ABSTRACT
This chapter theoretically summarises the sociocultural mechanism of early childhood curriculum (ECC) in Chinese societies based on the series of policy reviews and empirical studies in the previous chapters. A theoretical model based on Bronfenbrenner’s ecological system is presented to explain the transformation and implementation of ECC in Chinese societies. The horizontal dimension of this model delineates how social change leads to cultural conflicts and, furthermore, to cultural fusion. Moreover, its vertical dimension delineates the multiple influencing systems of ECC including macrosystem (globalisation, Chinese culture and social settings), exosystem (import of curricula, traditional pedagogical practices, research in child development and early childhood education policies), mesosystem (parents’ beliefs and expectations, early childhood professionals’ beliefs and requirements of formal schools), and microsystem (school-based blending of curricula and modern institutional curriculum innovations). The whole sociocultural system of the ECC mechanism serves for cultural inheritance and development in the early childhood settings of Chinese societies.
