Navigating different cultural beliefs and practices to support immigrant preschoolers and their families: a Bakhtinian textual analysis on preschool teacher and administrator perspectives

ABSTRACT

Understanding different cultural beliefs and practices has become increasingly important for early childhood educators in the contemporary United States. This paper investigates how preschool teachers and administrators navigate different cultural discourses in classrooms that frequently go unidentified or ignored, and how they support children and parents from immigrant families. Preschool teachers and administrators play a vital role as moderators in contemporary early childhood education and care settings due to the increasingly diverse demographic and cultural landscape. Using a version of Bakhtinian textual analysis, we illustrate the complexities of navigating multiple sets of cultural beliefs and practices in early childhood classrooms, as well as the possible challenges of supporting children and parents from immigrant families. The paper makes visible tacit cultural values and attitudes that manifest in early childhood classrooms to explore the circulating discourses about cultural diversity in the midst of rising anxieties, ambivalence, and tensions around immigration.

KEYWORDS:

• Immigration
• preschool
• cultural beliefs and practices
• Bakhtin

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author(s).

Notes on contributors

MinSoo Kim-Bossard received her Ph.D. in Curriculum and Instruction (Early Childhood Education) and Comparative and International Education from The Pennsylvania State University. Dr Kim-Bossard's research and teaching combines the fields of educational anthropology, Reconceptualist scholarship in early childhood education, and studio-based pedagogical practices borrowed from art education. Prior to joining The College of New Jersey as an Assistant Professor, she was a preschool teacher and art educator in Pennsylvania.

Jennifer Choi is a senior at TCNJ with a double major in Special Education and English.

Alejandra Meneses is a senior at TCNJ with a double major in Urban Elementary Education and English.

ORCID

MinSoo Kim-Bossard http://orcid.org/0000-0002-5963-488X

Additional information

Funding

This work was supported by the Mentored Undergraduate Summer Experience (MUSE) and the School of Education Research and Practice Mini-Grant Program at The College of New Jersey.