The first stream began in South Korea, where I was introduced to the complexities of navigating early childhood education across cultural contexts. Living and working in Korea marked a turning point—one where theory, practice, and cultural expectations often flowed in different directions. What I was practicing as a professional did not always align with what I was learning in my studies or with the approaches I had encountered before. This dissonance became both a challenge and an opportunity, pushing me to engage deeply with diverse perspectives and question my assumptions about education and early childhood. Arndt and Tesar (2015) remind us that an educator’s lenses are shaped by their histories, cultures, and realities recognized in the spaces that learning stories create for diversity, interconnections between worlds and pieces of knowledge, and the possibilities to share, negotiate, revisit, develop, and change meanings. 

In South Korea, my understanding of early childhood education was reframed as I witnessed how cultural values influence pedagogy, curriculum, and the image of the child. The structured learning environment, emphasis on collectivism, and respect for hierarchy contrasted with other educational philosophies I had explored. This experience laid the foundation for my ongoing commitment to integrating cross-cultural perspectives into my practice, not necessarily by choosing one approach over another, but by learning to hold multiple viewpoints in dialogue. This first stream represents more than just a geographical shift; it signifies the start of my continuing learning journey, where unlearning and adaptation became just as valuable as acquiring new knowledge. By engaging with different cultural frameworks, I began to develop a more flexible and reflective approach to early childhood education—one that recognizes the richness of multiple perspectives and seeks to bridge them in meaningful ways.