IJEC (2010) 42:165179 DOI 10.

1007/s13158-010-0017-3

Toddlers Life in Swedish Preschool

Eva Johansson Anette Emilson

Published online: 20 October 2010 Springer Science+Business Media B.V. 2010

Abstract The purpose of this article is to point to some patterns dealt with in Swedish research with 1 to 3-year-old children in preschool. The analyses focus on questions posed, theoretical perspectives, methods and results. The results give a unique picture of how toddlers participate, interact and communicate while engaged in how to master various content issues and intersubjective life in the preschool context. The studies represent different approaches, although there seems to be a common interest in basing research on childrens premises and gaining access to the childs perspective. This raise issues concerning the responsibility of research: How far can we go when talking in terms of childrens perspectives and how active and competent can a child be? The child is both vulnerable and competent, which is an issue that needs to be addressed by researchers. If not, we risk turning research on young children into ideology. Keywords Early childhood education Toddlers Learning Participation Competence Resume Le but de cet article est de signaler certaines tendances traitees dans la ` recherche suedoise concernant les enfants dun a trois ans au prescolaire. Les analyses portent sur les questions posees, les perspectives theoriques, les methodes et les resultats. Les resultats donnent une image unique de la facon dont les jeunes

E. Johansson (&) Department for Preschool Teacher Education, University of Stavanger, 4036 Stavanger, Norway e-mail: eva.johansson@uis.no A. Emilson School of Education, Psychology and Sports Science, Linnus University, Storken, 39182 Kalmar, Sweden e-mail: anette.emilson@lnu.se

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enfants participent, interagissent et communiquent lorsquils sont engages dans la facon de matriser diverses questions de contenu ainsi que de la vie intersubjective dans le contexte prescolaire. Les etudes representent des approches differentes, ` meme sil semble y avoir un interet commun a appuyer la recherche sur les pre` ` ` ` misses des enfants et a avoir acces a la perspective de lenfant. Cela souleve des ` questions sur la responsabilite de la recherche : jusquou peut-on aller lorsque lon ` parle en termes de perspectives des enfants et jusqua quel point un enfant peut-il ` etre actif et competent? Lenfant etant a la fois vulnerable et competent, cest une question qui doit etre abordee par les chercheurs. Sinon, nous risquons de trans former en ideologie la recherche sur les jeunes enfants. Resumen El proposito de este artculo es senalar algunos patrones en la investi gacion realizada en Suecia y que contempla a los ninos de uno a tres anos en preescolar. El analisis se centra en cuestiones planteadas, perspectivas teoricas, metodos y resultados. Los resultados ofrecen una vision unica de como los ninos participan, interactuan y se comunican al mismo tiempo en que se comprometen en el ejercicio de dominar diversos temas y de vida intersubjetiva en el contexto preescolar. Los estudios representan enfoques diferentes, aunque parece que hay un interes comun en basar la investigacion en premisa de los ninos y en ganar acceso a la perspectiva del nino. Esto plantea cuestiones relativas a la responsabilidad de la investigacion: >Hasta donde podemos ir cuando se habla en terminos de las per spectivas de los ninos y en cuan activo y competente puede ser un nino? El nino es a la vez vulnerable y competente, tema que debe ser abordado por los investigadores. Si no, corremos el riesgo de convertir la investigacion de los ninos pequenos en a. ideolog Preschool in Sweden has increasingly become a concern of society and is regulated in a curriculum (Ministry of Education and Science 1998). Most of the children start preschool at an early age, and attending preschool is seen as every childs right. The majority of children between 13 years attend preschools. In 2008, 432,600 children were enrolled in preschool and 46% of all 1-year olds attended preschool, as did 90% of the 2- and 3-year olds (Swedish National Board of Education 2009). Childhood in Sweden today is therefore to a large extent tied to educational institutions with the aim of promoting childrens learning. The purpose of this article is to point to some patterns in Swedish research with 1 to 3-year-old children in preschool. The following questions will be considered: How is research conducted? What questions have been asked and what kind of knowledge have these questions helped to uncover? What theoretical frameworks have dominated the studies and what kinds of methods have been utilized? The empirical basis is ve doctoral theses from 19962009 together with some later studies, all involving children under the age of three. It is important to note that the aim of this review is not to cover all research on the youngest children in Sweden. Instead the studies have been chosen strategically because they represent different approaches and signicant issues in educational research involving children under the age of three in Sweden.

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Research with Children under the Age of Three The analyses indicate three major themes of interest: learning in preschool, values in everyday interactions and preschool culture. These themes have been divided into different categories (see the Fig. 1). The studies in question will be briey summarized in the following. The focus is on questions posed, theoretical perspectives, methods and results. Learning in Preschool The studies related to the theme Learning in preschool can be divided into three categories: Studies focusing on: (a) the how aspect of learning, (b) the what aspect of learning and (c) creating conditions for learning. Some studies involve all these dimensions. The how aspect has focused on learning per se in the context of preschool whereas the what aspect of learning has primarily focused on mathematics and early literacy. Creating conditions for learning involves intervention studies with the aim of broadening childrens learning and challenging the learning conditions in pre-school. Among these studies, the research tradition of phenomenography has dominated, especially in the 1990s. The How Aspect of Learning: Discerning and Insights The doctoral thesis Experience and Learning from 1996 by Marita Lindahl was one of the rst studies in Sweden to take into account the youngest children in preschool. The aim was to investigate how 1-year-old children discern and encounter challenges in the new preschool world. The main focus was on the

Educational research with children under the age of three in Swedish preschools

Learning in preschool

Values in everyday interactions

Preschool culture

-The how-aspect of learning - The what-aspect of learning - Creating conditions for learning

- Morality in peer interactions - Fostering values in teacher-child interactions - Gender construction in teacher-child interactions

- Peer culture and childrens perspectives

Fig. 1 Theme and category overview

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childrens experiences and spontaneous learning and the theoretical approach employed was phenomenography. A signicant starting point of the study was gaining access to the childs own perspective. Data consisted of video observations of ten 1-year-old children in their rst month at preschool. The children were observed during their everyday activities with regard to their intentions and interests in the preschool setting. The aim was to acquire knowledge of how the children discriminate and try to solve problems, how they test their ideas and how they relate to others. The results indicated that learning occurs when a child extends his or her thinking from one way of grasping something to a qualitatively different way of understanding the same phenomenon. Lindahl argued that toddlers always act based on their own experiences when they encounter new phenomena. The children seem to possess a certain awareness of the learning process before they can express themselves in words. They use various strategies to solve different kind of problems, and they appear to separate the act of learning from the outcome of learning. The childs intention is vital for how and what he or she manages to learn. The What Aspect of Learning: Mathematics and Literacy Questions about the learning object have been raised in several studies. Many of these studies have been related to the phenomenographical approach with an interest in understanding how young children experience various phenomena in the preschool world. The learning objects that have principally been investigated are maths and early literacy. Doverborg (1987) is one of the earliest researchers in Sweden to study how very young children express mathematics in everyday life in preschool. Her studies have revealed the mathematical capacity of young children and how children are able to encounter mathematical aspects before they can express such understandings in mathematical terms. Doverborg and Pramling Samuelsson (2009) studied childrens learning in basic mathematics. A total of 225 children between 1 and 3 years of age (115 girls and 110 boys) participated in a structured mathematical play and talk interaction. The researcher engaged playfully with the children, encouraging them to describe and show their intentions when dealing with different aspects of basic mathematics. The intention was to involve the children in meaningful topics and to nd out how they approach basic mathematical issues. The interactions were videorecorded. The results indicated that experiences of basic mathematics grow with the quality of encounters and the childrens age. Accordingly, the teachers knowledge of basic mathematics and ability to challenge childrens understanding is of vital importance for their mathematical development. It is essential to use relevant concepts when interacting with children. Childrens participation in literacy events and their actions in literacy practice were focused on in a doctoral study by Bjorklund (2008). The study was inuenced by a socio-cultural perspective with reference to Vygotsky (1934/2007). Bjorklunds starting point was a broad denition of literacy involving reading and writing, telling and retelling (talking) narratives as well as singing and other verbal and nonverbal communication. The aim was to develop knowledge of literacy from the perspectives of the youngest children in preschool and to determine whether

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childrens literacy could have an impact on the social and cultural context of preschool. The data consisted of video observations of childrens (inter)actions, related to literacy, with objects, peers and teachers. The results showed how the toddlers participate, interact and communicate while engaged in literacy. According to Bjorklund, two different aspects of literacy emerged side by side in childrens literacy practice. One is storytelling, and this activity is given both time and space in preschool. Most often, the teachers invited the children to participate in dialogues and narratives by letting them contribute to the story with words or gestures. The other type of literacy was reading and drawing or writing. Various artefacts, including signs, were found to be signicant in the childrens reading activities. The children investigated books and used them to interact with others. Writing was connected with the childrens construction of signs, for example, when they were drawing. The author concludes that children create their own literacy practices together with peers in the preschool community. Creating Conditions for Learning Some studies have focused on the conditions for young childrens learning and wellbeing in preschool. On the one hand, these studies aimed to extend childrens learning and challenge the learning conditions in preschool; intervention studies based on specic developmental programs are one example of this research. On the other hand, the ambition has been to investigate learning encounters as well as the outcomes of learning in preschool. The theoretical point of departure varies, from phenomenography and phenomenology to ecological approaches. Mixed theoretical perspectives and methods can also be found in these investigations. Interventional studies have been carried out by several researchers. Lindahl (2002) investigated the ability of preschool educators to base their work on a childs perspective, taking into account the toddlers initiatives, ideas and intentions. The project involved an educational program and was inuenced by phenomenography and phenomenology. The aim was to nd variations and changes in the pedagogues conceptions of learning, their educational methods and their willingness to act. The study lasted for 2 years and used video observations, interviews and evaluations for data production. The results indicated that the intervention programme helped the educators to gain new insights, proving that there was a qualitative shift in their comprehension of children. Initially, the educators considered children to be intellectually immature. They took their own intentions for granted when approaching the children. At the end of the project, however, the teachers endeavoured to base their pedagogical practice on the childrens intentions and initiatives. They also described the children as being capable and intentional. According to Lindahl, the educators displayed an ability to take the childrens perspective and the children were allowed to inuence the everyday activities in preschool. Developmental pedagogy grounded in phenomenography (Pramling Samuelsson and Asplund Carlsson 2008) has been in the foreground in several investigations in Sweden and a few of these have involved the youngest children. One study addressed childrens knowledge of aesthetics (Pramling Samuelsson et al. 2009).

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The aim was to investigate the work involving the arts in preschool and school while, at the same time, contributing to childrens learning of aesthetics. Both teachers and childrens learning were taken into account. A group of ten toddlers participated in the study. The theoretical frames served as tools for investigating and developing childrens awareness of and interest in the arts. The core idea was to use playful aesthetic activities where there is room for the learning object and where childrens experiences are facilitated and made possible for them to express. Gradually, the teachers included more complex aspects of the learning object in the activities. According to the researchers, the study showed how these young children gradually enhance their awareness of the various dimensions of aesthetics. However, variations were found depending on how the children tackled the activities. While some children participated actively in the events, other children chose to take part more peripherally. Conditions for childrens learning in a pre-school context have been investigated in a small number of studies in Sweden.1 A central starting point in the study Childrens early learning was to address the perspectives of the children, the teachers and the parents (Sheridan et al. 2009). Various preschool settings were investigated in order to scrutinize the inuence these might have on toddlers learning. A signicant question was: How does childrens knowledge formation emerge in relation to certain content areas and in relation to different preschool contexts? The study was inuenced by interactionistic theory (Bronfenbrenner 1979) and variation theory (Marton and Booth 2000). In addition, a pedagogical perspective on quality was adopted as a point of departure (Sheridan 2009). A total of 230 children aged 1 and 2 years from 38 preschools participated along with their parents and teachers (120). The study was divided into eight different parts and content areas. The data produced were quantitative and qualitative. Video observations, for example, were used to document childrens mathematical and communicative learning. Questionnaires designed for teachers and parents were developed and preschool quality was evaluated using the Early Childhood Environment Rating Scale (Sheridan 2007). Teachers were involved in some of the data produced, for example, reading a story and observing childrens interactions. The results identied three different learning environments with low, good and high quality. This indicates, according to the researchers, that preschool does not provide young children with equal opportunities for learning. On the contrary, the study showed that the children seem to be involved in creative and reciprocal interactions, characterized by joy and interest. The study also identied an important shift in knowing and learning between the ages of 1 and 3 years with regard to childrens ability to tackle different tasks related to mathematics and communication. This is an important period in childrens learning, and much depends on the quality of the preschool, the authors conclude.

The aim of one study in this eld was to map the pedagogical work with the youngest children in preschool (see Johansson 2004).

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Values in Everyday Interactions The second theme includes the research dealing with values in everyday interactions. Three categories are constructed: (a) morality in peer interactions, (b) fostering of values and (c) gender constructions in teacherchild interactions. The common approach in these studies is an interest in values in early childhood education. On the one hand, the research views the child as subject of fostering values in early childhood, and on the other, it is the childs communication of values that is the focus of the research. The studies adopt different theoretical positions such as phenomenology, critical theory and a psychoanalytic theory. Morality in Peer Interactions Johansson (1999, 2001, 2002, 2007) has conducted several investigations with an interest in the youngest childrens perspectives on morality. The theoretical framework was phenomenology with inspiration from the theory of the life-world (Merleau-Ponty 1962). The ontological basis of the life-world is related to the child as a perceiving subject who is inseparable from, and in interaction with, the world. An important aspect of this theory is the lived body, which is regarded as central for understanding and communication. This means that children create meanings, express their intentions and have abilities to understand other people in a bodily way. In her doctoral thesis, Johansson (1999) studied toddlers lived experiences of values and norms for how to behave towards each other in everyday life in preschool. The main question was: What moral values and norms do children experience and express through their interaction? Data consisted of video observations of daily interactions between 19 toddlers, 13 years old, in preschool. The results indicated that moral values such as rights and others wellbeing are a vital part of childrens life-worlds in preschool. The value of rights referred to childrens spontaneous interest in exploring the world, in being active with objects and peers. The value of others wellbeing involved a concern for other children, including an intention to comfort and protect others from harmful situations. In addition, power appeared as a moral value communicated by the children to provoke others, to test others limits and to gain and defend rights. This power could be both physical and psychological in nature and was also related to age. According to Johansson, values become visible to children when they interact with others and especially when they confront each others perspectives. Conditions, which were signicant for childrens learning of morals, were the others reactions, the consequences of their acts and closeness to the other person. Johansson argues that important values for the children are similar to values emphasized in society. Children struggle with values that refer to existence, ownership and justice as well as with values dealing with respect, integrity and understanding of others wellbeing. Fostering Values in TeacherChild Interactions The aim of the doctoral thesis The Desirable Child (Emilson 2008) was to acquire knowledge about fostering young children, as expressed in everyday interactions

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between teachers and children in Swedish preschools. A critical approach was adopted in order to also acquire knowledge about important fostering aspects that can move hierarchal power structures towards a fostering of values characterized by intersubjectivity. In addition, the concepts of communicative and strategic action (Habermas 1995) served as analytical tools, together with strong and weak classication and framing (Bernstein 2000). Preschool fostering was also analyzed from a double perspective, with a starting point in Habermas (1995) concepts of system and life-world. The eldwork involved three groups of toddlers in different preschools. Forty-six children, aged 13 years, and their ten teachers participated in the study. The data consisted of videotaped observations of teacherchild interactions. Three empirical studies were included in the thesis. The rst study (Emilson and Folkesson 2006) focused on toddlers participation and the research question was: How can toddlers participation be understood in educational activities where the degree of teacher control differs? The results indicated that strong classication and framing could restrict childrens participation whereas weak classication and framing could promote childrens opportunities to participate on their own terms. The second study (Emilson 2007) considered the childrens inuence in circle time situations. The study revealed that strong teacher control does not necessarily limit childrens inuence; it depends on the nature of the control. Childrens inuence increases when the teachers control over the what and how aspects of communication is weak, and is characterized by closeness to the childs life-world and an intersubjective and communicative approach. The third study (Emilson and Johansson 2009) examined the values that teachers encourage and how these values were communicated to children. The analyses resulted in ten values embedded in value dimensions of discipline, caring and democracy. These, in turn, were divided into collective or individualistic social orientation. It was shown that the values were communicated differently and that the what aspect of the communication (the value) was interrelated with the how aspect of the communication; how teachers communicate inuences and sometimes change the communicated value. In order to change power structures in teacherchild interactions, three aspects of importance were identied: teachers closeness to the childs perspective, their emotional presence and playfulness. According to Emilson, these aspects can be included in the theory of communicative action (Habermas 1995) and then contribute to the construction of meaning in this theory in relation to the youngest children in the educational system. Gender Construction in TeacherChild Interactions Early gender constructions in preschool were investigated by Mansson (2000) in her doctoral thesis. The study was theoretically grounded in Daniel Sterns theory where pre-verbal aspects and the emotional dimension are foregrounded in human development. The purpose was twofold: rst, to study the interaction between children (aged 13 years) and their preschool teachers from a gender and contextual perspective, and second, to study the teachers perceptions of children and gender. Mixed methods were employed, for example, a research diary, video observations

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and interviews with the teachers. The interplay between the teachers (all women) and the children in three preschools was analysed. Attention was focused on the inter-subjective part of the interactions, and reciprocity and emotion were viewed as fundamental aspects. Gender was understood as being socially constructed in complicated processes involving intrapersonal, interpersonal and cultural aspects. Observational data indicated that the children communicated their intentions in various ways. Different contexts challenge diverse gendered interaction, according to Mansson. The boys for example, dominated circle times and the teachers gave them more attention and more elaborated answers. In situations characterized by less teacher guidance, e.g. meals, no special gender differences were identied. Mansson concluded that young children were part of gender constructions by virtue of the initiatives they took. Normally, the teachers responded to these initiatives, even if the communication was subtle and nonverbal, for example, a nod. Gender constructions, however, became more evident in situations characterized by high teacher guidance. Analyses of the interviews revealed that the teachers emphasized that girls were sensible and that they knew things, while the boys were more physically active with a need for affection and a lot of contact. Boys are often encouraged to play a dominant role in interactions, while girls play a secondary role, Mansson argues. The role of teachers in gender identity work is often invisible and unconscious with an over-idealisation of masculinity. Preschool Culture The third theme relates to the concept of culture and is a relatively new path in research involving toddlers. So far, little research has been done on the subject and most of the studies that do exist are outside the focus of this article.2 Of signicance is the idea of understanding young childrens relational lives on their own terms as well as meaning making and learning from the childrens own perspectives. Sociocultural and phenomenological approaches are used and the methods are inspired by ethnography. Peer Culture and Childrens Perspectives Engdahl (2007) investigated 1-year-old childrens play in a multicultural preschool context. Over a period of 9 months, the childrens interplay was documented by participating observation, eld notes and video recordings. The theoretical framework was phenomenology based on the ideas of Merleau-Ponty (1962) and the aim of coming close to the childs life-world and perspective was strongly emphasized. In addition, elements of Sterns theoretical ideas about toddlers interpersonal life were part of the theoretical framework. The research questions concerned what toddlers were playing, what kind of initiatives they took and how their play could be understood in terms of childrens competences. Engdahl does not
One study is in psychology (Michelsen 2004) which investigated interaction between one and two-yearold children in preschool. Another study by degard (2007) is described in the Norwegian contribution. Whereas the rst study takes peer culture as its starting point, the second views preschools as a cultural and culture-generating forum.
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explicitly relate to the concept of culture, but rather to narratives told by the children which she relates in the rst person singular. Three categories emerged from the data: friends, joint play and to do what you want. The rst category friends deals with toddlers inter-subjective engagement. The children searched and waited for each other and showed that they were aware of and cared for each other. Joint play stands for the continuing play going on between the children and do want you want represents the toddlers intense interest in a phenomenon, a game or an activity. This means that the child continued to focus on the phenomenon over a period of time. Patterns of interaction indicate, according to Engdahl, a competent toddler interacting, negotiating and communicating with peers. The emotional atmosphere was supportive and positive, and inclusion rather than exclusion characterized the interactions.

Concluding Discussion To sum up, the studies involving children under 3 years of age are based on different theoretical perspectives. The phenomenographic approach has dominated the eld and is most common in (developmental) studies of learning although sociocultural perspectives and phenomenology can also be found. The socio-cultural and phenomenological approaches have been used in studies where the focus is on values, communication and relations. It is notable that only one study claims to represent a critical perspective and only one study focuses on gender. This indicates a need for studies scrutinizing dimensions such as class, gender and ethnicity with reference to the youngest children in early childhood education. In two studies (Emilson 2008; Johansson 1999), we can also nd an emerging interest in philosophy as a basis of investigations involving young children. In addition, the majority of the studies have advocated naturalistic methodological approaches. Observations of everyday interactions in preschool settings are common. A few studies have adopted observation protocols, structured play and talk interactions, and tests as methods in their studies. These methods, however, have been rare. Almost all the studies use qualitative data and the most common data collection method is video recording, which seems adequate when researching these young children in order to understand meanings and intentions. One can, however, ask why there are so few longitudinal and national studies and what the research eld could gain by also encouraging research of this nature. Since childhood is institutionalized, there is a need for studies that also investigate learning and wellbeing in a long-term perspective. The questions raised in this review concern, in a broader sense, learning processes as well as the content of learning. They also concern childrens communication and their social lives in preschool. Conditions for young childrens learning and teachers competences have also been at the forefront in the research. The three themes presented above seem to have some important issues in common that refer to the ideology of the child. In the rst theme, a distinct focus on identifying the perspective of the competent child was found. The second theme takes consolidating the competent and equal child a step further while in the third theme, an interest in

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representing the childs perspective was identied. It can be argued that these signicant issues characterize Swedish research on the youngest children in the educational system. Below, we will briey discuss what these issues might mean. Identifying the Perspective of the Competent Child The studies referred to in the rst theme about learning in preschool have shown the capacity of young children to tackle and create knowledge about different phenomena in the preschool world. These studies are innovative because they take an interest in issues, something that has not been studied earlier when such young children are involved. The studies all build on the idea of a child with competences with the aim of basing investigations on the childs premises. In this way, the researchers participate in the construction of the discourse of the competent child. There is, however, a difference between approaches striving to nd out how children understand certain concepts, for instance, the study of basic mathematics (Doverborg and Pramling Samuelson 2009) and studies that take into account the childs understanding of different phenomena in everyday activities, for example, the study of literacy (Bjorklund 2008). The rst approach combines a top-down perspective with a bottom-up perspective where the researcher confronts the children with problems to be solved. It is important, however, that these issues are both challenging and meaningful for the child. The second approach has a bottom-up perspective, where what is signicant is the meaning the child creates in everyday interactions. The idea is to study the childs intentions. No specic problems are given to the child by the researcher. A combination of a top-down and bottom-up perspective is found in the interventional studies. The ambition here is to take into account the childs intentions and understandings and make them an object for teachers to change. In addition, the aim is to position the object of learning at the forefront of teachers didactics. In this way, although subordinated to the educational aims and methods, the childs perspective and competence is still of importance. Consolidating the Competent Equal Child? The research in the second theme, dealing with values in everyday interactions, provides a discourse of the child as competent and equal. Values education and emergent democracy learning accentuate the communication between the teacher and the child. Inter-subjectivity, communication and encounters with the childs life world are of signicance. Communication consisting of an inter-subjective relationship where both the teacher and the child become subjects is emphasized. However, to a large extent, the teacher has the responsibility for communication. The childs experiences are of interest and the childs lived body is also taken into account, which has not been focused on in this way before. This provides a new understanding of the toddlers bodily communication. Interpreting childrens bodily interactions is, however, an extremely difcult task and deserves critical discussion. A relevant question to reect on is how researchers can interpret a childs bodily expressions and whether they can adopt a childs perspective. The concept of ambiguity developed by Merleau-Ponty positions the child as a competent and

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vulnerable person. Nevertheless, implicit in these studies is a picture of the child with rights and possibilities who is able to express and understand the moral behaviour of others. Emilson (2008) adopts a critical perspective and Habermas theory as a framework and thereby takes an interest in democracy and the aim of changing power structures in teacherchild interactions. It is also important to critically consider this ambitionIs it possible to change these power structures and in what way? Taken as whole, the discourse of the child as competent is supported and further consolidated in these studies. A relevant dilemma we would like to point to is: when contributing to a new understanding of toddlers, there is also a risk that studies of the youngest children in the education system tend to become ideology. Representing the Childs Perspective The study by Engdahl (2007) rests on the conception of the competent child able to interact and create meaning through its body. This standpoint is based on phenomenological philosophy and empirical ndings. In addition, the study extends and challenges the idea of how researchers can speak in terms of the childs perspective. In this case, the researcher literarily speaks in terms of children, using the pronoun I when describing interplay between the children. In this way, the study differs radically from the other investigations presented in this overview. None of these describes childrens perspectives in the rst person singular. Nevertheless, similar ethical issues can be identied in all the investigations referred to: How far can researchers take the idea of nding and representing the perspective of the competent child? This raises important ethical questions when conducting research with children under the age of three and speaking on behalf of these children. Is it the childrens age and low position that allows researchers to interfere with their minds? This kind of approach would probably be impossible in research involving adults. How can Researchers Gain Access to Childrens Perspectives? The analysis has shown a strong focus on the childs perspective in all of the investigations. In this context, the childs perspective refers to an interest in childrens subjective experiences. Indeed, doing research with the intention of capturing or coming close to the childs perspective is positively loaded in Swedish research. Close to the idea of the childs perspective is the idea of the participant active child, which is another frequent keyword in several of the studies. The takenfor-granted idea seems to be that children, even as young as 13 years, are active and competent participants in research. It is also interesting to note that teachers competence does not seem to be loaded with similar positive connotations. These ideas raise issues concerning the ability of researchers to actually capture childrens perspectives and address them as subjects in research. How can researchers gain access to childrens perspectives and what kinds of conditions are important for making childrens perspective visible in educational research? Such discussions are not frequent in the studies presented here, although some researchers have addressed issues related to the idea of the childs perspective in

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other texts (Hallden 2003; Johansson 2003; Pramling Samuelsson and Sheridan 2003; Qvarsell 2003). In research, there does not seem to have been any critical debate scrutinizing the concept of the childs perspective. The issue of participation needs further attention and a critical debate. What does it mean to a very young child to participate in an investigation? What does it mean to address a child as a subject in research? The dilemma is a complex one. On the one hand, it is important for research to defend childrens rights, to address children with respect and as equals with the right to participate and give their opinions on matters that concern them. The Convention on the Rights of the Child is and should, of course, be a cornerstone of the investigations. Even if researchers admit that there is an imbalance of power in the encounters between children and teachers, the ideal is and should be to try to rectify this imbalance. On the other hand, it is important to critically discuss the problems and difculties involved in trying to live up to this ambition. It is extremely important to unpack and scrutinize the power relations that might be hidden in our ambition to take into account the perspective of the active participating child. How far can we go in talking in terms of childrens perspectives and how active can a child be? Talking in terms of children also means using power and making decisions about what and how to communicate. One of the studies describes the interactions between children as if the children were speaking. From our perspective, this is a dangerous matter and could risk diminishing or hiding the researchers responsibility for his or her research as well as the power to steer the investigation and the conditions for young childrens participation. Adults responsibility for young citizens in society can never be relinquished or dismissed. The child is both vulnerable and competent, which is an issue that needs to be addressed by researchers. If not, we risk turning research on young children into ideology. These ethical and political issues have been, and still are, neglected in research and education. Another side of the coin is that all the studies contribute to the knowledge of the life and learning of young children in early education. The results give a broad and unique picture of how toddlers participate, interact and communicate while engaged in early mathematics, arts, literacy, moral issues, how to master the preschool context, express their intentions and inspire their peers to interact and participate in playful activities. The children relate to each other, to moral values and their rights, and they create literacy practices. The competence of young children seems solid and much more developed than research has previously shown. This knowledge is novel and, taken as a whole, can be said to illustrate elements of the childrens perspectives on their everyday life and learning in preschool. Nevertheless, the responsibility for childrens competences and vulnerability depends on society and adults creating conditions for young childrens life in preschool.

References
Bernstein, B. (2000). Pedagogy, symbolic control and identity. Theory, research, critique. Revised edition. Oxford: Rowman & Littleeld.

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