Children’s Strategies for Agency in Preschool

This article is based on an ethnographic study of children’s everyday life in Swedish preschools. The ethnography is used to explore children’s strategies for influencing, defending and constructing the social order of a preschool institution. The focus of our concern is on how the children, in their interactions with each other and with the preschool teachers, manage the collective regulation and how they negotiate their participation in collective activities. There is an inherent tension between free play and the high degree of routinised and collective activities within the preschool institution. The study shows that children are active in playing at the border, acting as if the institution is the children’s place. It also shows how they draw on different strategies as resources for managing the regulations, accounting for personal autonomy and negotiating the social order. In taking a child perspective and acknowledging children as active agents, it is possible to see how they influence and shape their everyday life in a preschool context. In addition, the article illustrates individual children’s strategic and pragmatic use of resources and in doing so contribute to their own childhood and thereby become part of a social and cultural construction process.     

Making Room for Play: An innovative Intervention for Toddlers and Families Under Rocket Fire

Evidence from both clinical reports and empirical research suggests that symbolic play may help heal children’s traumas. Playfulness, an enduring individual characteristic, also contributes to resilience. However, trauma often sabotages children’s ability to engage in imaginary play and parents’ ability to be involved in playful interactions with their young children. This paper describes an innovative preventive group-intervention program by the name of NAMAL (Hebrew acronym for Let’s Make Room for Play), designed for mothers and their toddlers who live under the chronic stress of recurrent missile attacks in Israel. The major objective of the program is to bolster children’s resilience by enhancing their playful interactions with their mothers. The theme and activities of each session are organized around a saying with a relational or developmental message. Reports collected from 70 mothers after their participation in the program highlighted the success of the intervention and the changes in the children and parents, as well as in their interactions with each other. Follow-up interviews conducted a year after the intervention provided further information on the long-term positive effects of the program.     

Pretending emotions in the early years: The role of language and symbolic play

Although 3-year-old children sometimes simulate emotions to adapt to social norms, we do not know if even younger children can pretend emotions in playful contexts. The present study investigated (1) what emotions infants of 1–2 years old are capable of pretending and (2) the possible role of language and symbolic play in the ability to pretend emotions. The sample included 69 infants aged 18 to 31 months and their parents. Infants were administrated the Test of Pretend Play, and their parents responded to the MacArthur-Bates CDI-II inventory, part of the MacArthur-Bates CDI-I, and a questionnaire about the expression of pretend emotions. Results suggest that very young children simulate emotions. Furthermore, children's simulation of emotions was related to both symbolic play and language. Specifically, the ability to label emotions was linked to the ability to simulate them. The role of language and symbolic play in the development of the capacity to express and understand pretend emotions is discussed.     

Accommodation,empowerment and disinvestment—Typical second-language learning trajectories of Syrian refugees in Germany

This paper asks how refugees' second-language learning processes are embedded in their lives in host countries. To address this question, the paper proposes the concept of second-language learning trajectories. These trajectories explain refugees' second-language learning as closely intertwined with learners' self-understanding, experiences and positioning in host countries. Using longitudinal narrative interview data from Syrian refugees in Germany, the paper identifies three different types of second-language learning trajectories, that is empowerment, accommodation and disinvestment. These trajectories have vastly diverse outcomes, not only in terms of second-language proficiency but also in terms of learning motivation, self-views and future prospects. Moreover, second-language learning trajectories evolve based on self-reinforcing dynamics that make switching between trajectories increasingly difficult over time. This is particularly detrimental to refugees on the disinvestment trajectory, which entails social decline and exclusion. The paper also identifies institutional regulations in Germany that compound refugees' struggles to gain a foothold in their host country.     

English in contemporary Sweden: Perceptions,policies, and narrated practices

This paper compares trends in Sweden's language planning and language policies, and particularly the rationale underlying recent government legislation, to actual language use at the ‘grass roots’ of society, in order to investigate the extent to which academic and official rationales are confirmed by observed language practices. The passing of the Swedish Language Act of 2009 followed debates in academia and the media which not infrequently characterised English as a major threat to the survival of Swedish. However, despite the strong belief in the utility of English widely held in Sweden, the Swedish language is the preferred language of Swedes as well as immigrants in most domains. These results reveal a contradiction between the arguments put forward by a number of academics, educators and journalists concerning the ‘threat’ of English, and the language practices of ordinary folk in their daily lives.     

Vocal Coordination During Early Parent–Infant Interactions Predicts Language Outcome in Infant Siblings of Children with Autism Spectrum Disorder

This study examined vocal coordination during mother–infant interactions in the infant siblings (high‐risk infants; HR) of children with autism spectrum disorder (ASD), a population at heightened risk for developing language delays (LDs). Vocal coordination between mothers and HR infants was compared to a group of low‐risk (LR; no first‐ or second‐degree relative with ASD) dyads and used to predict later language development. Nine‐month‐old infants were video‐taped at home playing with their mothers, and interactions were coded for the frequency and timing of vocalizations. Percent infant simultaneous speech was predictive of later LD, and dyads with LD infants were less coordinated with one another in average latency to respond than dyads with non‐delayed (ND) infants. The degree of coordination between mothers and infants on this variable predicted a continuous measure of language development in the third year. This research underscores the importance of understanding early development in the context of interaction.     

Integration of Childhood Immigrants in the Short and Long Run – Swedish Evidence1

Immigrant children are often at a disadvantage at school while they adjust to their new environment. It has been found that the age at immigration of 7 or above represents a sensitive period as regards these children’s school performance for two main reasons: they have passed their prime age for language learning, and their acquisition of subject skills is less efficient while they learn to master the new language. Using Swedish administrative data, we track childhood immigrants born between 1972 and 1976 over time from adolescence (at 16) to adulthood (at 30), and study the role of age at immigration for educational and labor market outcomes. We find that immigration at a sensitive age (compared to a very young age) has a strong negative impact on compulsory school performance, but that the same individuals catch up strongly in terms of final educational attainment. In spite of this educational catching up, however, we find a considerable negative impact on earnings for men. We are able to rule out two potential mechanisms behind this puzzling result: It cannot be explained either by an impact on the chosen field of study or on completion time.     

Negotiating Languages in Immigrant Families

This study is about the multifaceted nature of language use in immigrant families. Following earlier explorations of language in the segmented assimilation framework and using adolescent and parental data from the 1995 wave of the Children of Immigrants Longitudinal Study, this article examines how adolescents’ use of English with their parents relates to their proficiency in English and ethnic languages, and their personal language preferences, as well as their parents’ language proficiency and use. The findings suggested that adolescent language choice in child–parent interactions reflected the family’s ways to negotiate the distinct linguistic repertoires of immigrant parents and their children. The adolescent use of English was not necessarily associated with social and emotional estrangement between generations. Even when adolescents generally preferred English, they were less likely to use English in child–parent interactions if their parents, particularly their mothers, were less proficient in English. On the other hand, adolescents were more likely to speak English to their parents if their mothers were proficient in English, regardless of what language parents used with the children. Parents who spoke to their children in English likely responded to their children’s doubts about their ethnic language proficiency and were linguistically and emotionally ready to make that transition.     

Play in Mexican‐American mothers and toddlers is frequent,multimodal, and rich in symbolic content

Play offers rich opportunities for toddlers to develop motor, social, cognitive, and language skills, particularly during interactions with adult caregivers who may scaffold toddlers to higher levels of play than toddlers achieve on their own. However, research on play has narrowly focused on children from White, middle‐income backgrounds, leaving a dearth of knowledge about dyadic play in diverse cultural communities. We videorecorded 222 Mexican‐American mothers playing with their 2‐year‐old toddlers with a standard set of toys. Play behaviors were coded as nonsymbolic or symbolic (play type) and as expressed through manual, verbal, or multiple channels (play modality). Play between toddlers and mothers was frequent, high in symbolic content, and toddler play closely corresponded with mother play in type and modality: Toddlers’ nonsymbolic play related to mothers’ nonsymbolic play; toddlers’ symbolic play related to mothers’ symbolic play; toddlers’ manual play related to mothers’ manual play; and toddlers’ multimodal play related to mothers’ multimodal play. Play in Mexican‐American mothers and toddlers is frequent, multimodal, and symbolically rich, offering new directions for future research and practice.     

The Relation Between Gesture and Speech in Congenitally Blind and Sighted Language-Learners

Gesture is widely regarded to play an important role in communication, both in conjunction with and independent of speech. Indeed, gesture is known to develop even before the onset of spoken words. However, little is known about the communicative conditions under which gesture emerges. The aim of this study was to explore the role of vision in early gesturing. We examined gesture development in 5 congenitally blind and 5 sighted toddlers videotaped longitudinally between the ages of 14 and 28 months in their homes while engaging in free play with a parent or experimenter. All of the blind children were found to produce at least some gestures during the one-word stage of language development. However, gesture production was relatively low among the blind children relative to their sighted peers. Moreover, although blind and sighted children produced the same overall set of gesture types, the distribution of gesture types across categories differed. In addition, blind children used gestures primarily to communicate about objects that were nearby, while sighted children used them for nearby as well as distally located objects. These findings suggest that gesture may play different roles in the language-learning process for sighted and blind children. Nevertheless, they also make it clear that gesture is a robust phenomenon of early communicative development, emerging even in the absence of experience with a visual model.     

Rinkeby Swedish and semilingualism in language ideological debates: A Bourdieuean perspective

The focus of this paper is on the mechanisms whereby liberal and well‐meaning democratic societies propagate a cycle of disposession where immigrants are constructed as least resourced while the powerful retain their power. Specifically discussed is the semiotic management of traditional hierarchies of privilege and access through language ideological discourses pertaining to second language acquisition, multilingualism and heterogeneity. One notion in particular is discussed in this context, namely Rinkeby Swedish , a potential, imagined, pan‐immigrant contact variety of Swedish. The discussion is framed within a primarily Bourdieuean conceptual apparatus using concepts of symbolic market, explaining the role of language boundaries and their institutional policing, and detailing the semiotic processes of iconization whereby immigrants are positioned as outside of a symbolically reconstituted community of 'real' Swedish speakers, in strategic attempts to restrict their access to important linguistic and symbolic resources.     

Shift work,father engagement,and the cognitive development of young children

The present study investigates whether the effect of fathers’ positive engagement on young children’s cognitive development is accentuated when one or both dual-earner parents is employed during nonstandard hours. Longitudinal regression models are fitted to three waves of nationally representative data from the Early Child Longitudinal Study-Birth Cohort. Father engagement when children are nine months old has an especially positive effect on children’s cognitive ability at age two when the father works during the day and the mother has a fixed evening or night shift. There are no interactions between shift work and engagement at age two in the whole sample, but subgroup analyses show that engagement has an especially strong effect on children who have a non-parent caregiver if both parents are shift workers. The results highlight the important role fathers play in couples with a shift worker, and provide a rationale for efforts to encourage and support their involvement.     

Responding to children’s ‘emotion talk’: a conversation analysis of a therapeutic encounter between a social worker and two siblings using child-centred play therapy

ABSTRACT

Reflection of feelings is a hallmark strategy of non-directive child-centred play therapy that enhances children’s emotional awareness and equips them with emotionally expressive words. The case presented here describes the application of child-centred play therapy by a social worker with two young children (aged four and six) with sibling rivalry issues. One of the sessions was videotaped, which enabled the use of conversation analysis to dissect the language patterns used by both the clients and the social worker. This in-depth verbal analysis illuminated subtle nuances in the children’s interactions and behaviour while also providing the social worker with the opportunity to reflect on practice. This case discussion presents a snapshot of that session and allows readers to understand how such therapy occurs.     

Language shift in Gammalsvenskby: A nexus analysis of the shift to Ukrainian in a traditionally Swedish‐speaking community

This article examines the collective language shift from Swedish to Ukrainian in the Swedish‐ethnic community of Gammalsvenskby, Ukraine. The Gammalsvenskby language shift is used to argue that language shift is such a complex social practice that it cannot be satisfactorily explained by the use of preconceived, deductive analytical frameworks. The argument is probed through a study of selected themes in the life story interviews of 16 last‐generation Swedish‐speakers, making use of the framework of nexus analysis. The study shows that the different kinds of discourses involved in the Gammalsvenskby language shift have resulted in a complex network of interrelated processes of change on various levels. These processes are so intertwined and have had such different scalar effects, that they cannot be simply grouped as factors which are classed as either micro or macro.     

Literacy education,reading engagement,and library use in multilingual classes

The topic of this paper is literacy education and reading engagement in multilingual classes. What facilitates reading engagement in the language of instruction in multilingual classes? In this paper, we analyze reading engagement in a literature-based literacy program in Norway (2007–2011). The design was a research and development project in which teachers, researchers, and librarians collaborated within literacy education. We present pedagogical interventions within the project and analyze subsequent reading engagement among the students, based on a survey. The survey documented that the overwhelming majority of students were engaged readers two years into the project, measured by the students’ amount and frequency of voluntary reading, their attitudes towards reading and library use. The findings indicate that reading engagement in the language of instruction among both first- and second-language learners was facilitated by literature-based literacy education, nonsegregated educational provisions and use of library resources. The study shows that literature-based literacy education may reduce possible negative effects of low socioeconomic status and linguistic minority background on reading engagement in the language of instruction. This requires literacy education, which gives students extensive access to books, voluntary reading of fiction and facts and sharing of literacy events and library use.     

Planning Requests for Help as a Function of Anticipated Resistance and Language Proficiency

This study examined how the formulation of message plans varies as a function of anticipated partner resistance and language proficiency. The ninety participants were students enrolled in English for Speakers of Other Languages classes (n = 24) and students in public speaking classes (n = 66). They wrote a plan in English in which assistance was requested from a prospective recipient who was portrayed as resistant to or cooperative with the speaker's goal. The anticipation of resistance did not predict overall plan elaborateness but was associated with a higher proportion of request-relevant units and a lower proportion of opening and closing units than the anticipation of cooperation. This difference occurred for more proficient speakers of English but not for less proficient speakers. Implications for planning theory and second-language instruction are discussed.     

Emancipating play: dis/abled children,development and deconstruction

This paper reflects critically on the meaning of play, especially as it relates to disabled children and their experiences. We explore the close alliance of play to cognitive and social development, particularly in the case of psychologies of development, and reveal a dominant discourse of the disabled child as a non‐playing object that requires professional therapeutic intervention. We argue that this pathologisation of play on the part of disabled children is closely tied to normalisation of childhood, in which non‐normal bodies are increasingly expected to be governed and corrected not only by professionals but also by parents/carers. In order to rescue more enabling visions of the disabled child and their play we turn to three perspectives – the new sociology of childhood; social oppression theories of disability; critical developmental psychology. These resources, we suggest, allow us to reconfigure what we mean by play and disability in a contemporary climate that celebrates competition and marketisation over the intrinsic potentialities of all children. We argue that how we conceive play will per se undermine or promote forms of inclusive research, policy and practice.     

Quirky kids: fathers’ stories of embracing diversity and dismantling expectations for normative play with their children with autism spectrum disorder

Abstract

Anchored in critical disability studies, we used a narrative methodology to study fathers’ stories of play interactions with their children with autism spectrum disorder (ASD). Three narratives convey how father–child interactions unfold and how patterns of interaction respond to, redefine and resist societal norms. Narratives of action demonstrate fathers’ responses to societal norms, while narratives of adjustment depict how fathers have redefined expectations of their children in the context of play. Narratives of acceptance demonstrate fathers’ attunement to, and acceptance of, their children’s preferred play interests and a resistance to play norms. We argue that fathers’ stories represent a step towards emancipating play for children with ASD in that fathers’ appreciation of their children’s quirky play accentuates the relational and social capabilities of children, thus countering deficit interpretations of the abilities of children with autism more broadly.     

Design of a language stimulation program for children suffering abuse

This article proposes an intervention program, designed specifically for children in residential care who suffer institutionalized abuse, aimed at stimulating their use of language. The objective of the intervention procedure is to improve children's linguistic competence and their socio-affective development, as well as to enable parents to communicate and interact effectively with their children. Several studies have focused on the difficulties children suffering from abuse have with verbal expression and other areas of development. The research stresses the need to set up intervention programs that can improve the linguistic and social competence of children suffering from abuse. With such children, there is a fundamental need to develop a competence that will encourage their adaptive social skills, which are basic skills for interacting socially and which encourage the pragmatic language function, a skill needed for relating to adults and solving interpersonal problems.     

Deconstructing language practices: discursive constructions of children in Individual Education Plan resource documents

Although Individual Education Plan (IEP) resource documents in Ontario, Canada aim to assist children in achieving their special educational goals, a point of disjuncture exists between the documents’ intentions and children’s actual experiences. Addressing this issue is crucial in preventing inequity and fostering educational development and social well-being for children. We employ critical discourse analysis informed by disability theory to deconstruct the language practices used to conceptualize children in IEP resource documents. Our purpose is to question the underlying assumptions regarding representations of children and illuminate the potentially harmful consequences of such conceptions. We expose the presence of both neutral and harmful language practices and consider how such language may shape the way the documents translate from policy to practice. This study offers a model through which the language of other special education documents can be critically evaluated and proposes potential avenues for creating documents that avoid disabling children further.