Interacting or Interfering? Improving interactions in the early years

by Julie Fisher

High quality interactions are recognized as fundamental to the achievement of outstanding teaching and learning in the early years. If you are working with children from six months to six years this authoritative new book from leading author Julie Fisher encourages you to reflect deeply on the quality and impact of interactions in your setting. Drawing on research undertaken in baby rooms, nurseries and classrooms over four years the book challenges prevailing orthodoxies and offers specific practical guidance on how to improve the quality of interactions on a day-to-day basis. With its illuminating examples, the book shows how you can best tune into and respond effectively to young children’s conversations. It exemplifies how interactions are most effectively sustained and how developing high quality interactions can better scaffold and support children’s learning and development.

Genres: Education

232 pages, Paperback

Published January 16, 2016

About the author

Dr Julie Fisher is a Professor in the Faculty of Information Technology at Monash University (Australia). She has worked and conducted research in the information systems field for over 20 years. Her research area of focus is gender and IT.

She worked with a variety of teams which have implemented intervention programs designed to encourage girls into IT careers. This work contributed to the design of the Digital Divas research project.

Reviews

[Zoe Mills · Rating 5 out of 5]

Great book to refer to when not sure if you extended or interfered in childrens play and learning. Explains how best to notice and react accordingly

[Lucy Mackey · Rating 5 out of 5]

Very helpful for my new job as a Preschool Assistant.

[Pip · Rating 5 out of 5]

Really has made me rethink my interactions whilst working in Early Years. A great book.

[Joanna McQueen · Rating 5 out of 5]

Interacting or Interfering explores the results of a study to determine the most supportive and effective ways for practitioners to communicate with children in an Early Years setting.

I found this book informative and insightful. The findings are presented in a manner to support understanding anecdotal evidence to support the findings and elaborate on the most effective communication strategies.

Even thought this book was a required reading I really enjoyed it. I felt that the information and anecdotes were not only useful but confirmed that as an Early Years educator I am on the right track and am already interacting with children in an appropriate and supportive way that is inline with the findings of this study. But I also took note of the areas that I should improve on.

I highly recommend this book to those interested in improving their pedagogy.