Cultivating Professional Friendships in Early Childhood Education

In the final legacy of a rich career, author Diane Kashin draws on a wealth of research and a lifetime of professional friendships to invite readers to muse with her on what it means to be a friend, how to make friends and keep friends, and what happens when friendships end.

Early childhood educators are skilled in supporting and promoting children’s friendships. But adult professional friendships, sometimes known as critical friendships, are also integral to early childhood education, giving educators daily support and collaboration, nurturing their professional and pedagogical growth, and--not to be discounted--making the job fun! Enhance your joy and practice as an early childhood educator through professional friendships.

This book is an invitation for you to:

• Reflect on the big ideas of professional friendships.
• Consider how to apply the theories of professional friendship to practice.
• Articulate what you value in a professional friend.
• Focus on yourself to describe your own identity.
• Communicate the expectations that you have for your professional friends in your current and potential relationships.

Diane Kashin is a registered early childhood educator in the province of Ontario in Canada and a retired ECE professor. Diane is the past president of the Association for Early Childhood Educators of Ontario and the current coordinator of the York Region Nature Collaborative. Diane’s areas of interest include emergent curriculum, play-based learning, loose parts, the Reggio Emilia Approach, and Indigenous perspectives of early learning and outdoor play. Find her blog at Technology Rich Inquiry Based Research.