Young children’s agency: exploring children’s interactions with practitioners and ancillary staff members in Greek early childhood education and care settings

ABSTRACT

Most research in early childhood education and care (ECEC) settings, in Greece and internationally, focuses on children’s relationships with their early years practitioners, but evidence regarding young children’s role in the formation of these relationships is limited. This paper focuses on 10 children, under the age of three, recognizing children’s agency and their significant contribution to the formation of interpersonal relationships with practitioners and ancillary staff members. The paper draws on findings from an ethnographic case study, conducted in two Greek day-care settings over the course of six months, which used an adaptation of the Mosaic Approach. The analysis suggests that children’s relationships with significant adults beyond the home are paramount for children and influence and shape the way they perceive and experience the settings.

KEYWORDS:

• Under three
• young children’s agency
• Greek ECEC settings
• child–adult interactions
• ancillary staff members

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the authors.

Notes on contributors

Dr Eleni Katsiada is an associate lecturer at the Department of Early Childhood Education, Technological Educational Institute of Athens. She teaches courses on observation and young children's play. Her research interests are in children under the age of three, agency and social interactions.

Irini Roufidou is a lecturer at the Department of Early Childhood Education, Technological Educational Institute of Athens. She teaches courses on infant and toddler care and education and children's literature. Her research interests focus on infants and their learning environments and on psychoanalysis.

Dr Jonathan Wainwright is head of postgraduate taught programmes at the Sheffield Institute of Education, Sheffield Hallam University. His research interests are in leadership in education, particularly in the Early Years sector. His doctorate was a narrative study of leadership in UK children's centres.

Varvara Angeli is a lecturer at the Department of Early Childhood Education, Technological Educational Institute of Athens. She teaches courses on Infant and Young Children's Education and Care. Her research interests focus on infants' and young children's education and care and on neuroscience.

ORCID

Eleni Katsiada http://orcid.org/0000-0001-7249-9742

Jonathan Wainwright http://orcid.org/0000-0003-4769-1147

Notes

1. Kagan and Neuman (1998) identify the vertical transition as the initial transition from home to nursery and the horizontal, everyday transition, as children move from home to nursery.

2. The practitioners from the first setting would usually sit, during free play, at the settee which was placed on one side of the classroom where they could supervise the whole room without having to move around. In the second setting, the practitioners usually adopted this supervisory and physically remote style during free play, both indoors and outdoors. The physically remote style, in this study, was determined as being approximately 2 m between an adult and the scene where children’s actions were taking place.