Children’s participation in preschool – on the conditions of the adults? Preschool staff’s concepts of children’s participation in preschool everyday life

Abstract

The purpose of this study was to investigate, analyse and describe preschool staff’s concepts of children’s participation in everyday preschool life, as well as preschool staff’s experiences and concepts of what characterises the children who participate. Furthermore, it addresses the conditions that preschool staff consider as crucial in promoting children’s participation in preschool. This study has a mixed methods design in which the definitions of participation given by preschool staff were initially analysed using a qualitative content analysis approach. The definitions provided by the preschool teams were then matched to interviews with staff from 20 preschools. Results from the questionnaire show that self‐determination and management of everyday life are strong indicators for high participation according to the staff. The interview results show that preschool staff share the understanding that giving children a sense of coherence and comprehension of their surrounding world consequently supports children’s management of and participation in everyday life in preschool.