Professional Documents
Culture Documents
Instructor
Jack Hicks
jack.hicks@carleton.ca
Please note: ALL e-mails between
students and myself (and the
Teaching Assistants) MUST be to/from
Carleton e-mail accounts
Office Hours:
Dunton Tower room 1314/1315
Thursdays 16:00 to 17:00
Teaching Assistants
Role of TAs
1. Facilitate Discussion Groups
2. Grading assignments and exams
Our TAs
Hannah Miller-Selzer
Tabetha Meikle
Students
From Ottawa, other places in Ontario,
elsewhere in Canada, international
students?
What department/major?
Different backgrounds, different life
experiences, and different
perspectives and attitudes
Have kids?
Questions
Where did you grow up?
Tell me something about your
childhood
Where have you travelled?
Tell me a story from your travels
What is a child?
What is childhood?
What Is My Textbook?
Theres no textbook as such
The coursepack of readings will be
available at Haven Books -- 43
Seneca St., at Sunnyside
+ other assigned readings
+ In-class videos
Important Dates
Assignments due: Jan. 14, Jan. 28
and Feb. 25
Last day to withdraw from fall term
courses without academic penalty:
Apr. 8
In-class final exam: to be scheduled
during the examination period from
Apr. 8
Reflections on Questions
Biological parents still together / Single
parents/ Blended families / more challenging
situations
Big-city Canada / Small-town Canada (I find
that the world looks better in a small town.) /
Grew up partly overseas / Grew up overseas
and moved to Canada as an adult
Some have travelled extensively / other not
so much, or only in Canada/US
Lots of life yet to live, many places yet to
see!
Reflections on Questions
The most beautiful days of human
life.
Many mentioned age ranges and the
need for adult protection; I am a
child
Were all children in our parents
eyes.
Income
Gender
Ethnicity
Political systems
Educational systems
Family values
Discourses of childhood
Discourse is the word used by social
constructionists to describe a set of
ideas that reflect an ideology or
value system
These ideas reflect socio-political and
historical context
These set of ideas influences
outcomes of child development
Discourses of childhood
Change with changes in time and
place
Children as well as adults have ideas
on what childhood is
Discourse of childhood may be
different for children and adults from
the same family
Philippe Aris
French historian
Pioneer of the idea of childhood as a social
construction (Centuries of Childhood, 1962)
Analyzed paintings to extrapolate social
constructions of childhood
Children were depicted as small adults until the
1500s
Until then children not seen as different from
adults
Because of high infant mortality of the Middle
Ages adults were indifferent to children until they
reached the age of 7
Giotto, Ognissanti
Madonna, c. 1310
Western discourses of
childhood
Puritan discourse: Children are
ignorant and sinful, but could be
enlighten through discipline and
education
Thomas Hobbes (1588-1679)
Life without strict discipline would be
nasty, brutish, and short
Oliver Twist clip
Western discourses of
childhood
Tabula rasa discourse: Children
arrive in the world as tabula rasa
John Locke (1632-1704)
Children are inadequate precursors to
the real state of human beings but
could be educated to develop a rational
and reasoning mind.
Children are a product of their
environment (neither bad or good)
Western discourses of
childhood
Romantic discourse: Children are born
innocent and naturally good and society
corrupts their heart
Jean-Jacques Rousseau (1712-1778)
children should be allowed to develop at
their own rate without adult authority and
corruption from society;
happiness is what childhood should strive
for;
education should address the specific
developmental needs of children
Summary
Notions of childhood can vary widely across
cultures and societies, and within a same
society (i.e., Canada) social constructions
Notions of childhood have varied according
to historical context
Three main ideologies are the origin for
most views on childhood in the Western
world and influencing education puritan,
and tabula rasa and romantic
Histories of childhood outside the Western
world are limited
Key concepts
Children and childhood have
universal characteristics
Adults need to take care of children
Childhood can be governed at a
global level
The global level shapes childhood at
the local level
Family, school and work also shape
childhood
Levels of influence
The
Chil
d
The
Famil
y
The
Econom
y
Health,
educatio
n, child
labour
policies
Social
security,
welfare,
and
taxation
policies
Political Framework
Levels of influence
Play
With adults and peers
With the environment
Alone
School age
High
Number
concepts
Sensitivity
Hearing
Peer
relationships
Symbols
Language
Vision
Low
0
Executive
function
3
Age
Graph developed by Council for Early Child Development (ref: Nash, 1997; Early Years Study, 1999; Shonkoff, 2000.) Slide presented by
Clyde Hertzman, Human Early Learning Partnership in Reggio Emilia, Italy, September 2011.
The family
What constitutes a family?
Social resources:
Relationships
Parenting skills
Education
Cultural practices
Economic resources:
Disposable income
Occupation
Housing conditions
The family
Primary social influence through
attachment
Secure attachment as a building block for
social and physical exploration
Exploration leads to self-confidence which
leads to more exploration
What factors can impact on mothers and
children to develop secure attachment?
Maternal depression, low birth weight,
malnutrition, infections, war, domestic violence,
poverty, physical or mental disability
The family
SES gradient effect
Under 5-mortality
Greater in countries with wider gap
Economic growth not paired with more
spending increases child mortality
The family
Mental and physical health
Addictions, violence, depression, chronic
illness, physical handicaps, acute stress, HIV
How can the health of the caregivers affect child
dev.?
ECD- TEAM: Total Environment Assessment Model for Early Child Development (Siddiqi, Irwin,
Hertzman 2007)
Globalization
What is globalization?
It is a particular type of international
integration (Noam Chomsky)
Different approaches
Scientific: Generation of facts by testing
hypotheses through experimental and
observational study
What do we know about children?
Scientific approach
What is the purpose of science in child
studies?
Simply put, science consists of seeking to
establish universal laws of cause and effect
(whether about physical processes like gravity or
psychological and physiological processes like
development) through developing theories and
testing them by observation and experiment
(Stainton Rogers, 2003; pg. 12)
Do you agree with this statement?
What does universal laws of cause of effect mean?
What role do context and individual differences play in
science?
Scientific approach
Social contructionism
What is the purpose of social
constructionism?
Its aim is to describe the alternative ways in
which we can answer the question What is
a child and What is childhood, to explore
the origins of these questions, and, crucially,
to examine the consequences of adopting
different answers. (Stainton Rogers, 2003; pg. 24)
Social contructionism
An extreme take on social
contructionism is that nothing is
objective but rather the product of
human meaning-making (Stainton Rogers,
2003; pg. 25)
Social constructionism
What is a discourse?
a set of interconnected ideas that work
together in a self-contained way, ideas
that are held together by a particular
ideology or view of the world (Stainton
Rogers, 2003; pg. 21)
Discourses of childhood
Romantic discourse Jean Jacques
Rousseau
Children are innocent and inherently good natured.
We must support and nurture them and protect their
innocence
Applied approach
What is the purpose of the applied approach?
This is where concern is focused on practical issues and
questions, such as: how children should be brought up
and cared for; what should be done to foster their
development; what support and services should be
provided for them; and what should be done when they
cause trouble. (Stainton Rogers, 2003; pg. 30)
Applied approach
How does law take into account what is
known about children in dealing with
young offenders?
The welfare model
While it sees that children can be criminally
responsible, it advocates for treatment of young
offenders that is different from that of adults
(rehabilitation)