ABSTRACT
Before exploring how Urie Bronfenbrenner’s theories of human development influence and contribute to the field of early childhood education (ECE), this chapter explores the development of Bronfenbrenner’s theory across his career, ending with an in-depth discussion of the bioecological model of human development, and the importance of proximal processes and the Process-Person-Context-Time (PPCT) model for ECE. Rather than being discrete variables, all four components of the PPCT model function interdependently and synergistically. The mesosystem is an important component of context in the lives of young children because it allows for an analysis of the transitions between microsystems (e.g., drop-off and pick-up from school, moving from outdoor recess to indoor activities, the move from preschool to elementary school). Exosystems have an indirect influence on the proximal processes of a developing child. Like exosystems, the influence of macrosystems is indirect, but they operate at a societal, cultural, or sub-cultural level.
