Professionalism is not defined a priori, but rather within a professional community, in the immediate contexts where professionals interact. It is a situated phenomenon that cannot be accounted for without the voices of members of the professional community. In this article, I discuss professionalism through the perspectives of early childhood (EC) teacher educators during practicum placements. Placements are a microcosm that offers a forum for discussing and researching processes in situ within the professional community. The article draws on 11 in-depth interviews and 150 hours of participant observation in a Teacher Education Institute in Buenos Aires (Argentina). Results show EC teacher educators construct and (re)negotiate professionalism through discourses and practices of assertion and resistance banalisation, ¬schoolification and fordification of early childhood education. Results show that professionalism unfolds from collective and individual practical wisdom, a sensitivity and awareness of particular situations that is tacit and embodied in the most experienced.