Voicing the child? A case study in Finnish early childhood education

Alasuutari, Maarit

doi:10.1177/0907568213490205

Cited by 44 publications

(33 citation statements)

References 34 publications

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“…), at least regarding its implications for negotiating napping practices in ECEC, since no such negotiations were actualised (cf. Alasuutari, ). Instead, the analysis showed how both practitioners and parents resisted these implications by drawing on a naturalised discourse of napping and on a discourse that defined the child as problematic or as having internal deficiencies, when he or she did not fall asleep as expected.…”

Section: Resultsmentioning

confidence: 99%

Documenting Napping: The Agentic Force of Documents and Human Action

Alasuutari

2015

Children & Society

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The article examines the question of the agentic force of documents in institutional practices and proposes a conceptual model of the agentic relation between documentation and human actors. For this aim, it presents an empirical case study of Finnish early childhood education and care. The study deals with individual education plans (IEPs), which are an example of child documentation that aims at an individualised and participatory pedagogy. The analytical focus is on a single topic of an IEP, the child's afternoon naps, and how these are negotiated in the three‐party encounter between a parent, a practitioner and the IEP document. The theoretical framework draws on the theories of documentality and institutional ethnography, on the analytic of government, and on the idea of domestication. The analysis applies the approach of discursive constructionism. By analysing the negotiations related to napping, the study demonstrates not only aspects of the agentic force of the IEP document, but also human resistance of it.

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Section: Resultsmentioning

confidence: 99%

Documenting Napping: The Agentic Force of Documents and Human Action

Alasuutari

2015

Children & Society

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“…socially accepted showed that certain types of initiatives remain unseen. Although the discourse of a competent child may dominate the educational discourse, it is too simplified to expect that it would be the predominant approach in educational practices (Alasuutari 2014).…”

Section: Discussion and Implications For Research And Practicementioning

confidence: 99%

“…In the Nordic curricula, children are seen as active, competent, developing and learning. (Alasuutari, 2014) This reflect the viewpoint of sociological research of childhood where children are sen active agents of their live (Corsaro, 2011). Furthermore, equality and the ideal of universal access of ECE services is central in the Nordic educational policies (Karila, 2012).…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 92%

Children’s Initiatives in the Finnish Early Childhood Education Context

Kangas¹,

Lastikka²

2019

Nordic Families, Children and Early Childhood Education

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Pedagogical practices in early childhood education, which embrace children's initiatives and agency, have been found to have an effect on children's learning and competence skills. These initiatives can be seen crucial for children's wellbeing and self-motivation; however, children's initiatives are sometimes considered only wants, and children incapable to express meaningful initiatives in educational settings. In this paper we introduce children's initiatives in their educational society and examine the gap between children's experiences and teachers' observations. Children' initiatives exist in many different occasions with the daily practices and through the processes that nourish motivation and create meaning-making through actions, it is essential to focus on children's participation aiming to promote children's agency and motivation

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“…Alasuutari (2014) also found that the parents' role in partnership discussions was restricted to what concerned the individual child: parents did not have a say in the more general educational practices of ECEC. These findings lead us to wonder if this holds even in partnerships for bilingualism; if so, it would mean that parents do not have a say in the choice of e.g.…”

Section: Ecec Partnerships In Finlandmentioning

confidence: 99%