Jeanette Clarkin-Phillips

Young children developing meaning-making practices in a museum: the role of boundary objects

A kindergarten, housed in a museum building in the centre of the capital city of New Zealand, has provided a unique opportunity for young children, teachers and university researchers to explore opportunities to learn with, and from, a museums artefacts and exhibitions. The authors have researched the ways in which the children constructed meaning from the displays and the knowledge offered by the museum. This article explores the childrens learning when they visited one of the special exhibitions during the first year of an action research project. We highlight their developing boundary-crossing competence and meaning-making practices and explore the role of ‘boundary objects’ in this learning. This article focuses on some of these objects and considers the way in which (associated with dialogue) they contributed to highlighting and strengthening the learning opportunities in the museum.

An affordance network for engagement: increasing parent and family agency in an early childhood education setting

Research from the United Kingdom suggests that early childhood centres that operate from a multi or integrated service model, offering opportunities for parents to attend to a range of their needs and aspirations, increase the ability and the inclination of families to engage with their childs learning at the early childhood centre. Integrated service models of early childhood education are a relatively new concept in Aotearoa New Zealand and it is only within the last three years that the government has introduced initiatives based on integrated services in early childhood education. This article reports on one initiative at one early childhood centre involved in the implementation of integrated services: the establishment of a playgroup for parents and caregivers with babies and toddlers. The authors analysed the impact of one of these initiatives, applying the notion of an affordance network for engagement as opportunities that are available, inviting, and personalising: a framework that described affordances that progressively increased the possibilities of agency for the families.

Dialogue-based teaching: The art museum as a learning space

Book review: Olga Dysthe, Nana Bernhardt & Line Esbjorn (2013). Dialogue-based teaching. The art museum as a learning space. Copenhagen, Denmark: Skoletjenesten.

Young children visiting museums: exhibits, children and teachers co-author the journey

ABSTRACT Research in New Zealand on museum visits from two culturally different early years education sites has analysed the ways in which a co-authoring by children/tamariki, teachers/kaiako and artefacts/taonga constructs an understanding of the museum as a ‘forum’ for debate rather than as primarily a ‘temple’ in which the aim is for children to accumulate new understandings and facts. The authors argue that the co-authoring can weave together two processes: an ecological synergy spiral or a going-on, whereby artefacts and things are animated and brought to life; and a storying where heritage stories are restored and improvisation is encouraged. The paper concludes that a co-authoring can construct a museum visit as a forum of inquiry and critique. Key theoretical guidance comes from Mason Durie (a Māori philosopher and educationalist) and Tim Ingold (a Scottish anthropologist who also writes about education).

Fighting the odds to make it even: Mapping an affordance ecosystem in a kindergarten community

This thesis is a case study of a kindergarten in one of the most deprived areas of Aotearoa New Zealand. Through the documentation of the stories of management, teachers and families, the thesis explores how the transformation of the kindergarten and a policy intervention have provided multiple opportunities and affordances for adults to realise their aspirations. Bourdieu’s logic of practice thinking tools and Bronfenbrenner’s ecological systems theory are intertwined to theorise about the contribution of macrosystem ideologies that position communities as vulnerable and frame up subsequent exosystem policy attempts to intervene. The concept of habitus is applied to explain how a commitment to social justice and an empowerment view of individuals and communities can afford conditions for the transformation of habitus. The thesis argues that the level of strength of an affordance is significant in the recognition and utilisation of opportunities and that early childhood teachers can be mesosystem agents in mediating affordances. Inherent in the thesis is the acknowledgment that early childhood services have the potential to contribute to positive life trajectories for adults as well as children, particularly for those in communities who have the odds stacked against them. The thesis adds to the scholarship about habitus and its transforming features and contributes to a deeper understanding about the role of effective early years services as powerful intervention sites for adults. The unique combination of Bourdieu and Bronfenbrenner’s theories offers new insights about the individual/environment relationship and impacts on agency. The thesis outlines a range of policy implications for consideration with respect to communities who are poorly provided for due to dominant ideological discourses and reiterates the right of all individuals to realise their hopes and dreams.

‘Physical education’ in early childhood education: Implications for primary school curricula

Children’s physical education in early childhood settings has always been underpinned by an emphasis on play. This is viewed as foundational for child development (movement education, cognitive growth, socialising functions, emotional development). However, where priorities about childhood obesity prevail, increased ‘prevention’ efforts have become targeted at primary and pre-school-aged children. It could be argued that early childhood education has become another site for the ‘civilising’ of children’s bodies. Drawing on data from a questionnaire completed by 65 early childhood education centres in Aotearoa New Zealand, we examine the play and physical education ‘curriculum’ and what this may mean for pre-school children’s views of physical activity and health. In light of the evidence that suggests pre-school physical education programmes reinforce achievement of a certain restrictive and narrow model of physical health and activity, we explore the implications for primary school physical education. In doing so we consider how teachers of physical education in primary schools may need to reconsider the curriculum to support young children to regain enthusiasm for pleasurable movement forms that are not centred on narrowly perceived notions of the healthy or sporting body.