The International Journal of Early Childhood is frequently mentioned in discussions that seem to have nothing to do with academic publishing. A Nairobi policy brief. A curriculum review in Bogotá and a pedagogy debate in Helsinki. The journal, which is the type of publication that researchers take off the shelf when they need something reliable to rely on, sits quietly beneath a large portion of it.
It is currently published by Springer Nature, but its true foundation is OMEP, the World Organization for Early Childhood Education, which was established in 1948 in war-torn Europe. That’s a lineage. It’s evident in the writing.
| Field | Detail |
|---|---|
| Journal Name | International Journal of Early Childhood (IJEC) |
| Founding Body | OMEP — World Organization for Early Childhood Education |
| Year OMEP Established | 1948 |
| Publisher | Springer Nature |
| Focus Age Group | Birth to 8 years |
| Editorial Scope | Comparative ECEC research, policy, pedagogy, sustainability, inclusion |
| Member Countries (OMEP) | Over 70 countries worldwide |
| UN Status | Special consultative status with UN and UNICEF |
| Peer Review | Double-anonymous, minimum two referees |
| Aligned Framework | UN 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development |
| Sister Publication | International Journal of Early Years Education (Taylor & Francis) |
| Indexing | Scopus, ERIC, Web of Science |
IJEC’s publication choices provide insight into the direction the field is taking. The scope resembles a map of current concerns related to childhood. Children’s experiences in different cultures. sustainability in terms of the environment and the economy. Policy analysis between nations that frequently have quite different views on what a four-year-old ought to be doing on a Tuesday morning. Indigenous viewpoints have shifted from the field’s periphery to its center. Then there are the more recent themes that weren’t around twenty years ago, like postdigital learners, the dangers of AI in early childhood education, and the messy convergence of politics, technology, and climate that toddlers are inheriting whether or not it was anticipated.
The journal seems to take kids seriously in a way that is still a little out of the ordinary. Instead of viewing them as empty brains, it treats them as citizens. That theme runs through the articles on children’s agency, democratic classrooms, and dialogic education. This may stem directly from OMEP’s older heritage, the postwar belief that children’s rights were essential to establishing peace. That conviction was never truly removed from the journal.
Every IJEC issue has contributors from all over the world. a group researching preschool transitions in Ghana. A Norwegian researcher is studying outdoor education. Someone in South Korea wrote about kindergarten-level standardized testing and parental anxiety. The approaches are arranged in a non-hierarchical manner, with large-scale comparative studies next to ethnographies. Double-anonymous peer review with a minimum of two referees is a standard procedure, but it’s important to note because it keeps the journal from turning into a single-region echo chamber.
A slightly different role is played by the companion publication, the International Journal of Early Years Education, which is more practitioner-focused and concentrates on creative classroom projects. When combined, they provide a nearly comprehensive picture of the state of early childhood research worldwide.
It’s interesting to see how this has changed over time because early childhood education was once thought to be a soft subject. Adorable, significant, but not quite serious. Journals like IJEC are partially responsible for this change in perception. These days, investors in educational technology pay attention. OMEP papers are cited by policymakers. It’s still unclear if all that attention will result in more research or better funding for preschools. However, the journal continues to take young children seriously enough to conduct thorough research on them, just as it has done since the beginning. That still seems uncommon on its own.
