21 research outputs found
Inclusive or exclusive participation: Paradigmatic tensions in the mosaic approach and implications for childhood research
Caralyn Blaisdell - ORCID 0000-0002-5491-7346
https://orcid.org/0000-0002-5491-7346Early childhood research continues to be dominated by psychological research in the positivist paradigm. The Mosaic approach is one work that contests this dominant discourse on early childhood, using task-based, participatory inquiry to share power and involve children as co-constructors of knowledge. However, there are paradigmatic tensions underlying the use of task-based methods. In this paper I examine these tensions in the context of my own experience as an early career researcher. In particular the complex role of the researcher is discussed, and connected to issues of inclusion and exclusion regarding childrenâs participation in the research process.http://www.childhoodstoday.org/article.php?id=686pubpub
Participatory work with young children: The trouble and transformation of age-based hierarchies
Caralyn Blaisdell - ORCID 0000-0002-5491-7346
https://orcid.org/0000-0002-5491-7346Item previously deposited in University of Strathclyde repository on 9 Aug 2018 at: https://strathprints.strath.ac.uk/id/eprint/65102This paper explores the ways that participatory work with young children was actually lived in practice, in one early childhood setting. Drawing on an ethnographic study, the paper argues that disruption of age-based hierarchy was key for making space and time for young childrenâs meaningful participation. Practitioners held a strong, nuanced view of young childrenâs ârichnessâ, rather than defining young children in terms of what they lack. The finished state of adulthood was troubled, with adults seen as fellow âemergent becomingsâ, in the process of learning alongside children. However, despite conscious efforts to deconstruct age-based hierarchy, age and life experience remained troublesome concepts at the nursery. The paper examines tensions and limitations in how far adults were willing to cede control to young children, focusing on the example of care routines. The paper contends that participatory work with children must itself be maintained as a space for inquiry and reflection.https://doi.org/10.1080/14733285.2018.149270317pubpub
Listening to young children: meaningful participation in early childhood settings
This briefing reports on research that looked at how listening to children was put into practice in one early childhood setting. It provides questions to help early years practitioners reflect on and deepen their participatory work with young children
Young childrenâs participation as a living right: an ethnographic study of an early learning and childcare setting
My doctoral research has explored how young childrenâs participation was put into
practiceâhow it was âlivedâ and negotiatedâin the context of one early learning
and childcare setting.
The concept of childrenâs participation is rooted in large part in the UN Convention
on the Rights of the Child (1989), which enshrines childrenâs right to express their
views and have those views taken into account. However, young childrenâs
participation rights are often overlooked. The more prominent discourse about young
children has been one that focuses on early childhood as a preparatory period of life,
in which adults must intervene and shape childrenâs development. My research has
therefore focused on child-adult relationships within the early childhood setting,
looking at how young children and early childhood practitioners âlivedâ childrenâs
participation and negotiated the tensions and challenges that arose for them.
To carry out the research, I used an ethnographic methodology to study one
fieldwork site in depth. âCastle Nurseryâ was an early learning and childcare setting
in Scotland, where practitioners professed to work in participatory ways with young
children. The long-term nature of ethnography allowed me to observe how childrenâs
participation was lived and negotiated at Castle Nursery over an eight-month period
of fieldwork.
The research found that practitioners challenged adult-led, âschoolifiedâ practices by
foregrounding young childrenâs knowledge and contributions to the setting.
Childrenâs participation was embedded into play-based pedagogy at Castle Nursery,
with practitioners organising time and space to allow young children a great deal of
influence over their daily experiences. Rather than planning adult-led learning
activities, practitioners instead cultivated a rich learning environment for children to
explore, through free-flow play.
The thesis has also highlighted a variety of tensions and challenges that arose. Even
at Castle Nursery, where practitioners were proud of the ways their work challenged
conventional norms about young children, there were limits to how far practitioners
would take a participatory approach. The thesis has particularly highlighted the
importance of reflective practices about the ethical dimensions of early childhood
practice. Uncertainty seemed to be an inevitable and enduring feature of living
young childrenâs participation
Posing Unique and Urgent Challenges to Understandings of Quality: Elucidations through a Froebelian lens
This paper reports on findings from a small pilot study undertaken with early years practitioners in Scotland. The Scottish Government is currently implementing its key election promise of almost doubling the entitlement to publicly funded early learning and childcare (ELC) for all three and four-year old and eligible two-year old children. A key message from the Scottish Government during this period has been that quality is at the heart of the expansion initiative (Scottish Government, 2017b). However, quality can be a contested and an ill understood concept (Moss, 2019). This pilot study, therefore, explored the perspectives of practitioners in Scotland regarding what quality in early years provision entails, particularly in this time of change and expansion. The paper will make three key arguments based on the findings from the study. First, that although quality is a much-used term in Scottish ELC settings, understandings of the term can be subjective, yet powerful and can leave practitioners with more questions than answers. Second, we argue that Fröbelian principles could ameliorate some of the issues regarding quality in Scotland, particularly in terms of combatting discrimination. Finally, we argue that those principles must be accompanied by a social justice lens in which prejudice and stereotypes are recognized, named, and unpacked and action for change taken
âWhy am I in all of these pictures?â From learning stories to lived stories:The politics of childrenâs participation rights in documentation practices
Caralyn Blaisdell - ORCID: 0000-0002-5491-7346
https://orcid.org/0000-0002-5491-7346In this paper, we report on Phase One of a small action research project that examined how Learning Stories were put into practice at one Scottish nursery. Specifically, the paper looks at young childrenâs participation rights and how they were enacted within the authorship of the stories. The project used an action research approach in which qualitative data about participantsâ current experiences with the stories was used to spark reflection, experimentation and change in documentation practices. Drawing on Phase One data from young children, parents and practitioners at the nursery, our findings illustrate the complex enactment of childrenâs participation rights, including childrenâs right to information, freedom of expression and their right to express their views and have those views taken into account. The paper concludes that more work needs to be done in the field of Learning stories to (a) acknowledge the complex political and material considerations at play in the creation of pedagogical documentation and (b) to accommodate childrenâs own authorship, through flexible, non (or less) written methods.The research was funded by The Froebel Trust: Registered Charity No. 1145128 Company Limited by Guarantee Registered in London No. 7862112.https://doi.org/10.1080/1350293X.2021.2007970aheadofprintaheadofprin
The Impact of the Covid-19 Pandemic on Children of Colour in Scotland: Methodological and Ethical Reflections
Caralyn Blaisdell - ORCID 0000-0002-5491-7346
https://orcid.org/0000-0002-5491-7346In this article, we offer methodological and ethical reflections from our research project, âThe Impact of the Covid-19 Pandemic on Children of Colour in Scotland: Visions for Changeâ. The project was conducted from January to July 2021, largely under Covid lockdown conditions. Our reflections take the form of creative writing, spoken-word poetry, images and reflective writing. Particularly, we highlight the ongoing, enmeshed and entangled nature of researcher and researched and how this relates to extractive practices, ethical care and navigations of systemic racism in childrenâs rights research with children of colour. We do so by positioning ourselves and our personal narratives, at times, as axles within this piece of work using Unarchigal (àźàźŁàź°àŻàźàŻàźàźżàźàźłàŻ)âModalities of Resistance, which is an embodiment resistance approach created within postcolonial radical feminist autoethnography. We suggest that researchers might consider similar reflexivity around these issues in their own childrenâs rights research.5pubpub
Look Whoâs Talking:Using creative, playful arts-based methods in research with young children
Young children are often ignored or marginalised in the drive to address childrenâs participation and their wider set of rights. This is the case generally in social research, as well as within the field of Arts-Based Education Research. This article contributes to the growing literature on young childrenâs involvement in arts-based research, by providing a reflective account of our learning and playful engagement with children using creative methods. This small pilot project forms part of a larger international project titled Look Whoâs Talking: Eliciting the Voices of Children from Birth to Seven, led by Professor Kate Wall at the University of Strathclyde. Visiting one nursery in Scotland, we worked with approximately 30 children from 3 to 5 years old. Seeking to connect with their play-based nursery experiences, we invited children to participate in a range of arts-based activities including drawing, craft-making, sculpting, a themed âplay basketâ with various props, puppetry and videography. In this article, we develop reflective, analytical stories of our successes and dilemmas in the project. We were keen to establish ways of working with children that centred their own creativity and play, shaped by the materials we provided but not directed by us. However, we struggled to balance our own agenda with the more open-ended methods we had used. We argue that an intergenerational approach to eliciting voice with young children â in which adults are not afraid to shape the agenda, but do so in responsive, gradual and sensitive ways â creates the potential for a more inclusive experience for children that also meets researcher needs
Children as competent social actors
Caralyn Blaisdell - ORCID 0000-0002-5491-7346
https://orcid.org/0000-0002-5491-7346Item not available in this repository.https://uk.sagepub.com/en-gb/eur/the-sage-encyclopedia-of-children-and-childhood-studies/book245903pubpu
Chapter 2: Whose knowledge counts in Early Childhood Education and Care
Caralyn Blaisdell - ORCID: 0000-0002-5491-7346
https://orcid.org/0000-0002-5491-7346Item is not available in this repository.https://www.criticalpublishing.com/anti-racism-in-educationpubpu