Om fostran i förskoleklass.

The purpose of this study is to investigate and analyse how child-rearing and child-rearing tasks are described in centrally, regionally and locally produced texts related to a Swedish pre-school class (in Swedish: förskoleklass) in a multicultural urban area in Sweden. The researcher asks the following questions: 1) Who is the ‘child-rearer’ and who is described as the person carrying out the child-rearing task? 2) How is performance of the child-rearing task described, what techniques are to be used? and 3) What is the purpose of the child-rearing task, how is the desired result of the child-rearing work described? In addition, the study examines the relationship between the respective levels of the texts.

The study shows that in the pre-school curricula parents as well as pre-school (förskoleklass) are considered the foremost child-rearers. The child-rearing task seems to be divided between the home and the pre-school class; each with different tasks. For instance, a child’s behaviour is considered the parents’ task, and if the child displays an undesired behaviour at the daycare facility it can be questioned whether the parents have carried out this task satisfactorily. The child-rearing task for the pre-school class is more about values and norms. Furthermore, the study shows that parents are also educated or disciplined in the relationship between pre-school class and home. Examples of this may be that parents are told what their child may and may not bring to pre-school class (e.g. toys, money or sweets). The researcher also finds that a large part of the child-rearing task at pre-school class takes place in the subject ‘knowledge of life’; a topic which is highly emphasised in the local documents and considered a subject in itself.

The researcher conducted a document analysis of a number of central, regional and local documents linked to the Swedish pre-school class (förskoleklass). Moreover, the researcher followed one particular pre-school class in Malmö for five months from August 2003 to January 2004, two to five days a week. During this period, the researcher conducted participating observations in which field notes and video footage were collected. Data included a total of 15 hours of video footage and 110 pages of field notes. The researcher interviewed early childhood educators and the head of the specific pre-school class/school, and a total of 15 hours of formal interviews were recorded on a dictaphone. The material was analysed on the basis of a historical pragmatic approach inspired by Skinner and Foucault.

Thelander, M. (2012). Om fostran i förskoleklass. Ph.d.-afhandling. Malmö högskola, Fakulteten för lärande och samhälle.