Relational care, interpersonal intimacy and emotional attunement are crucial for children’s development and wellbeing in ECEC. The present study examines how they are enacted in a Swedish preschool (for 1–5-year-olds) through recurrent adult-child physical conduct, i.e. affectionate and affectionate-controlling touch. The data consist of 24 hours of video-recorded observations of everyday activities. The study shows that educators’ Affectionate-Comforting touch was used for emotion regulation as compassionate response to children’s distress; Amicable touch engaged children in spontaneous affection; and, Affectionate-Controlling touch was used to mildly control and direct the child’s bodily conduct and participation in preschool activities, or to mitigate the educators’ verbal disciplining. The study demonstrates the emotional complexity of ECEC enacted through the practices of haptic sociality. It supports the holistic policies arguing that embodied relational care should be integrated in ECEC, contrary to ideas that connect professionalism with emotional distance and lack of physical contact.
Preschool teachers in Sweden are expected to document children's learning and assess their learning outcomes, for the purpose of long-term evaluation and to develop the educational preschool practice. Previous research shows that the tools for documenting individual learning are particularly focusing on children's cognitive knowledge, while the tools for evaluating the preschool practice are developed for standardized assessment and teachers' self-reflection. The purpose of this study is to present and illustrate an action-based tool that (i) facilitates documentation and assessment of children's multifaceted learning and (ii) combine and interweave individual learning with situated teaching approaches and evaluation of the preschool practice at institutional level. The action-based methodological framework takes a starting point in John Dewey's pragmatism, transactions and functions of education including qualification, socialization and person-formation. Two analytical approaches; Practical Epistemology Analysis (PEA) and Epistemological Move Analysis (EMA) are used to clarify and illustrate individual, social and institutional dimensions of learning from four sequences of one preschool activity including four children and one teacher talking about a fairy tale. We argue that this tool for assessment and evaluation facilitates action-based reflection and discussion about relations between children's individual learning and institutional norms and values.
Research into preschool education has paid a lot of attention to investigating children's conceptual development and cognitive learning about nature, with methods based on observations and verbal interviews before and after a teaching period. The purpose of this study has been to present and illustrate an approach that facilitates the analysis of practical meaning making in Early Childhood Education. The study is largely based on John Dewey's pragmatism and has a particular focus on his use of transaction, functional coordination, inquiry, educative experience and nature. In this context meaning making is understood as the growing, learning process that contributes to further actions in extended ways. A transactional approach to physical experiences, with a focus on analyses of toddlers' bodily actions in nature encounters, is illustrated by a video recording of a toddler's encounter with icy and clay surfaces. This encounter was analysed using Practical Epistemological Analysis. Toddlers' inquiry processes were studied with a specific focus on functional coordination, i.e. relations between different actions and their consequences when meeting the environment. The methodological approach contributes to further research by focusing on practical and physical learning processes. It can also be seen as a contribution to Early Childhood Science Education by showing the relation between previous experiences of natural phenomena and meaning making for further actions in extended ways.
Previous research has shown that the Swedish preschool educational tradition is characterised by outdoor-oriented and democratic approaches. The purpose of this study is to empirically investigate what consequences these approaches have for preschool children's meaning-making of nature, when studied in practice, in children's spontaneous outdoor activities. The methodology is based on John Dewey's pragmatism with a specific focus on transaction, habits and customs. A transactional analysis method has been developed to fulfil the purpose of the investigation. The analysis illuminates relations between: (1) the Swedish preschool's educational tradition in terms of national customs; and (2) the local customs expressed in practice. Fifty-seven events were chosen for further analysis including play with water and sand, and sliding on snow. Consequences for children's meaning-making of nature are shown as possibilities for experience-based inquiry based on children's own choices and also for enjoying and feeling good in nature. The results show fewer possibilities for scientific concept learning. The results can thus be seen as a contribution to the early childhood educational discussion about how to arrange learning situations of natural phenomena and processes in preschools and at the same time maintain their democratic/outdoor-oriented characteristics.
The Swedish preschools have evolved to be more diverse in terms of language and culture amongst the attending children. Previous research on newly arrived children in the Swedish preschools focusses on, amongst other things, how to provide for the best reception or education, but less is known about the newly arrived children’s own communicative ways when they start preschool. The aim of this paper is to explore how children entering a new linguistic environment are able to participate by using communicative tools in speech events at preschool. The analysis shows how the children participate by combining different communicative tools when they shadow, code-switch, invent language and make use of expressive body language. The study contributes with knowledge about preschool children’s various ways of approaching a new language and adjusting to a new cultural context and children’s social and informal learning practices in preschool.
The aim of this study is to explore how cultural factors interact with preschool teachers’ shaping of activities with science content, and also how Activity Theory (AT) as a theoretical framework can be useful for examining interrelations within preschool systems. Qualitative data was collected from three preschools in the form of guided group discussions with preschool teachers, observations and video recordings of activities, and stimulated recall discussions based on the recorded practices. The preschools displayed diverse approaches for experiencing and learning science, some with great creativity. In all preschools learning was integrated with care, upbringing and play. To support children’s interest and confidence was central. How science activities were shaped mainly depended on how children’s interests were allowed to govern practice. The use of AT as an analytical tool was proven to be effective in identifying the elements, relationships and tensions crucial for understanding the framing of science activities.