Supporting ‘successful knowledge transfer’ for early childhood professionals – An emerging conceptual framework in an Australian context

ABSTRACT

A wealth of literature exists that describes the process of knowledge transfer (KT) as activities, interactions and mechanisms that foster the dissemination, application, and contextualisation of acquired learning into practice. However, little of this literature addresses the idiosyncratic nature of early childhood education and care contexts (ECEC), or the implications the process of KT has for professional development and professional learning of early childhood educators. This paper reports on efforts to address this issue by investigating existing literature. A four-stage filtering process was employed to interrogate KT literature (process, frameworks and models), and contextualise this information for ECEC settings. The paper outlines an emerging conceptual framework that has relevancy to ECEC in Australia, and more broadly, and explains how knowledge from professional development can translate into practice. The framework reinforces that the process of successful KT needs to start by identifying knowledge, and then move to acquiring and applying knowledge, before upscaling and sustaining knowledge.

KEYWORDS:

• Knowledge transfer
• early childhood education
• professional learning
• professional development
• framework

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the authors.