Democratic,caring and disciplinary values in Danish preschools: Bringing values together

Abstract

Teachers and caregivers organize children’s everyday life in early childhood settings to support children’s well-being, learning and development. Teachers’ organizational decisions (e.g. daily schedule, arrangement of furnishings, activities, behavioural expectations) are influenced by a set of ideas, norms and values which they may or may not be conscious of at the time. The purpose of this study is to gain a deeper understanding of how democratic, caring and disciplinary values are communicated and negotiated between adults and children (from birth to five) in crèche and preschool settings, with particular attention to whether these values are animated in isolation (e.g. separately from one another) or in a more unified fashion. The conceptual framework for this study is based on previous theories and research on democracy education, communicative action, educational content and children’s democratic formation, caring values and disciplinary values. The researchers analysed video recordings of interactions between children and teachers during lunch, circle time and free activities. The findings reveal the nature and extent to which teachers expect children to follow and participate in the social order that adults have established for them, as well as ways in which empathic practitioners create space for children to influence changes in the social order.

Introduction

The study of values and values education has been underexposed in Denmark. Values are defined as principles that guide human action and by which actions are judged to be good or desirable (Halstead and Taylor, 2000). In Denmark, practitioners most often reflect on values with reference to the Danish philosopher Knud Løgstrup (1997: 8), who argues that showing and claiming trust is the most fundamental value. However, many other values are expressed in everyday life and educational settings: love, equality, freedom, justice, happiness, security, peace of mind and truth (Halstead and Taylor, 2000).

As part of the Nordic project ‘Values education in Nordic preschool’, the present study investigates the prevalence of the values communicated between practitioners and children in three Danish preschools, with a special focus on democratic, caring and disciplinary values. The overall aim of the study is to gain a deeper understanding of the values communicated in children’s everyday life in preschool. The specific research question is: How are democratic, caring and disciplinary values communicated, expressed and negotiated between practitioners and children?

The prevalence of values in preschool is self-evident and is almost seen as ‘normal’ or something which identifies life in preschool (Gannerud, 1999). For this reason, there is a need to uncover the hidden values and make them visible. There are often manifold values embedded in situations, communications and relations between practitioners and children. However, for analytical reasons, we refer to Emilson and Johansson’s (2009) model, which gives an overview of democratic, caring and disciplinary values, which are also found in both Danish and Nordic curricula (Einarsdottir et al., 2014). In the following, we introduce the three values in turn.

The term ‘democracy’ originates from the political organization of the Greek city states in the 5th century bce (Hardt and Negri, 2005). In the 17th and 18th centuries, the Enlightenment movement linked democracy to liberalism. John Locke (1689) argued that every man has a natural right to life, liberty and property. In this regard, liberty and equality are fundamental values of modern democracy.

Today, education and democracy are connected in order to create, uphold and/or protect democracy. Biesta (2009) connects this perspective to two influential strands of thinking concerning the subject of democracy. First is the individualistic Kantian perspective, which aims to create the rational, autonomous subject (Kant, 2009). In preschool, it is about stimulating the child’s growing self-awareness and encouraging exploration of the environment. Second is the social perspective of the democratic subject, as emphasized by Dewey (1960). In preschool, this is about the practitioner’s ability to take the child’s perspective, maintain a state of emotional presence or closeness, and maintain playful social practice (Bae, 2009; Emilsson & Johansson, 2009).

‘Caring’ values can be described as a particular way to be in relation to the child (Noddings, 1986) and a special way to create zones of joint attention, where the child and the practitioner can share their intentions (Tomasello et al., 2009). In relation to preschools, the Danish researcher Sven Thyssen (1995: 8–9) characterizes care as responsible actions targeting the needs of the child. By doing this, the practitioner knowingly provides support for the child’s mental development, ensures the cohesion of socialization and the appropriation of culture (norms, attitudes and behaviours) and, at the same time, denotes the unity of care, discipline and education (Broström, 2006a).

The function of ‘disciplinary’ values is to integrate people in a social life and, consequently, to orient them towards obedience, independence and achievement (Emilson and Johansson, 2009). Thus, values like dutifulness, adjustment, willingness and readiness, responsibility and eagerness to learn can be seen as disciplinary values. The disciplinary process is expressed both directly and indirectly. Some values are generally socially acceptable and expressed as communal values and people’s general view on ‘the normal child’. Parallel to such deliberate discipline (Durkheim, 1973), a smoother, more faceless, implicit discipline is expressed through daily routines and generally acceptable play activities (Ehn, 1983; Henckel, 1990; Nordin-Hultman, 2004).

Theoretical and conceptual framework

This study applies Biesta’s (2009) ideas about democracy, democratization and inclusion. Drawing on Rancière (1999), Biesta (2009) is sceptical about what he calls a colonial frame for thinking about democratization, which is characterized by privileged subjects inside a democratic sphere working to include others in their sphere. From this perspective, the point of democracy is the inclusion of everyone (the whole demos) in the ruling (kratein) of society – the formation of democratic subjects adhering to a stable democratic norm.

To interpret and understand the democratic values expressed in the actions of children and practitioners, we use Biesta (2009) argument that democratization is portrayed in ‘normal democracy’ in some situations and that there is ‘sporadic democracy’ in other situations. Normal democracy is here understood as based on the idea of a stable foundation of values, competences and skills (a democratic norm), which is a prerequisite for deliberative democratic action. Normal democracy describes democratization as a process where those who possess the requirements (those who live by the democracy norm) strive to include those who are outside. Sporadic democracy, on the other hand, is about temporary emancipatory processes where the established norms are challenged and redefined, so that new positions and identities become available (thereby destabilizing the norm). Thus, we try to identify expressions of both normal and sporadic democracy in order to find out how democratic values are communicated in preschool practice.

Care as a value field in preschool

Early childhood education is characterized by a particular emotional and caring relationship between the educator and the child, which, theoretically, is reflected in the concept of care. Katz and Goffin (1990) investigated life in preschool and describe some typical characteristics of pedagogues in early childhood education, finding that care and responsibility for the child’s needs and well-being, with special attention to areas of vulnerability, plays an extensive part in the role of early childhood education and care practitioners.

Care is seen as both a practical and theoretical activity, where the adult protects the child and meets the child’s needs and demand for food, rest and human interaction with close and secure attachment in order to contribute to the child’s well-being, learning and development (Broström, 2006a). Although care is commonly understood as the most fundamental activity in international early childhood education, there is a more significant and predominant focus on care in the Nordic countries. Nordic researchers have stated that pedagogues in early childhood education are predominantly women, who implement a practice based on care (Broström and Hansen, 2010; Dahlberg and Moss, 2005). Thus, in general, practitioners create a caring, appreciative and nurturing ethos (Gannerud and Rönnerman, 2006). In addition, research has shown that a general caring atmosphere also has an impact on children’s forms of interaction. Children care for each other, show others compassion, share their feelings and comfort one another (Broström, 2006b; Emilson, 2008; Hansen, 2013; Johansson, 2007; Thronton and Goldstein, 2006).

Nevertheless, in recent years, influenced by the Lisbon Strategy from 2000 (Rodriguez et al., 2010) and the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development’s (2001) report Starting strong, a more explicit learning dimension has entered the field of early childhood education with the educational practice in Nordic preschools moving towards an approach combining care and education, and the introduction of the concept of educare (Broström, 2006a; Caldwell, 1989; Johansson and Pramling Samuelsson, 2001).

The concept of care

Care is a kind of existence where two (or more) persons relate to each other. In early childhood education, the pedagogue relates to the child in a caring way. Heidegger (1962) understands care as the very being of human life, an ultimate reality of life and the final demand of life. The pedagogue expresses an existential striving to ease the child’s burden. According to Løgstrup (1997), the pedagogue meets a weaker, more dependent person who really needs the adult’s care. Since the relationship is not equal, Løgstrup (1972) uses the concept of an ethical demand.

Noddings (1984, 1992) expresses a similar understanding, emphasizing the caring relationship as an interaction where both parties contribute. It is ‘a connection in which each party feels something towards the other’ (Noddings, 1992: 15). The pedagogue expresses a caring attitude and the child on the receiving end accepts the care. In order to obtain a subject–subject relationship, or an ‘I–You’ relationship (Buber, 1983), the pedagogue has to express a specific emotional attitude, which Noddings (1984) describes as sensitivity, openness, responsibility, susceptibility and empathy: ‘When I care, I really hear, see, or feel what the other is trying to convey’ (Noddings, 1992: 16).

Care and caring values are a central part of professional pedagogical work. For Noddings (1986), ‘caring’ in educational environments means a specific way to interact with children – namely, being able to create zones of joint attention and thus make it possible to expand learning environments (Sheridan et al., 2009). Thyssen (1995) and Diderichsen (2005) further specify that caring is characterized by actions aimed at children’s existence, development and well-being. According to Hansen (2013), sharing intentionality requires an open and attentive pedagogue who also reflects on what is going on in the relationship with the child. The pedagogue thereby learns new things about themself and about the child. In this way, caring relationships construct the child as well as the pedagogue.

‘Disciplinary’ values are the values inscribed in everyday life that focus on the maintenance of a social order. Thus, children acquire shared norms and values – a code of conduct – which more or less make up a common base – a shared morality (Durkheim, 1973). With reference to Anton S Makarenko (1969), the educator can set up clear demands when such a shared morality or ideology is established. A common morality is developed over time and communicated via education defined by teaching, upbringing and care – that is, educare (Broström, 2006a).

It is especially through their upbringing that children acquire culturally embedded values, norms, attitudes and morals. Thus, upbringing and the transmission of cultural values might be seen as a kind of adjustment to the culture, or inculturation. However, upbringing does not necessarily mean adjustment. The British philosopher Robert Stanley Peters (1965, 1966) uses the concept of ‘initiation’ to balance between conservative notions of education as cultural transmission and a more progressive understanding of education as cultural regeneration. Nevertheless, the concept of initiation has been criticized as representing transmission (Biesta, 1997) and thus the exclusion of children’s agency. One might argue that upbringing understood as initiation contains a dimension of liberation.

Methodological approach

The investigation of democratic, caring and disciplinary values was carried out in close collaboration with the practitioners in the three preschools. Over a period of two years, the researchers videotaped lunchtime sessions, circle time and free activities, along with subsequent dialogues and shared sessions, in the specific preschools and also organized refection seminars with practitioners from the three preschools. In the sessions and reflection seminars, the researchers and practitioners analysed and interpreted selected video fragments, raised critical questions and engaged in discussion. Based on this, the practitioners formulated possible changes for future practice.

The continuous interaction between the researchers and the practitioners had the character of action research, following four repeated steps: (1) the practitioners and researchers formulate an educational idea; (2) together, they describe and decide on each action step; (3) parallel to this, they carry out a research step with data collection, analysis and reflection, which brings them to (4) a decision about the next action step (Lewin, 1958). This approach has a double perspective. The researchers obtain data which brings them to new knowledge and the practitioners make use of the analysed data in order to change practice towards a ‘better condition’ (Hegland, 1981: 66), which is a normative definition based on a communicative action (Habermas, 1987). This close-knit duality between practice and research is described by Clark (1972) as simultaneous change in the organization and study of the process. With reference to Lewin (1997), action research is a democratic ‘bottom-up’ strategy for change, which can result in democratic solutions in a democratic country.

The data was collected by use of video observations. The data set consists of approximately two hours of observation of three different situations (18 hours in total): circle time, free play and lunchtime in each preschool. Video observation was chosen in order to obtain dynamic visual data to describe and sustain the practitioners’ and children’s body, facial and verbal language expressed in social interactions in everyday situations. During the video recording, the camera was mobile in order to be able to focus quickly on an interaction. With reference to the idea of interactive episodes (Corsaro, 1985), interactions were recorded for as long as the two partners communicated and were in contact. In the phase of analysis, the video episodes allowed for close study of details in the interactions. Here, slowing down and speeding up the recordings was helpful to gain an analytical distance and reflexivity (Lemke, 2009: 46). According to research ethics, the use of video recordings challenges the idea of anonymity, which calls for a detailed strategy with regard to written informed consent. Moreover, the data must be stored following specific security procedures, and so the use of video material in reporting was rejected.

The study was undertaken with ethical considerations (Statens Samfundsvidenskabelige Forskningsråd, 2002). Written informed consent was obtained from the participants and pseudonyms are used for the persons portrayed in the vignettes. The total duration of the raw video material for analysis, for all three values, was 460 minutes. The raw data was divided into three parts for detailed analysis with regard to the three different values. In order to find the parts that concerned variations in democratic processes, we looked for passages displaying changes in the interaction patterns of the collective activities in which children and adults participated. Twelve passages were indexed in total. The passages varied in length and each worked as a unit of analysis. The indexed passages were viewed repeatedly in order to find out what characterized the shifts in the interaction patterns on a descriptive level. Dissimilar content was identified and briefly described on Post-it notes for tentative themes. The next stage of analysis was more deductive in character. The tentative themes were interpreted in relation to the theoretical concepts of normal and sporadic democracy. The analysis process ended up with two main concepts – democratic values and caring values – and subcategories related to each of these concepts. Selected passages were then transformed into vignettes illustrating how democratic values, caring values and disciplinary values were expressed in the data.

Findings

Forms of communicated democratic values

Democratic values are expressed during everyday life both in the planning of collective activities and when individual children or groups of children are actively engaged in interactions. The democracy-related patterns of interaction detected in the data involved both resistance and mutuality. Specific ways of expressing these patterns are exemplified in the vignettes and interpretations below.

Resistance-related interactions

Resistance-related patterns of interaction regarding children’s explicit resistance to adults’ expectations and/or agendas were found to affect children’s participation during circle time, as well as their ambitions in terms of influencing the common agenda.

The children in the preschools clearly resisted expectations of participation during circle time. Circle-time sessions involved a process in which the practitioner leading the session called on the children, who took turns in answering questions and contributing their perspectives. The children seemed able to destabilize these norms by refusing to participate, thereby opening space for sporadic democracy:

During circle time for a group of three-year-old children, the practitioner asks each child about what he or she experienced during the previous weekend. One girl relates a family trip on a ferry. The practitioner turns towards the next girl and asks: ‘Have you also been on a ferry?’ The girl looks the practitioner in the eye and firmly answers ‘No’ while shaking her head. The practitioner pauses to give the girl an opportunity to say something, which she does not. After a short silence, the practitioner asks: ‘Is there something else you want to tell us?’ Still looking directly at the practitioner, the girl shakes her head. After more silence, the girl turns her head towards the window. ‘Did you do something exciting over the weekend?’, the practitioner asks one more time. She then turns to the next child.

Although this interaction appears to go almost unnoticed in the video clip, it conveys a strong message of resistance from the girl to the practitioner, which should prompt the practitioner to reflect on why the girl does not want to say anything. Since the circle-time session continues, the norm prevails, yet it is inflected by this moment of resistance which the practitioner tolerates. One must ask whether the process of striving to include all children in a round robin of weekend stories is really a democratic process. At other times, resistance is more overt, as some children verbally interrupt sessions to push for changes to the shared agenda:

A group of three-year-old children are having a circle-time session in which each child is invited to tell a short story. The practitioner leading the session starts by saying that they will all sing at the end of the session. One girl, who sits on another practitioner’s lap, wants to proceed directly to the singing. ‘Singing! Singing!’, she chants. Though repeatedly told to be quiet, the girl continually states her desire to move on to the singing part of circle time during small breaks and pauses in the session. The practitioner keeps close bodily contact with the girl throughout the session.

Even though the girl is silenced by the teacher, there is important sporadic democratic potential in the girl’s desire for change and her willingness to overtly criticize the prevailing order. The girl does not succeed in changing the order. On the other hand, the practitioner does not fully succeed in including her in the prevailing order. The girl’s body is still in the circle, but she refuses to participate in the expected ways (silently waiting for the agenda to progress).

Mutuality-related interactions

Mutuality-related interactions, in which children seek to engage with each other and/or adults, were found to pose challenges for the practitioners in accurately understanding and appreciating the children’s perspectives. Furthermore, they exhibit children’s ability to demonstrate caring relations, even in more formal, regulated contexts such as circle time.

Regardless of their good intentions in seeking to appreciate how children see their world, the practitioners could not fully relate to the children’s perspectives. The practitioners did not always succeed in engaging the children in rich dialogues about their interests, which thereby limited the potential for sporadic democracy:

During a circle-time session for a group of three-year-old children, the practitioner asks a boy whether he wants to say something. The boy mumbles a little and says: ‘I have a Wii U [i.e. a gaming console] at home’. The practitioner clearly does not understand. ‘You have what? A Weeluu? What is that?’ The boy looks firmly at the practitioner and repeatedly says ‘Wii U’ to the best of his ability, but to no avail. The practitioner turns to a colleague who is also sitting in the circle: ‘Help me – I don’t understand’. At first, the other practitioner is confused too: ‘Is it something outside in the playground?’, she asks. ‘No, it is at my home’, the boy answers assuredly while pointing at himself. A third practitioner joins the conversation and guesses that it is some kind of game. The boy’s face lights up and he starts to explain further: ‘You can turn into a snake on the Wii U’. However, the practitioners do not understand what he means and they instead agree with each other that he is talking about a Wii [i.e. an older gaming console] and that they must ask his mother for clarification when she comes to fetch him from preschool.

What children can learn during circle time, including which identities and perspectives are possible during circle-time sessions, is implicitly governed by processes based on the practitioners’ values and perspectives. These processes evince a stable core of knowledge and values by which the practitioners, by means of caring and disciplining initiatives, strive to include the children.

Another mutuality-related interaction showcased the children’s ability to spontaneously form a caring micro-community at the periphery of the larger group of peers and practitioners, governed by disciplining values:

It is a circle-time session in a classroom of three-year-old children. The session has proceeded for nearly 15 minutes by allowing each child a turn to say something, and the children are clearly tiring and losing focus. The practitioner nevertheless continues to direct her attention from one child to the next in the circle in order to ensure that every child has the chance to contribute. The children are expected to sit still and concentrate on the leading practitioner and her conversation with each child. Silently and initially unnoticed, one boy caresses the girl next to him and gently grooms her hair, which she seems to appreciate. When he leans over to kiss her forehead, another girl notices and softly tells the boy to stop. This second girl then pinches the boy’s ear. The boy turns towards her and likewise pinches her ear playfully. For a while, the three children playfully touch each other, until a practitioner nearby notices and tells them to stop.

Here, the practitioner acts to reintegrate the three children into the group, thereby policing the prevailing order. Although the three children do not directly resist the circle time’s norms, their micro-community of playful, caring intimacy excludes them from a social order in which they have lost interest. In this micro-community, alternative possibilities for meaningful interaction emerge, as shown in this vignette.

Forms of communicated caring values

Caring values are expressed non-verbally through facial expressions and gestures, and, when speaking, through tone of voice, intonation and the rhythm of language. Like democratic values, caring values are expressed during everyday interactions, and we also see a variation in forms of communicated caring values. In caring interactions, the practitioners often merge processes characterized by socialization and the adaptation of culture (values, norms, attitudes and behaviours). These processes unite care, discipline, democracy and education, and can thus be denoted as educare (Broström, 2006a). Based on the research data, we have identified four forms of caring values.

Emotional care: care as recognition

Emotional caring values are communicated and expressed when an adult spontaneously follows the child’s initiative (shared intentionality) and perspectives, and have also been identified as ‘careful value[s]’ (Hansen, 2013). Noddings (1986: 30) has characterized the caring practitioner as one who manages to receive others in themself and to look and feel with them – in a sense, to become one. Devoted caregivers share children’s intentions and show that they care, and view caring as a way of being in the world together with others in need of care. With reference to Honneth (1995) and Bae (2009), emotional care is characterized by symmetrical relations which give the child a basic self-confidence – a kind of emotional recognition:

Two girls, Vera and Inga, aged four and five, are sitting next to each other at a table outside in the garden. They are cutting carrots and potatoes into small pieces to put in a pot with water. A practitioner, Helen, is with them. In front of them on the table, they both have a cutting board with a carrot on.

Vera at first holds the knife with her right hand and the carrot with her left, but when she cannot take hold of the knife in the carrot, she grasps it with both hands. The carrot is slipping a little. Helen asks: ‘Should I help you and hold? Should I hold it a little bit?’ She grabs the carrot and says: ‘Now you can saw’. Vera saws with the knife. She makes a small notch in the carrot. ‘A little bit more, you’ll soon be through’, Helen says. And after a few seconds: ‘Ahhh, one last little bit of sawing now . . . It’s not far now’. Vera then succeeds and cuts off the very tip of her carrot. ‘Yeah!’, shouts Helen and bends down to look underneath Vera’s screen cap. Vera looks up at her and smiles. Helen holds up the pot so that she can put the piece into it.

The practitioner concentrates her attention on the two girls’ cutting work. She acknowledges when they succeed in cutting the vegetables, creating a harmonious atmosphere and caring about the girls’ work. She expresses ‘caring’ values in order to support their learning – ‘educare’.

Educational caring

Besides the practitioners’ caring interaction with the children, the subject–subject relationship and the being together, they often also have a shared focus on an object or a theme they are learning about. In this way, the practitioners express idea-generating, expanding, interaction-guiding and educative values. The practitioners support the children’s discovery of the world; they also point out things of interest and name the observed objects and phenomena. This requires a planned educational base adapted to each child’s stage of development (Hansen, 2013). Simultaneously with the caring interactions, the practitioners often challenge the children’s learning and development and, in the process, facilitate caring:

Five children aged between two and three and one practitioner, Emma, sit together at a table in order to eat lunch. Emma sees that Agnes has got a lump of butter on her sandwich and she shows her how to spread the butter. Emma says: ‘You can try, Agnes. I can see if there is anything I can help you with’. Emma turns to Tom: ‘What should one do to get it up [the lump of butter]?’ Immediately, Klara responds: ‘Like I do!’ Tom and Emma look at Klara, who spreads the butter on her sandwich. Then they look at Tom’s sandwich and Emma says: ‘Shall I show you the same as I showed Agnes?’ She takes the butter knife and Tom is looking at what she is doing. She gives Tom the knife and he tries again, with his attempts to put butter on his sandwich proving successful. He looks at the sandwich with an air of satisfaction.

The practitioner constructs a caring and cosy atmosphere while the children carry out a meaningful and educational activity. The practitioner supports the children’s struggle to spread the butter.

Disciplinary caring

Some caring interactions contain a disciplinary dimension. The practitioner supports and helps the child in order to achieve a positive interaction with other children or avoid negative behaviour. Disciplinary caring is not negative, judgmental help but positive, constructive, culturally founded caring values:

In circle time, 3 practitioners and 12 children aged 14 to 34 months sing songs, which the children take turns in selecting. This circle-time session is dominated by a boy aged 22 months who is impatient and repeatedly tries to attract attention by interrupting the songs. He also tries to grab the objects involved in the song selection which are placed in the centre of the circle. The practitioner closest to the boy places her hand gently on the boy’s arm and looks at him with a mild but determined gaze. Nevertheless, the boy continues his activity. The practitioner then moves closer to the boy and says in a firm tone of voice: ‘Now, you have to stay calm and wait for the other children!’ When the boy calms down, she smiles and gently squeezes his hand.

The disruptive boy becomes the object of the practitioner’s care, which he might interpret as a kind of reprimand. However, the practitioner does not scold him; on the contrary, she expresses a caring attitude by squeezing the boy’s hand. As such, the disciplinary intent is communicated with tact.

Democratic caring

Democratic caring communicates caring values which at the same time allow for children’s influence and often also their learning about the surrounding world. Below is an (abridged and edited) observation where a four-year-old girl, Tiina, plans to go into the playground on a cold day of −13 °C:

The practitioner, Tanja, says: ‘Tiina, here are your clothes [dungarees and fleece trousers]. You can begin to dress yourself’. Tiina sits down and begins to put on woollen socks. She then tucks the legs of her dungarees inside the socks and tries to adjust the legs many times without succeeding. She leaves the fleece trousers on the floor and puts on a hat. Tanja returns and, kneeling down near Tiina, says: ‘You have to put the fleece trousers on and then take that jacket’. Tiina despairingly raises her shoulders and cries: ‘I can’t put the fleece trousers on!’ Tanja places Tiina’s dungarees and fleece trousers in her lap and, in a gentle tone, says: ‘Which of these do you want to put on?’ Tiina points to the dungarees with her toe. Saara says: ‘OK, you pick these; let’s put them on’. Tanja helps Tiina to put on the hat and, smiling, says: ‘You look so sweet. You have such a warm hat!’ Then she gives the mittens to Tiina, who happily goes out into the playground.

Tanja tries to force Tiina to put on two pairs of trousers because of the frost outside. When Tiina refuses, Tanja offers her a way out of the situation and lets her choose one pair of trousers. In this way, Tiina manages to come out of the situation with a possible new identity: instead of being the object of the adult’s strategic communication, she is now a subject engaging in a compromise.

Forms of communicated disciplinary values

The analysis of the data from the three preschools over a period of two years offers a rich basis for the identification of communicated disciplinary values. Below, three episodes are presented, analysed and discussed in order to identify different forms of disciplinary values.

One preschool accommodates 20 children aged three to five and three female practitioners. In the following, three sequences are communicated. In the first, a boy disturbs the drawing activity of two girls. The next two are episodes from circle time, where two boys disturb the shared activity in different ways.

Alicia and Alba draw on the ground

On a sunny September afternoon a group of one- and three-year-old children enter the playground together with two preschool teachers. The children play in the area with two broad slides and also a pipe slide, which draw in many children. Two 3-year-old girls, Alicia and Alba, sit on the ground deeply involved in a drawing activity. They use their fingers and also some sticks. Four children are sitting around the drawing area watching them carefully. After a while, Alicia and Alba stop their activity in order to search for some more sticks to draw with. When the girls are out of sight, a one-year-old boy crawls towards the drawing area. When the two girls return with a bunch of sticks in order to continue the drawing activity, an observing practitioner, who is squatting nearby, directs herself at Alicia and Alba: ‘I suggest you should move to the sandpit. Then you can also have some shovels and buckets’. The girls ignore the practitioner’s idea and do not answer. But, in the meantime, the one-year-old boy has begun to draw in the drawing area. Alicia realizes the problem and starts crying. The practitioner seizes the boy’s arm carefully but without moving him away. Alicia protects the drawings by covering the area with her body. She claps the sand. The one-year-old boy puts out his hand to do the same. Alicia cries loudly. The preschool teacher holds back the one-year-old’s arm and calmly addresses the two girls: ‘You can also find a secret place. Alicia, listen to me – a secret place where the young children are away, a place where you have the space for yourself. Ask Alba if she will follow you’. The two girls then leave the area. The preschool teacher stays back, together with the one-year-old boy, who straight away starts drawing.

The practitioner observes Alicia and Alba’s drawing activity and realizes that the one-year-old boy might spoil the girls’ drawing and thus disturb the social order and violate the shared morality (Durkheim, 1973): respect other people’s activities and products. She could solve the problem by removing the one-year-old. However, based on the idea that children learn by observing, imitating and participating, the practitioner gives the young boy a chance to be present without spoiling the girls’ activity. Therefore, she grabs the boy’s arm carefully, which is both a disciplinary and a caring action. She cares for the child’s learning possibilities and disciplines the boy by preventing him from scribbling over the girls’ drawing. In adjusting the boy’s movements, she opens his eyes to new possibilities.

The practitioner feels empathy towards the two girls and, in order to protect their activity, she suggests that they find a secret place. She appeals to the girls’ independence, to them making their own decision. This protecting attitude contains caring values which support the girls’ creative drawing activity and thus have a dimension of liberating values. However, while the practitioner strives to maintain harmony, there is also a touch of adjustment and, indirectly, faceless discipline (Ehn, 1983; Henckel, 1990; Nordin-Hultman, 2004). Thus, there is a knitting-together of different values: caring values with elements of liberating values go together with smooth disciplinary values. Such compound disciplinary values, expressed in situations where the practitioner wants to protect the individual child or group of children, could be categorized as ‘protecting disciplinary values’ or ‘harmonization disciplinary values’.

Circle time

Fifteen children aged three to five and three practitioners are gathered in the corner of a big room in order to carry out a circle-time activity. They sit on the floor in a big circle with lots of space in the middle. The children are familiar with the situation and they are all looking forward to participating in a popular play activity, which the practitioners and children have agreed on in advance.

The activity runs like this: the children agree together on a number – for example, ‘two’ (Danish to). Then they have to choose a word that rhymes with ‘two’ (to). This could be ‘cow’ (Danish ko). After this, the play leader/practitioner and the children count to two and the practitioner tells a story about a cow and invites the children to move their bodies according to the story about the cow.

In the first episode, the practitioner who is leading the session is sitting on the floor and has placed a three-year-old boy, Peter, close to her, who moved to the preschool a few weeks previously:

The practitioner looks at Peter and whispers: ‘Ready now’. Nevertheless, Peter moves from his place, makes a noise and disturbs the children sitting next to him. The practitioner asks Peter: ‘Would you like to sit in my lap?’ Peter agrees, sits himself in the preschool teacher’s lap, embraces her body and stops disturbing the circle time.

The second episode runs as follows:

Directed to the children, the practitioner says: ‘Now, what number do you want?’ Some children shout ‘nine’, ‘five’ and ‘two’, but many shout ‘seven, seven, seven’. ‘OK, then we will pick seven’ (Danish syv), and right away some children scream ‘thief’ (Danish tyv). The practitioner replies: ‘Right, and do you know what kind of thief we are speaking about?’ She moves to an upright position and pretends to cry. She puts her hands to her eyes and pretends to wipe away the tears. She says: ‘It is a really sad thief’. The children laugh loudly. Their bodily and facial expressions show their expectation of what is to come. They wait for the signal to stand up and move around imitating ‘a really sad thief’. However, a five-year-old boy, Mohammed, stands up and moves to the middle of the free space in the circle; he turns around and shakes his bottom just in front of the practitioner. In response to this interruption, the practitioner expresses in a correcting voice: ‘No Mohammed. Take your place’. At the same time, she pushes him into his seat in the circle in a gentle way, saying: ‘We do not need your bottom play’. Mohammed sits down and the practitioner continues in a normal voice: ‘Listen’. Then, she takes up the idea to pretend to be a crying thief. Again, Mohammed stands up and tries to get attention, but the practitioner moves towards the open space in the middle of the circle and gently sits him back down, saying: ‘Sit down’. Without saying anything more, she returns to the play activity.

In the first episode, the practitioner places Peter close to herself and establishes intimacy, saying ‘Ready now’. She understands Peter’s situation as new to the group and expresses caring values. When Peter starts to move around and make a disturbance, she offers to let him sit in her lap. Although this is a caring action, the practitioner tries to maintain social order and a shared morality (Durkheim, 1973). The action also holds disciplinary values, expressed in a friendly and indirect way. The practitioner expresses and communicates disciplinary and caring values in order to help Peter achieve success in a social activity and thus support the child’s possibility to establish actual social relations and friendships in the long term. Such values might therefore be called ‘socially supporting disciplinary values’.

In the second episode, the practitioner tries to start the play activity but each time is interrupted by Mohammed, who tries to get attention. In a calm way, the practitioner rejects the boy and, in a gentle way, she pushes him back and corrects him, saying: ‘Sit down’. She makes use of direct discipline with a clear demand (Makarenko, 1969). The practitioner substantiates her disciplinary demand in the group’s interests. While the children really want to play, Mohammed’s interruption is a breach of the shared morality and thus an undemocratic action. Because the practitioner’s discipline is directed towards supporting the children’s interests and intentions, and is thus based on the idea of maintaining a democratic life, this form of value can be categorized as a ‘democratic disciplinary value’.

In summary, disciplinary values are communicated in different ways and with different intentions, and can be categorized in three (overlapping) groups: harmonization disciplinary values, socially supporting disciplinary values and democratic disciplinary values.

Discussion

We have seen how ‘democracy’ was expressed as the children participated in the planning of shared activities such as a buffet and circle time. In the data, however, this is not the only way in which democratic values are expressed. In the following example, we see adults striving to facilitate children’s co-determination.

As Freja is pondering which activities to include in a suitcase, Bente (the practitioner) is engaging in a conversation with her, asking about her thoughts, listening to her and helping her express her wishes. In this regard, we can see glimpses of communicative action, even though Freja is choosing from a fixed set of possible activities. Approaching this theme from a didactic perspective, we can ask some critical questions that extend beyond the mere form of the communication: In the case of the circle-time suitcase, with which criteria is the total set of activities selected (the set from which Freja can choose)? One of the cards Freja chooses states that the group should talk about what Christmas is and why it is celebrated. This Christian tradition happens to be firmly in line with the cultural backgrounds of the children who are currently in the group – but how and when will the practitioners make a similar Ramadan card (a Muslim holiday), for example, available? As Klafki (1998) points out, democratic Bildung is not about affirming what is well known, but about expanding horizons with reference to key societal problems, such as those arising from cultural differences and conflict.

In a similar vein, one can problematize the educative quality of a shared buffet. It is relevant that children learn about food, how to prepare it collectively, and so on, but, in the example, the origin of the food was the local supermarket. Some of the children had participated in the shopping trip for groceries. With reference to a key problem such as sustainable development, taking children to a local farm to help harvest potatoes and carrots opens up new potentials for democratic Bildung.

‘Caring’ values are mainly communicated through a variety of emotional gestures, mimicry, and eye and bodily contact. The practitioners involved are all part of a Danish professional culture where care is seen first and foremost as an emotional relationship, in which the child feels secure and safe. Second, it is a means of cultural expansion and disciplinary communication. In the Mohammed-example above, the child in focus experiences a careful interaction in which he learns about social and cultural values in a Danish context where he shares his lifeworld with ethnic Danes. In the process, he is educated and, at the same time, recognized for his presence.

The Danish understanding of caring values underlines a special relationship that targets and supports the child’s needs, and they are facilitated by emotional actions, as described above, where the practitioner builds a professional form of a secure frame around the child. In this sense, the practitioner’s actions can be described as a way to meet the child, which requires a conscious effort on several levels – ethical, cognitive and emotional.

‘Disciplinary’ values are communicated in many situations and with many nuances. Nevertheless, the values expressed can be organized into three categories – socially supporting disciplinary values, protecting disciplinary values and democratic disciplinary values – which have a shared basis – namely, the preschool teacher’s efforts to make the best conditions for all children’s well-being and learning. When the three values are brought into play, it might seem like a kind of adjustment and limitation of the child’s activity. However, although disciplinary values govern and also, in a way, adjust children, the fundamental principle and aim is to structure an environment which can support children’s well-being and learning.

In the circle-time sequence involving Peter, the preschool teacher invited the child to sit on her lap, thereby averting disturbing behaviour and thus a conflict with reprimands. She used her authority in order to regulate the child so that both Peter and the entire group of children had a positive experience. By using socially supporting values, both the individual child’s and the group’s interests were taken into consideration.

The same dynamic is seen in the example of the girls drawing in the sand. In a gentle way, the preschool teacher uses protecting disciplinary values to construct a situation where both the young child and the two older girls can carry through their ideas. She could easily have physically moved the young boy in order to protect the girls’ activity, but she would then have spoiled the young boy’s sense of harmony and his urge to explore the world.

In the example of the play activity, the preschool teacher actually stopped the boy who was disturbing the group by using her authority and saying ‘No’. This could be seen as an external and direct behaviour modification, but we categorize it as democratic disciplinary values, where the intervention is based on both the interests of the entire group and an effort to include the boy in a group activity.

In summary, the communicated disciplinary values in the three preschools are not characterized by a random use of power but are mixed up with democratic values, where the preschool teachers strive to support all of the children’s intentions and activities, as long as they do not oppress other children. The descriptions of lunchtime, circle time and spontaneous activities illustrate not only how children are expected to follow and relate to the existing social order, but also how practitioners, in an emphatic way, give space for children’s possibilities to use their abilities to change that order.

In the sections discussing caring, democratic and disciplinary values above, we see the communication of both isolated values and values expressed as a whole in combination. In the episode with Mohammed, who disturbed circle time by shaking his bottom at the teacher, the practitioner expressed an isolated disciplinary value. However, it is characteristic to see a combination of values. In the episode in the playground where the two girls were drawing in the sand, and also in the episode with Peter who was disturbing circle time, both caring and disciplinary values were expressed.

Concluding remarks

Our study has deepened our understanding of values in the everyday life of crèches (for children from birth to three) and day-care settings (for children aged three to five), and might contribute to a more reflective and goal-oriented values education in these settings. The study has shed light on existing values which have been previously expressed at a less conscious level – what Polanyi (1958) and others describe as ‘tacit knowledge’. The concept of tacit knowledge refers to the idea that you actually know more than you are able to describe and explain. So, via our shared analysis of video observations and dialogue with pedagogues, we have been able to uncover their tacit knowledge of values and elevate it to a conscious level.