Early childhood educators experience high stress and burnout, yet their positive emotional experiences, particularly joy, remain understudied. This phenomenological study examined how seven early childhood teachers described joy in their work and the conditions that facilitated or inhibited it. Using secondary qualitative data from thirteen book club meeting transcripts with seven early career teachers, we used thematic analysis to identify how joy is experienced alongside occupational demands. Findings focus on contexts that generate joy and the ways it may function as a resilience resource. This study positions joy as a distinct and potentially protective factor in supporting teacher well-being. 

This presentation shares a project that examines the use of a cohort structure in an early childhood education preparation program. Faculty researchers surveyed undergraduate early childhood education majors at three points in the program (entry, mid-program, and nearing graduation) to gather candidates’ perspective of how participation in a cohort model influences their sense of belonging, academic development, and readiness for professional practice. Findings highlight how cohort-based program design can support retention, professional identity formation, and preparation for the early childhood workforce. Results will inform continuous program improvement and contribute to broader conversations about strengthening educator preparation pipelines. 

This session explores the integration of expressive arts—music, movement, drama, and visual arts—as a primary vehicle for fostering joy and Diversity, Equity, Inclusion, and Belonging (DEIB) in early childhood teacher preparation. By shifting the focus from product-oriented outcomes to process-based learning, pre-service teachers learn to value diverse cultural expressions and individual learner identities. The presenter will share a course framework that utilizes "Arts-Based Literacy" and "Around the Community" engagements to help future educators dismantle rigid curricular boundaries, ultimately defending the right of every child to a playful, culturally responsive, and joyful education. 

This session argues that the most powerful way to instill joy in ECE teacher education is for ECE teachers to first rediscover it. It describes a structured yet playful workshop experience, as an example of joy-centered curriculum and instruction in ECE teacher education. Participants will learn about the planning framework, materials, facilitation structures, reflection prompts, and follow up learning experiences. The experiences of ECE teachers who participated in the workshop will be brought to life through their own stories and documentation, offering authentic testimony to the power of play as a pathway to professional joy and renewed purpose. 

Kumar, A. R. (2026, June 8). First, we play: Cultivating joy in early childhood teacher education through a play workshop experience [Conference session]. NAECTE Summer 2026 Conference, Virtual. 

This presentation examines how Black families’ everyday literacy practices cultivate Black boys’ love of reading and how these practices can inform joyful, equity-centered instruction in early elementary classrooms. Drawing on a 2.5-year case study with 12 Black parents and their sons (ages 3–8), the study is grounded in Critical Literacy and Culturally Sustaining Pedagogy. Findings highlight culturally sustaining book selection, collaborative reading routines, and talk that links texts to boys’ racialized experiences as key drivers of motivation, strategy use, and self-efficacy. Implications focus on preparing early childhood teachers to design identity-affirming, family-informed literacy experiences that advance both achievement and joy. 

This study examines how family–teacher relationships contribute to early childhood teacher well-being, advancing DEIB-centered approaches that honor reciprocal partnerships. Survey data from 434 educators (birth–age 6) reveal that supportive family engagement practices significantly predict higher workplace well-being beyond demographic factors. Findings position families as critical sources of social support, fostering joy, resilience, and retention among educators. Implications highlight the need for teacher preparation programs to embed equitable, culturally responsive family partnership training as a core competency. Strengthening these relationships not only supports educator well-being but also promotes inclusive, affirming environments for young children and their families. 

Through semi-structured interviews, pre-K teachers described the culturally responsive literacy practices they employ, the challenges they encounter, and the kinds of support they would like to receive to implement them. The presentation will discuss these findings and suggest implications for practice. 

Nurturing joy in early childhood classrooms benefits all children and teachers. Joy supports a learning space where children are curious and motivated to learn. The purpose of this study was to examine how to cultivate joy, wonder, and curiosity in graduate early childhood teacher preparation programs. Action research inquiry was used to improve graduate students’ teaching practices for fostering joy in their classrooms. Using an early literacy curriculum focusing on joy and exploring the legacy of Fred Rogers, twenty-four graduate students were able to rediscover joy in their teaching practices. A vital aspect of teaching is the spirit of joy. 

This presentation examines the development and early implementation of a fully online BS in Early Childhood Education, designed to expand access to teacher certification for adult learners. Grounded in research on workforce shortages and barriers to access, the program combines synchronous and asynchronous online coursework with community-based clinical experiences across the state. Using a qualitative design-based approach, the study explores how program structures advance equity and inclusion in teacher preparation. Early findings indicate increased access for historically underserved populations, particularly working adults while maintaining alignment with accreditation and state requirements, offering a model for more equitable teacher preparation pathways. 

Home‑based child care educators (HBCCEs) — particularly Black women — sustain early learning ecosystems through culturally grounded, relationship‑rich care. Yet their well‑being is often overlooked in research, policy, and teacher preparation. This qualitative study, Healing Myself to Get Back Into the Fight, centers the lived experiences of Black HBCCEs and examines well‑being as a socio‑political construct shaped by racialized labor, community care traditions, and systemic inequities. A key finding of this study is the role of joy — not as a superficial emotion, but as a culturally rooted practice, a form of resistance, and a sustaining force.

Early childhood classrooms are simultaneously sites of engineering thinking and peer conflict, yet most curricula treat these as entirely separate domains. This paper presents findings from a semester-long action research study in a K–2 STEM classroom on the Navajo Nation, documenting one teacher-researcher's inquiry into cross-disciplinary problem solving. By aligning the Engineering Design Process with Navajo peacemaking values, the study reframed conflict resolution as a problem-solving opportunity, affirming children's cultural identities while integrating engineering thinking and social problem solving. Findings center relationship and reflection as drivers of responsive, culturally grounded curriculum design with implications for early childhood teacher education. 

Early childhood teacher education programs often grapple with balancing social and emotional learning (SEL) and social justice in curriculum. To investigate this dynamic, I conducted a qualitative study utilizing 1 collective storytelling as a site of critical consciousness and sociocritical literacy. Preservice teachers wrote children’s books exploring SEL and social justice, and findings, supported by analyses of the books among other artifacts, indicate that students leaned more towards SEL. This paper relies on educational third spaces and culturally sustaining pedagogy to explore how teacher educators can cultivate collective storytelling experiences that empower preservice teachers to be ambitious in their social justice approaches. 

Higher education faculty play a key role in removing systemic and program-level barriers to equitable education and career pathways for diverse and non-traditional students. Online content analysis was used to identify US colleges and universities that offer academic credit to students who have earned the Child Development Associate (CDA) Credential and/or that have designed coursework to support CDA preparation through course competency alignment. Strategies for issuing credit for prior learning, aligning coursework content, and partnering with Career & Technical Education (CTE) and Registered Apprenticeships were identified as key solutions to advancing equity, inclusion, and justice through early childhood teacher preparation. 

Council for Professional Recognition: https://www.cdacouncil.org/en/ 

Council Alumni Network Higher Education Consortium: https://councilcan.org/spaces/17731839/page  

The presenter will discuss program examples that reflect efforts to embody culturally responsive and sustaining approaches to early childhood teacher preparation. The participants will discuss, explore, and evaluate the culturally sustaining pathways, in particular credit for prior learning, as the opportunities to adapt and use these ideas in early childhood preparation programs. The analysis of initial faculty insights and reactions of students will illustrate the impact of access for the underserved pipeline of incumbent early childhood workers and implications for addressing teacher shortage in Illinois. 

‘Walking with Place’ pedagogy foregrounds Indigenous worldviews in teacher education and shapes my professional formation from a graduate assistant to an assistant professor. I explore how Hamm’s (2015) ‘Walking with Place’ informs growing debates around Land conflict acknowledgment as performative. I document students' place-thought-walk narratives collected in a range of institutions and revisit the material by reengaging three examples Hamm (2015) uses to illustrate how she begins to think with Place in different ways. I conclude with conceptual tensions between reconciliation and decolonization for diverse student teachers for whom colonization, assimilation, and displacement reveal messy relations with reconciliation pedagogies. 

Integrating diverse guest lecturers or the more knowledgeable other, (Vygotsky, 1978) into classroom curriculum has the power to disrupt the metanarrative and privilege their lived experiences and insider knowledge. This practice illuminates experiential knowledge, offers representative role models, and can foster an inclusive counter-narrative that centers historically silenced voices as sources of expertise. Inclusion of diverse voices can legitimize education curriculum, provides students access to diverse perspectives, adds nuance and variety, and demonstrates that learning and meaning making can be collaborative. 

The term “reflective practitioner,” introduced by Schön (1983), highlights the gap between professional theory and lived practice. As junior faculty, we aim to model reflective practice through a social-emotional lens. Although the importance of explicitly teaching social and emotional learning (SEL) is well established (Jones & Khan, 2017), particularly in a post-pandemic context, preparing preservice teachers for this responsibility remains complex. Through ongoing self-study grounded in Noddings’ Theory of Care (Adhikari et al., 2023), we examine evolving pedagogical practices, mentorship, and strategies to address student anxiety while strengthening preservice teachers’ SEL foundations. 

This study examines how two teacher educators intentionally cultivate joy in preservice early childhood teacher education through their pedagogical practices. Using a duoethnographic approach, it explores their experiences in Hawaiʻi and how instructional decisions shape preservice teachers’ engagement. Grounded in culturally responsive and sustaining pedagogy, joy is framed as a pedagogical stance enacted through relational, culturally grounded, place-based practices. Through shared narratives and reflection, the study highlights strategies such as warm-up activities, culturally responsive prompts, and empathy-centered teaching. Findings show that joy is intentionally designed through teaching practices, contributing to more sustainable and meaningful approaches in early childhood teacher education.