Asian Models

Asian scholars have challenged some of the cultural assumptions of learning models that are being integrated from the West. While Ahn (2023) observed that key pieces of Reggio are being removed in the iteration that she studied (i.e. collaboration and aspects that are harmonious with Confucianism and Korean values), there is also the question of play.

Play-Based Learning

Through its “hundred languages” philosophy, Reggio Emilia encourages individual children to express their learning through the exploration of many materials and experiences; this, in and of itself, is a highly Western construct. In addition, it fosters exploration through a broader mode called “play-based learning,” which is usurping traditional, more teacher-directed models of early learning all over the globe (e.g., Nigeria, Korea, China, India, and many others). What we have to think about, then, is:

• What exactly are the cultural assumptions of learning through play?
• Do these assumptions translate to other cultures and the multitude of ways in which children engage in play?
• Does play really support learning across cultures? If so, what does that look like and are cultures adapting this Western model to best fit what they do in the classroom?

Recall earlier in the chapter that Patricia Falope referred to play as being distinct in many ways in Nigeria as compared to the West, and this has been key to her local collaborations with educators. It is in the differences in notions of play and learning that the type of hybrid model she is helping to cultivate can be relevant for a particular community. So, when turning to other cultures, it is important to understand what we mean by play or explicit teaching, as both are readily present all over the world.

Just as we have done with the broad application of Piaget in schooling, is the West persisting through the broad application of play-based learning? We can best understand the impact of integrating play-based learning by referring to scholars in other countries.

India

In the Indian context, Gupta (2022) takes this next step beyond what Falope and Ahn have done to address the use of play-based learning to actually question it as a further tool of colonial practice. Accurately identifying it as a Western approach, Gupta explored this “policy borrowing and local realities” question in the new Indian early learning curriculum that has moved from being highly structured to child-centred and play-based. She rightly identifies cultural values emphasizing individuals over the collective and even ties this individualism to a particular political (i.e., capitalist) view of childhood.

We must listen to Gupta’s warning because it makes us not only question “ages and stages” as many ECEs are known to do as an act of critical reflection on Piaget (and developmentalism more broadly), but we have to question our insidious values in the individual that permeate so very much of what we think about in the West. That is not to say that those values are to be judged as right or wrong; rather, it is to say that they must be made explicit. The West often looking to the global South or East Asia to dictate that teacher-directed, rote learning must stop! But must it?

In Nigeria, Falope has discovered a hybrid approach that integrates Indigenous practices of play into early years curriculum (derived from local materials and values) while maintaining explicit teaching in numeracy and literacy (which are highly valued in Nigerian early learning). Gupta speaks to this local relevance but also challenges the wisdom of implementing a system that has not been analyzed for its cultural import.

Like Falope, Gupta refers to not only a long history of play in learning in India (to the late nineteenth century), but she also points to British colonial practice that instituted rote memorization and rigorous examinations (2022). This is also parallel with British colonization in Nigeria, establishing a troubling pattern of Western colonial content coming in different ways to different parts of the world.

So, how does Gupta suggest that policy move forward in India? She did a complex analysis of the discourse used in the national preschool curriculum in India to identify differences from its previous versions and where it was connected to global influences versus local realities. She arrived at many areas of fundamental conflict, but they related primarily to:

• The emphasis is on the individual being neither supported locally nor practically with large local class sizes.
• A lack of tools and resources locally to implement the curriculum as written.
• Teachers who were unfamiliar with constructivist theories yet who may be offered an opportunity to train with instructors/trainers from the Global North, further reinforcing the cultural clash.

Considering the complexities of cultural hybridity and Western models being used around the world, consider this video clip of an early learning circle time at the laboratory school at Somaiya Vidyavihar University (2016) in Mumbai, India.

Captions were not provided from the authors of this third-party video, but a transcript is available.

Malaysia

Consistent with this cultural conflict, Kheioh, Low, & Malaysia (2022) found that ethnically Chinese educators in Malaysia had difficulties in implementing play-based learning in a preschool classroom. While the early years curriculum in Malaysia has not yet incorporated play, there is interest in it, and the authors report in their literature review that it supports “problem-solving, creativity and imagination, reading and arithmetic skills” (p. 19).

The authors looked at one private preschool as a case study and found that teachers were not consistently applying the principles of play-based learning; moreover, the teachers did not have extensive knowledge about the approach, which was a strong factor in their ability, or lack of ability, to take it up in the classroom. Specifically, there was evidence of a more teacher-directed model even though the teachers reported valuing play very strongly.

This value-practice gap parallels what Ahn (2023) reported in South Korea and is another example of the type of cultural clash that can occur when a Western model is adopted internationally.