Leiing av læring i barnehagen – nasjonale retningsliner og lokale fortolkingar

The purpose of this study is to examine how ECEC centres interpret the Norwegian Framework Plan for the Content and Tasks of Kindergartens in their guidelines and frameworks for leading learning. The research questions are: What learning views are expressed in the ECEC centres' annual plans? What themes and learning activities are emphasised in the annual plans? How are ECEC centres organised given the fact that they must sharpen focus on learning, and what type of leading learning does this focus entail according to the annual plan?

Overall, the author finds great variation in the design and length of the annual plans, and the plans do not have a standard design. However, common for the annual plans is that they refer to the Framework Plan for the Content and Tasks of Kindergartens.

Most annual plans refer to the learning view in the Framework Plan, which has a holistic learning view emphasising play, learning and caregiving. Many annual plans cite or have copied phrases directly from the Framework Plan. According to the author, most annual plans state that play is the road to learning. The annual plans have less focus on the correlation between caregiving and learning than on the correlation between play and learning.

The learning content of the annual plans differs considerably. In most cases, the seven learning areas in the Framework Plan are also mentioned in the annual plans. These are: (1) communication and language, (2) body, movement and health, (3) art, culture and creativity, (4) nature, environment and technology, (5) ethics, religion and philosophy, (6) local community and society, and (7) numbers, spaces and shapes. Many annual plans elaborate and clarify each learning area, whereas others focus on special areas of initiative within the seven learning areas. According to the author, the annual plans seem to be aimed at parents.

In many annual plans, staff are broadly referred to as "the adults", and there are no job titles or specifications of the areas of responsibilities of the individual staff members. The author concludes that the annual plans generally provide an unclear picture of how ECEC centres are led and organised, despite the fact that planning is emphasised in the Framework Plan. According to the author, the vagueness regarding leadership and organisation may indicate that the ECEC centres have a flat structure, or that their organisation is weak/unclear. Alternatively, the ECEC centres' organisation may be specified somewhere else than in the annual plan.

The data material consists of annual plans from 64 ECEC centres in three municipalities. The annual plans were analysed, focussing on the following three areas: (1) the view on learning, (2) the content of the children's learning, and (3) learning and organisation of learning.

Skjæveland, Y. (2016). Leiing av læring i barnehagen – nasjonale retningsliner og lokale fortolkingar. I: Moen, K. H., Gotvassli, K. Å., & Granrusten, P. T. (red.), Barnehagen som læringsarena: Mellom styring og ledelse, 167-182. Oslo: Universitetsforlaget.