An Attempt of “New Early Childhood Education” at the Kindergarten Attached to Chiba Normal School after the Enactment of the School Education Law

Abstract

This study aimed to identify the characteristics of the “New Early Childhood Education (1947),” developed and practiced at the Kindergarten attached to Chiba Normal School, after the enactment of the School Education Law, based on the available practical materials. The results highlighted the following three characteristic aspects of the “New Early Childhood Education”: a focus on and embodiment of “appropriate environments” provided in the School Education Law; the structure of daily lives based on the voluntary activities of children, induced in relation to environments; and the adoption of care and education forms that ensure adequate development of children's voluntary activities and reconstruction of the “guiding child care theory,” attempted at the kindergarten since before the war.