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emergent curriculum. Her new Director has chosen not to initiate a top-down directive to
the other teachers, feeling the process of change needs to be self-initiated. Felicia felt the
burden of being the lone voice for the approach.
Challenges.
In order to make the program accountable, Felicia follows the provincial
guidelines for kindergarten programs. This outcome-based framework has alleviated
some parent concerns with emergent curriculum and the issue of pupil learning. Felicia
demonstrates accountability by making links between the children’s project work and the
suggested learning outcomes for this age group. Now that only a small number of vocal
parents were expressing concern, Felicia realized her greatest challenge was with her coworker.
While Felicia’s co-worker is trained as an early childhood educator, her practice
remains consistent with a theme approach. She is resistant to the practice of emergent
curriculum and is unable to grasp some of the basic concepts. This stressful combination
of trying to prove the merits of the curriculum to the parents, in addition to “trying to
help” her co-worker, has impacted Felicia’s feelings of worth to the point of her
questioning her own collaborative skills.
Collaborators.
While Felicia says, “Emergent curriculum has brought me here,” she now finds
herself in an environment where “it is not embraced.” This has resulted in intense
feelings of frustration for her.
It would be a little less challenging had my co-worker been there to
support me. There were days when I went home crying because of the
burden of parent complaints. I thought I was going to burn out and this
frightened me. I reached out and I said to her, I can’t do this alone. The