Comparison of Epistemological Traditions and Their Application to Competency Development in Early Childhood Education Students

Abstract

Early childhood teacher education often incorporates active methodologies, research, inclusion, and technologies without making explicit the conceptions of knowledge that legitimate such practices. This comparative literature review examines how positivist, constructivist, sociocultural, pragmatist, critical-decolonial, and sociomaterial-digital traditions contribute to competency development among university students in Early Childhood Education. An integrative review was conducted using academic publications and institutional documents issued from January 2021 through May 2026. The analytical corpus comprised 25 relevant sources, examined through a matrix linking ontological and epistemological assumptions, student roles, pedagogical mediations, promoted competencies, evidence, and limitations. Findings indicate that no single tradition addresses the professional complexity of early childhood education: positivism strengthens measurement and systematic inquiry but may reduce children’s experiences to indicators; constructivist and sociocultural approaches enhance design, interaction, and scaffolding but require explicit validity criteria; pragmatism connects inquiry with problem solving; critical-decolonial perspectives foster reflexivity, inclusion, and epistemic justice; and sociomaterial-digital epistemology extends informational, algorithmic, and ethical literacy. The Situated Epistemological Pluralism Model is proposed through five movements: problematize, contrast, co-construct, act, and justify. Its innovation lies in assessing not declared adherence to a tradition, but the ability to select, combine, and justify knowledge frameworks according to the pedagogical problem, evidence, children’s voices, and sociocultural context. Professional competency in Early Childhood Education should therefore include explicit and demonstrable epistemological judgement.