Singh, RenishaBipath, Keshni2024-09-062024-09-062024Renisha Singh & Keshni Bipath (27 Jul 2024): Challenging South African early childhood development teachers’ perceptions and pedagogical practices regarding gender, Education 3-13, DOI: 10.1080/03004279.2024.2382172.0300-4279 (print)1475-7575 (online)10.1080/03004279.2024.2382172http://hdl.handle.net/2263/98062To develop gender equality, teacher perception and pedagogical practices need to be challenged. This article sets out to explore challenging early childhood development (ECD) teachers’ perceptions and pedagogical practices regarding gender in South Africa. There is a dearth of research on gender pedagogical practices among ECD teachers. The research methodology employed participatory action research that focused on collaborative learning workshops. Data collection methods were interviews, observations, reflective journals and focus group discussions with 12 ECD teachers. Data was generated in two phases. The first phase revealed that teachers’ perceptions and pedagogical practices of gender needed to be challenged as they were gender biased. The second phase, teachers highlighted the influence of challenging their perceptions and pedagogical practices on gender. Findings revealed that learning environments were more gender aware by challenging teachers’ perceptions and pedagogical practices. The findings revealed that teachers’ development programmes are paramount to gender-equitable transformations at ECD centres.en© 2024 The Author(s). Published by Informa UK Limited, trading as Taylor & Francis Group. This is an Open Access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives License.Early childhood development (ECD)Gender equalityTeachers’ perceptionsParticipatory action researchSDG-04: Quality educationSDG-05: Gender equalityArticle