Materiell som vilkår for utforsking innen fagområdet natur, miljø og teknikk i barnehagen

Materials as conditions for explorative activities related to science in Early Childhood Education

Abstract

Despite international emphasis on the advantage of children’s exploration, there is limited knowledge about how availability of physical materials influence children´s exploratory activities. This paper presents findings from a study that examined the availability and use of materials related to science in 26 Norwegian kindergartens. Data were collected by kindergarten teacher students during their practice in kindergartens. Quantitative data were gathered using checklists, qualitative data by observations of children´s activities involving science related materials. The quantitative and qualitative data were analyzed separately and then together using the three categories of exploratory activities introduced by Neuman: formal activities, informal activities and incidental activities. Our findings surface that most kindergartens had much of the materials listed in the checklist, but much of it was locked up and only a few of the objects, such as vinyl animals and books, were available for children´s informal activities. We also found that formal activities gave stimuli to informal activities, which highlights the importance of including children in collective activities as working with theme or projects over time. Only one of the activities in our data was categorized as incidental. Our findings indicate that benefits of using materials to extend children`s exploration are not taken fully advantage of and should be further discussed and highlighted.