“Everything is dangerous.” Preschool teachers’ discursive practices and children’s positions

• Authors: Gawlicz, Katarzyna

Abstracts

EN

Drawing on data from ethnographic research in two Polish preschools and taking a poststructuralist perspective as its interpretational framework, this paper examines the ways in which teachers’discursive practices centered around notions of the well-behaved child and the self-reflecting child, worked to position children. These discursive practices appeared to constitute the children as obedient and quiet, as knowing the rules and regulations, of doing only what they were told to do, of being capable of controlling their bodies and behavior, and accepting hierarchies and authority, rather than developing their own “unique personalities” as stated in the official preschool documents. However, one of the preschools, with children enrolled from the middle-class, also positioned them as moral subjects capable of taking into consideration the needs and feelings of others as well as being responsible for their peers’ well-being. Furthermore, the dominant positioning was gendered, as the submissive, passive and powerless child corresponded closely to common understandings of femininity. Discursive practices that teachers engage in may position children in ways that are very different from the teachers’ intentions, often becoming problematic. The paper therefore emphasizes the importance for teachers to reflect upon their discursive practices and to become aware of what they may bring about because of them.

Keywords

EN

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• Publisher: Polskie Towarzystwo Pedagogiczne
• Journal: Problemy Wczesnej Edukacji
• Year: 2010
• Volume: 6
• Issue: 12(2)
• Pages: 122-132

Contributors

author

Gawlicz, Katarzyna