ABSTRACT
Friedrich Froebel (1782–1852) has been, and remains, one of the greatest influences on early childhood education in the UK and beyond. The nature of his impact on policy and approach to curriculum and pedagogy has continually shifted across time. Since his work began there have been times, especially in the first decades after his death, when the influence of his educational approach has been highly visible and in the foreground. But, as time has gone by, overt articulation of a Froebelian approach has become increasingly indirect and in the background. Currently those who put forward Froebelian arguments are often not aware that they are drawing on the Froebelian principles of early childhood education which he pioneered. Froebelian practices seem to have faded such that the ‘Gifts, Occupations, Mother Songs, Movement Games and Nature Study’, together with the ‘Forms of Life, Beauty and Knowledge’, are terms which mean nothing to most contemporary academics, practitioners, parents or policy makers.
