Purpose
The study investigates how children give meaning to what they do in kindergarten. It explores how children's past experiences affect how they understand and act in kindergarten. By studying how children and kindergarten staff talk to each other in different activities, the researcher tries to find out how children create meaning both alone and with others.
The research questions are:
- In what ways are available artifacts and intellectual/linguistic tools which children and educators use and interact with important for children's meaning making?
- What do children make meaning of in the situation in question?
- What institutional habits can be identified in kindergartens and what meaning suggestions can be related to these?
Result
The results show that children's way of understanding things is complex. It is influenced by their own experiences, the kindergarten staff's knowledge, and the kindergarten's routines. The skill of the kindergarten staff is important for the children to understand well. In kindergarten, children often focus on language, but also on being with others and being taken care of. The researcher behind the study believes it is important to think about what the child already knows and how this affects their experiences in kindergarten.
Design
The data material comprises 20 hours of video recordings from two Swedish kindergarten departments, where the main focus was on the interaction between children and kindergarten teachers. The study involved 33 children aged four to five years, in addition to three kindergarten teachers and three assistants. While one kindergarten had a multilingual profile, the other had no specific profiling.
References
Wank, A. C. (2021). "Meningsskapande samtal. En studie om barns meningsskapande med fokus på processer och innehåll relaterat till förskolans praktik". Akademisk avhandling. Göteborgs universitet.