”Samspil og læring – børnehavebørns deltagelsesmuligheder i pædagogisk tilrettelagte aktiviteter”.

The purpose of this study is to examine how the interaction between preschool teachers and children in preschool affects children’s opportunity to participate in, experience and learn from educational activities. The study adopts four different thematic perspectives concerning the interaction between preschool teachers and children using the four sub-studies. All sub-studies are based on the same empirical data material. The first article investigates what initiatives and opportunities exist with regard to including children in decisions, and what presents an obstacle in this regard. The second article examines how joint learning, i.e. situations where two or more children collaborate on a common objective in an educational activity, can take different forms and direction. The third article explores how affective factors such as intensity, mood, tension and bias that unfold between individuals affect interaction and the subjects themselves in mutually constitutive exchanges between adults and children. The fourth article raises the question of how preschool teachers, when interacting with children, alternate between their own perspective and the children’s perspective and how this alternation of perspectives affect children’s opportunity for participation.

The main results of the study are presented together and in each of the four sub-studies. The four sub-studies conclude that although children and preschool teachers are co-creators in the interaction, they are not equal in this co-creation process. This affects the way in which different children can participate in different activities, and consequently the experiences that the educational activities offer.

The first sub-study investigates how the practice of including children in decisions emerges and is formed in relation to educational activities. The study shows that including children in decisions primarily happens on the children’s own initiative. This inclusion in decision-making is negotiated verbally and physically in the interaction between children and adults. The study additionally concludes that children do not have equal opportunity for participation in the educational activities, and that the children’s language skills and social position within the group influence their opportunity for inclusion in decision making.

The second sub-study examines how children’s joint learning in educational activities can take different forms and develop in different directions. This study shows that the preschool teachers rarely encourage the children to collaborate and draw on each other’s resources. Collaboration mostly happens spontaneously and on the initiative of the children. It is also pointed out that children inspire, help and mimic each other in their joint learning.

The third sub-study examines what effect affective factors have on the interaction between children and adults in connection with educational activities. Affectivity is a theoretical concept in this context. This study shows that the affectivity guides the children’s participation and the development of the intensity of the interaction demonstrates how the children’s opportunities to participate are unequal.

The fourth and final sub-study examines how preschool teachers, when interacting with children, alternate between their own perspective and the children’s perspective, and how this alternation affects the children’s opportunity for participation. The study shows that despite different weighting of the perspectives of children and the preschool teachers in the interaction, the preschool teachers’ perspective primarily dominates. Moreover, openness to changes in the activity that favour the children’s perspective is not often seen. At the same time, the study shows that the preschool teachers’ openness towards the child’s perspective enhances the child’s involvement and participation.

The study consists of four sub-studies with individual research questions and thematic perspectives. The empirical material for all sub-studies consists of video footage of adult-children interaction in relation to 24 educational activities carried out in two preschools in 2008. The first preschools is for children aged between 2.7 years and 6 years, and the second preschool is for children aged 0-6. During 2009-2011, the author of the report also carried out observations of participants and recorded additional video footage as well as conducted seven interviews with preschool teachers and managers. The author also interviewed preschool children aged 3-6, and the study also included a questionnaire answered by preschool teachers. Moreover, the author used sound recordings from meetings with staff from the two preschools when developing the study. Furthermore, the preschools’ websites, curricula and interviews with two educational consultants from the municipal children and youth administration were included as data material. The dissertation uses a theoretical socio-cultural learning perspective and focuses on the interaction between preschool teachers and children; however, the special culture prevalent in the preschools, their facilities and legal foundation are also seen to have an impact on the interaction.

Svinth, L. (2014). ”Samspil og læring – børnehavebørns deltagelsesmuligheder i pædagogisk tilrettelagte aktiviteter”. Ph.d.-afhandling. Institut for Uddannelse og Pædagogik (DPU), Aarhus Universitet.