Children’s Participation in ECE Documentation—Creating New Stories

Abstract

This chapter presents and discusses empirical examples from one Swedish preschool in which children’s participation in documentation practices was specifically highlighted. Children can be involved in documentation in a number of ways, for example, through drawing or giving their view on previously documented activities. Photographs are often used to allow teachers and children to return to and reflect on previous activities. Preschool documentation, and children’s participation in it, is complex and it is important to study what can happen, concretely, in preschool documentation practices. What might documentation become when teachers listen to children’s thoughts, and bring their voices forward? What happens with documentation itself when children take an active part in it? In the examples presented, new and unexpected stories were produced between teachers, children, computers, photographs and drawings. The chapter highlights the need for taking into account the purpose of documentation and children’s participation in it, and of materiality such as photos, computers and drawings, but also of to what, or where, documentation might lead.