
  • Invest in Quality Teachers
  • Give your child the best start
  • Early Childhood Educators Change Lives
• Roads to Quality: Strengthening Professionalism in Early Childhood Education and Care Settings (ISSA, 2016)

AÇEV Foundation, ISSA’s member organization in Turkey, is please to share this report, which is the result of a joint project. Yale University, UNICEF, AÇEV Foundation, the Fetzer Institute and other global partners have embarked on a joint initiative to achieve the common objective of analyzing the linkages between early childhood development (ECD) and peace building through scientific research, to disseminate results and advocate for better policies on global platforms - as a pathway to sustainable peace. 

A new report launched by the European Commission includes a case study exploring the work of ISSA’s network and of the Open Society Foundations (OSF): OSF/ISSA Approaches to Teacher Training and Pedagogy. The case study was written by Dawn Tankersley (ISSA Program Expert) and Sarah Klaus (Director, Early Childhood Program, Open Society Foundations).

Building Opportunities in Early Childhood from the Start - A Teacher's Guide to Good Practices in Inclusive Early Childhood Services is a guidebook developed within "The Good Start Project", funded by the European Commission and led by Roma Education Fund in partnership with ISSA and other organizations. The project aimed to raise early childhood education and care (ECEC) outcomes for Romani children in an effort to enhance school readiness and long-term life opportunities, while scaling up access to quality ECEC services for disadvantaged Romani children. The guidebook is organized around ISSA Principles of Quality Pedagogy. Besides brief theoretical parts, it is promoting examples of good practices as well as different activities which can be used with professionals, families and children. 

Activity book for early childhood educators contains a body of activities for early childhood educators for planning for integrated teaching using a thematic approach. The main purpose of this book is to help professionals, and give hints and ideas to creatively plan activities for children from 2 to 6. In particular, this activity book uses the rhymes and stories created by Georgian poetess Teona Beqishvili. The resource was created for Tbilisi (capital city of Georgia) kindergartens, but in few years it was scaled up to the entire country. 

Putting Knowledge into Practice: A Guidebook for Educators is a reference book that describes in depth each of the Principles of Quality Pedagogy and the related Indicators. The Guidebook connects theory with practice and research and provides clear examples on how to use the Quality Principles. Lastly, it makes evident how children benefit from teachers using the quality tools consistently.

The booklet Diversity and Social Inclusion - Exploring Competences for Professional Practice in Early Childhood Education and Care booklet is a result of the ISSA and DECET (Diversity in Early Childhood Education and Training network) Working Group on Professionalism with the support from Bernard van Leer Foundation. It was created to highlight the need for the professional Early Childhood Education and Care (ECEC) communities to recognize, respect and embrace diversity and equality as part of their ECEC professional engagement.

Based on interviews with more than 120 ECEC professionals from  Belgium (Flemish Community), France, Ireland, Serbia, Mexico, Morocco, The Netherlands, Scotland and England,  fundamental and essential competences for ECEC providers in addressing diversity and equality issues were defined as well as five specific competences. It includes quotes from practice which are inspiring and which are showing that those working in ECEC  have an openness to grow and learn with the children and families in their services. These competences challenge the profession to explore personal and collective values and holistically embrace diversity and social inclusion. The booklet can also be used as a training tool.

Professional Development Tool - a tool for gathering examples on ISSA quality principles is a tool used for identifying and documenting examples of good practice in teachers' practice (peer observation, etc.) on specific ISSA quality principles and indicators. Teachers use these examples for reflective discussion for developing common understanding. The tool can be used in professional learning communities or in the mentoring process. 

My Reflective Diary: ISSA Pedagogical Principles is developed around the ISSA Principles of Quality Pedagogy. It can be used to document professionals on-going changing understandings of different principles as they work together in learning communities to go deeper into the concepts presented.

Study on the implementation of ISSA's Pedagogical Standards (2001-2008) was developed to evaluate the impact of the work done by ISSA members in 27 countries on quality assurance and improvement. The study examines the role of the ISSA Pedagogical Standards (2003) as they were implemented through certification, mentoring, training and as part of broader initiatives for improving quality of preschool and primary school care and education. The results of the study showcase how the ISSA Standards influenced changes on different levels : individual teacher practice, level of educational institutions, community culture, and national policy. The study also includes case studies, best practices and lessons learned across the ISSA network.

The outcomes are documented in terms of how the standards influenced three levels of implementation: individual teacher practice, educational systems and school and community culture, and national policy. The final results of the study:

Competent Educators of the 21st Century: Principles of Quality Pedagogy is a policy document that defines quality teaching practices when working with children from 3 to 10 years old, and their families, to better support the child's holistic development and well-being.

After a brief description on how these principles came to pass and to whom they apply, the resource clarifies 7 Focus Areas of Quality that form the framework. Thereafter, 20 specific principles are being explained, followed with no less than 85 indicators on how and where to apply the principles in Early Childhood Education and Care daily practices.
 

Click on the cover to download the PDF in the other languages

 French                            Spanish                          
          

Russian

Competent Educators of the 21st Century: Principles of Quality Pedagogy is a policy document that defines quality teaching practices when working with children from 3 to 10 years old, and their families, to better support the child's development and well-being.  

This resource contains:

• A brief history of the development of the Principles, including references to the international documents on which they are built
• Explanations of the values the Principles represent for ISSA and its member NGOs
• Short suggestions for how they can be used and by whom
• Brief descriptions of each of the 7 Focus Areas that provide the framework for the Principles of Quality Pedagogy
• A list of the 20 Principles and the 85 Indicators that describe how to apply these Principles.

In addition to the to the four full PDF versions, ISSA has translated the Quality Principles into two Romani dialects: Vlaxicko and Rumungricko. Download the printable leaflet versions by clicking on the images below. 

Vlaxicko                                               Rumungricko

The Principles are accompanied by an enabling Quality Resource Pack that is meant to help unpack and translate the principles into practice. The Quality Resource Pack is available only to licensed ISSA members. For more information, contact us.

Arielle is given a little coconut plant as a present. She plants the tree, watches it grow, bloom flowers and finally produces coconuts. A hurricane does major damage to many of the neighborhood plants including uprooting the coconut tree. The cycle of life goes on when two small coconuts are found and are planted, giving rise to two new plants.

Written by Ghyslaine Rochelin (Haiti)Illustrated by Olivier Bertoni (Haiti)

Price: € 9,99

Picture Book Preschool 8.25 x 8.25 in. - 32 pages - paperback
Copyright 2010

Please click on the links below to order this book in the language of your choice and for shipping from the most convenient location. (Books will be purchased and shipped from amazon.com (US), amazon.co.uk (UK) or amazon.de (Germany).

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Creole

978-1-60195-319-3

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English

978-1-60195-322-3

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French

978-1-60195-318-6

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Early Learning and Development Standards for Children from Birth to 7 (ELDS) and Early Childhood Development Teacher Standards are coupled to reinforce a holistic approach to child learning and development through child-centered practices. The ELDS, along with traditionally addressed physical and cognitive domains, bring into the foreground the socio-emotional domain, language and communication, as well as attitudes towards learning. All five domains are interrelated and each domain is explicated through standards and indicators.

The document is structured around 4 developmental periods - 0-18 , 19- 36, 37-60, and 61-84 months. The indicators are specific to the age of children and are hierarchically organized depending on their complexity. For each indicator there are suggested relevant activities and learning contexts that adults can use to support the achievement of the expectations formulated by standards. The documents states that the indicators should NOT be considered an exhaustive list of steps to be followed by exactly and in the same way/at the same rate by every child, it is NOT to be used as an evaluation document either with children or teachers.

The publication, Early Childhood Development and Education in emergencies: country profiles from the CEE/CIS region presents the existing emergency preparedness resources and plans for protecting children’s rights and meeting their needs in five countries in the CEE/CIS region (Bosnia-Herzegovina, Georgia, Kyrgyzstan, Moldova, and Tajikistan). It was created under the partnership project between UNICEF, ECARO and ISSA in 2009 with the purpose of showcasing an overview of the emergency context in the five countries, highlighting common issues which need to be addressed as countries further develop their emergency response and plans to ensure that young children are protected and their needs as well as needs of their families are met.