「3-5세 누리과정」의 가정 및 지역사회연계 활성화 방안

Abstract

This study was conducted as the part of the overarching study, titled ‘Monitoring and Assessment of the Nuri Curriculum’, with the purpose of examining in-depth the home-community partnerships and generating plans for further improvements. What is the meaning of home-community partnerships with regard to the early childhood care and education at kindergartens and child care centers? It could be defined as the pivotal means for supporting children’s development and expanding the scope of their experiences by encouraging ongoing interactions among children’s ecological systems. This study aims to examine the connections between home and the its surrounding communities that support 「Nuri Curriculum for Ages 3 to 5」 for children. Additionally, the interactions among children’s ecological systems, especially focusing on the early childhood education and care institutions, are examined. By doing so, it is aimed to understand the current state of home-community connections and furthermore design future plans for improving partnerships via 「Nuri Curriculum for Ages 3 to 5」. This study defines the concept of home-community partnership by analyzing the precedent studies and policies of relevance. Exemplar cases were collected via site-visits and interviews and were analyzed. The current state of home-and-community connection and the urgent needs were examined with the focus on the aspect of teaching and learning in 「Nuri Curriculum for Ages 3 to 5」. The content of a teacher’s manual for 「Nuri Curriculum for Ages 3 to 5」 was scrutinized as well. Also a survey was conducted on 2,100 participants, who were either a principal, a teacher, or a parent from 700 kindergartens and child care centers. Based on the results of the study, the roles of each system were delineated and suggested in categories. The active agents regarding the issue of home-community partnerships are differentiated as following: the “administrative systems” include the Ministry of Health and Welfare, the Ministry of Education and government agencies; the “support systems” comprise Early Childhood Education Agency and Child Care Support Centers. The “local systems” involve kindergartens, child care centers, local institutions and children’s home. In this study, different roles were suggested as follows: the administrative systems must initiate policy developments and institutionalize the related polices. As for the supporting systems, content/program development for creating effective home-community collaboration, providing relevant consultation services, and distributing successful example cases are suggested. At the local systems level, kindergartens and child care centers need to collaborate, and also offer diverse activities and programs to create active connections to the community. To create supportive connections among children’s ecological systems, the institutionalization of relevant policies should be conducted first. Also, public awareness and motivation need to be encouraged. Opportunities for professional developments, sharing of guidelines and successful case studies are necessary as well. In order to promote partnership between home and community (school), we suggest encouraging the daily face-to-face teacher-parent interactions, creating adjustment programs for new-coming children, offering opportunities for fathers and working parents, and providing families with programs that enable them to play active roles in their child’s education. Also, diversifying means of communication between teachers and parents is suggested. For strengthening the mutual relevance between school and community, we suggest establishing a nation-wide online-hub that provides information on local community resources, strengthening collaboration among urban-rural early childhood education and care institutions, ensuring the alignment between the early childhood education institutions and the local elementary schools, and offering consultation programs for utilizing the local community resources. Finally, creating a community network that involves both early childhood education and care institutions is suggested.