Limes and Lemons: Teaching and Learning in Preschool as the Coordination of Perspectives and Sensory Modalities.

Based on the assumption that the way in which we view phenomena such as teaching and learning has practical consequences for ECEC, this study presents a way to conceptualise teaching and learning that can ensure a better understanding of how teachers can facilitate children's learning in preschool. The authors use data from mealtime situations, i.e. typical everyday situations, to illustrate this.

Overall, the results indicate that teaching and learning at preschool level are different from teaching and learning at basic school level. Preschool differs by being more of a social arena, in which the children engage in group activities and learn together. Moreover, the authors find that mealtime is not only a framework for eating situations and for adjusting behaviour, but also provides a good pedagogical framework for learning. During mealtime everyone – children as well as adults – can see and hear each other. The children engage in conversations that the teacher can participate in, although the conversations were initiated by the children. The teacher plays an important role in the conversation as she can ensure that all children take part in the conversation and thereby also ensure their learning by coordinating their perspectives, experiences and situations across time. In other words, the teacher coordinates the children's experiences by helping the children interconnect the current situation with their previous experiences. The authors suggest that this coordination is to be conceptualised as teaching and learning in preschool. Moreover, the results show that the teacher plays an important role in introducing the children to new cultural tools which go beyond merely acknowledging the children's suggestions.

The authors stress that when teachers participate in the children's meaning-making process, e.g. when they coordinate different perspectives, they provide a basis for children’s learning. Furthermore, the study indicates that learning within the context of preschool is based on conditions that differ from those of basic school. Therefore, it is necessary to take into account and acknowledge that learning in a preschool setting is to a great extent social and group-based.

The data collection builds on a previously collected large dataset (Kultti, 2012), which was re-analysed from another analytical angle. Data in this study is based on video footage from one of the original eight preschools, in which one teacher and six children aged 1-3 years engage in dialogue over mealtime. This data was used to analyse how the teacher coordinates the children's actions (primarily verbal actions).

Kultti, A. & Pramling, N. (2015). Limes and Lemons: Teaching and Learning in Preschool as the Coordination of Perspectives and Sensory Modalities. International Journal of Early Childhood (47)1, 105-117.