Spiritual Experiences in Early Childhood Education Four Kindergarteners, One Classroom

Spirituality is frequently avoided in the public school classroom in an attempt to prevent controversy. However, by ignoring, preventing, or discounting spirituality, educators can also inhibit children?s spiritual development. Based on qualitative research and interactions with both children and adults, Jennifer Mata argues that educators should be responsible for addressing children?s spirituality in the classroom and for re-introducing these topics into early childhood education.

By surveying the existing literature on spirituality, Mata offers a working definition of spirituality as an essential characteristic of humanness, which helps connect individuals to themselves, others, and to the transcendent. The book portrays stories and descriptions of four kindergarten children in their classroom setting, exploring their different modes of expressing and experiencing spirituality. Finally, Spiritual Experiences in Early Childhood Education offers a review of pedagogical strategies to nurture spirituality, for both teachers to implement in the classroom and teacher educators to facilitate in teacher preparation programs.

Introduction
Part I: Making the Case for Spirituality
Chapter One: Why Spirituality?
Chapter Two: What is Spirituality?
Chapter Three: Spirituality – How can it be nourished?
Part II: Through the Spiritual Experiences of Children
Chapter Four: Studying Children’s Spirituality
Chapter Five: Ellen: “I can spell your name!”
Chapter Six: Anna: “You can’t do that! Can I help?”
Chapter Seven: Mark: “Uhm, uhm, uhm, dance to the music.”
Chapter Eight: Matt: “I don’t know.”
Chapter Nine: Looking for Commonalities and Differences in Children’s Spirituality
Part III: What does this mean for Early Childhood Education?
Chapter Ten: Answering Guiding Questions and tying it back to Theory and Research
Chapter Eleven: What needs to be done by Teachers and Early Childhood Education Programs?
References
Appendix A Semi-Structured Individual Activity Protocol
Appendix B Photographs Presented in the Individual Activity
Appendix C Semi-Structured Group Activity Protocol
Appendix D Questions Guiding Informal Conversations

Jennifer Mata, Ed.D., is Assistant Professor of Early Childhood Education at the College of Education, DePaul University, USA. She received a doctorate in early childhood education from Teachers College, Columbia University, and has worked in the field of early childhood education since 1995. Dr. Mata has been an infant and toddler, preschool, and kindergarten teacher in both monolingual and bilingual settings in the U.S. and abroad, and was formerly Associate Professor at Universidad Metropolitana in Caracas, Venezuela. Her research interests stem from children’s spirituality and teacher preparation to moral development and bilingual and bicultural education.