General Introduction Developmentalism and the Need for Critical Conversations within and across the Fields

As scholars in the fields of early childhood and middle grades education, we have been struck by common issues across our fields—most of which have resulted from the fields’ reliance on grand developmental theories prevalent throughout the past century. By assuming universal stages and age norms, developmental perspectives have portrayed humans as perpetually being on their way toward something and as simultaneously lacking in reference to the intended goals. One consistent thread that runs through schooling practices in these fields has been an assumed developmentalism, leveraged through discourses of developmental appropriateness and readiness in early childhood education and developmental responsiveness in middle grades education.