Abstract
Arts are an expectation in early childhood classrooms — traditionally, visual art, music, drama, and movement. The variety of understandings of art and aesthetic experiences shape approaches to arts education, particularly with young children. Attempts to define the aesthetic experience refer to the presence of an object, most commonly a work of art. The object becomes central to the human response within the aesthetic experience. Through the analysis of data documenting conversations between a child and an adult, the author have previously proposed child — adult conversations as aesthetic experiences. In this article, she re-examines excerpts from child—adult conversations from her research, negotiating the possibility of naming child—adult conversation as art, in order to recognise child—adult conversation as an aesthetic experience. This article continues the conversation around thinking of conversation as art, and the art of conversation — an integral component of pedagogy with young children.