In an online graduate-level early childhood education course, the authors sought to playfully disrupt and transform educators’ conceptions of children’s “dark play,” as provoked by contemporary popular culture. Embracing the imaginative potential of darkness and liminality, the course participants problematized and expanded their thinking concerning what constitutes children’s play scripts focused on themes of fear, power, and violence. Cognizant that some educators are reluctant and even refuse to allow children opportunities to engage in play centered on troubling social issues, the educators co-authored a fantastical tale, inspired by the Disney animation film Frozen, and included course topics, classroom observations, and their own childhood memories of “dark play.” Vivian Paley’s ideas about the connections between storytelling and play provided a creative impetus to the fictional narrative-imagining exercise, as did Hans-Georg Gadamer’s notion of Spiel. Eliciting the literature of children’s play experiences through fictional story-writing, and “play” as a contemporary aspect of creative thinking, the educators entered imaginary worlds of their own making. Unlike a traditional online graduate course format that often incorporates textual readings, posts, and responses, the authors strived to foster a virtual space in which the educators buttressed theories about play and imagination in a deeply felt, experiential, and playful manner. In creating an imaginary story based on the film, the participants gained a different understanding of the nature of play, and came to recognize how popular-culture play themes can provoke and strengthen children’s imaginative and abstract thinking, problem-solving skills, and emotional development. Likewise, this narrative experience showed the potential and role of “dark play” in initiating new ways of thinking and talking with children about the complex issues of the modern world.

The program approach in specialized early learning programs may result in adults focusing too intently on therapeutic treatment reports and disabilities and not on the stories children share through play. Observing, listening, and documenting play scripts can shift adults’ focus and make the self of children and their interests visible. Exploring different ways of documenting children’s experiences in specialized educational settingswas the impetus for this paper. The Living Wall—a form of pedagogical documentation—aligns with Ted Aoki’s notion of a “curriculum-as-lived-experience” that honours children and gives them a voice through the collection and interpretation of their artwork, dialogue, and imaginative play scripts.

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In this article, the authors discuss how Shaun Tan's graphic novel The Arrival (2006) opened a polyphonic dialogue with culturally diverse early childhood educators. Using visual, graphic and symbolic languages provided alternative ways for the research participants to express their experiences and understandings of being recent immigrants. Analyzing and interpreting the stories that the participants narrated, the authors noted their linguistic, aesthetic and embodied responses to Tan's visual poetry-specifically the physical act of pointing to the images. The research raises multiple questions for consideration: How might The Arrival (and other graphic narratives) be used as an elucidative prompt for understanding caregiver/teacher practice in early childhood education and in educational research more broadly? How can visual research methodologies enhance the complex interrelations among curriculum, diversity and visuality in early childhood education? And, lastly, how can such imaginal and playful approaches point to deeper considerations around intercultural dialogue, social relations, pedagogy and the curriculum in early childhood education settings? Graphic novels provoke intercultural dialogue in research interviews and point to new research methodologies. They enhance cultural understandings among students, scholars and educators at post-secondary and pre-K-12 levels, providing insights into how culturally diverse educators and students can live and learn together in an always complex world. Every voyage is the unfolding of a poetic. The departure, the cross over, the fall, the wandering, the discovery, the return, the transformation. (Minh-ha, 1994, p. 21)

While running on a forest path, we imagined the Greek god Hermes flying alongside and interrupting our progress. Similar to navigating alternative routes while running with Hermes, the immigrant educators interviewed for Carolyn Bjartveit’s doctoral study veered from a single curriculum course and playfully exchanged and challenged cultural and Western ideals about pedagogy and childcare. Drawing on the work of early childhood education (ECE) scholars and the research participants’ lived experiences, we critically consider how wild dreams, imaginings, and hermeneutic ideas about play may contribute to our understanding of a transcultural curriculum that acknowledges diversity and difference.