Bringing the jellyfish home - University of Plymouth · •Otto F.Bollnow Experienced space above mathematical space Plymouth ... The spell of the sensous, perseption and language

Plymouth 10.01.2016

[email protected]

Nature kindergartens

Learning outdoors

Kari-Anne Jørgensen

Associated Professor

Faculty for Humaniora and Education

University College of Southeast Norway

Plymouth 10.01.2016

[email protected]

What is going on out there?

• What does it mean for children’s experiences when the kindergarten is moving their everyday activities into nature-landscapes and its places?

• Doctoral thesis University of Gothenburg 2014

Plymouth 10.01.2016 [email protected]

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Background

The National Curricula for the Content and Tasks of theKindergartens

Kindergartens shall provide children withopportunities for play, self-expression and meaningful experiences and activities in safe yet challenging surroundings (Department of Education2005:15)

Under learning areas:….love using the nature (Ibid2005:23)


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An increasing interest for outdooreducation in early years

•Affordance of the landscape(Fjørtoft:2000, Sandseter: 2010, Kytte: 2007,2009, Mårtensson: 2009)

•Use of outdoor areas in Kindergartens(Mårtensson 2004, Maynard: 2009, Arlemark-Hagser:2010)

•Learning outdoors (Thulin: 2011, Waller:2010)

•Schoolyards as sites for learning (Lindholm, 1995, Tranter and Malone 2007)


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Theories

•Relation between the affordance of a landscape ant the individual perception. The function of the landscape. (James Gibson, 1978)

Phenomenological approach as a reference «The livedbody and the pre reflecsive cogito (Merleau Ponty:1962)

‘Sense of wonder’(Rachel Carson, 1965)


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Experienced Place

•Edward Casey

- Displacement and implacement

- Wild places

•Otto F.Bollnow

Experienced space above mathematicalspace


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Children experiencing places outdoors

Narratives

Play and the wild places

The world of wonders

The lived body

The intertwining

place and body

Importance of sensory

experiences and the

sense of place

The senses

The function of the

landscape

Climbing, Hiding

Sliding

Swinging

Affordance


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Island group


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Forest Group

Steps in the research process

Ethnographic fieldwork on children’s experiences of nature landscapes and its places in Norwegian Kindergarten groups

Field notes, informal conversations , photo

Narrative analyses of the data, thick descriptions(Geetz, Polkinghorn, Corsaro)

Narrative maps to place the wide range of imaginary play in the landscapes


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Landscapes and places for outdoor education


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All the senses involved


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Sensory

experience

Visual

Kinaestetic

Olifactory

AuditiveTactile

Gustafactor

Humans - relationship

“Humans are tuned for relationship. The eyes, the skin, tongue, ears and nostrils - are all

gates where our body receives the nourishment of otherness.” David Abram 1997


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Environmental consciousness and the sense of wonder, two dimensions of environmental

learning


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The JellyfishesHow the jellyfish went ashore and how it entered the ocean again.

The group has gone over to the beach and finds a lot of jellyfish that that are left on the beach because the tide going back.Tom: “We have to bring them back to the ocean, if not they will die” In his hands the boy of four carries blue jellyfishes, one by one. He continues: “Many years ago there were lots of water in the ocean , and then the jellyfish were swimming in the sea, now the ocean has withdrawn. Good luck that we found them!”The boy and his mates- a group of ten children-boys and girls in the age from two –six years are all working on the rescuing project.


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The Bug Lilla Billy


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Experiences and relatedness

• “Animate “ relatedness : The animal as us, The Jellyfish wanting to go home or Lilla Billy as a pet

• Intersubjective relatedness: The communication

• Linguistic relatedness : The process of use of language in shared stories


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Approaches on “the others”

•Antroposentric; From human perspective

•Biosentric; Other species with intrinsic values

•Value of an experience – get to know


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The others as ourselves-experience of other species

• The love of nature is a difficult topic because nature is a contested concept

• Looking at children’s play and exploration of other species brings up a more diverse approach on how they connect and develop relatedness to other animals, animated, Intersubjective and linguistic


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Anthropocentric or biosentric?

• Even if children understand the others from their own life-world perspective identification also leads towards an understanding of other species as animals with intrinsic values and needs

• Value of the experience is also links to the existential “sense of wonder” as a driving force to understand the others


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Experience and learning

• John Dewey: Experience is not learning, but a stepping stone towards learning

• Experience and reflection

• Socio-cultural learningPlymouth 10.01.2016 [email protected]

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Places and the sense of wonders

•‘If facts are the seeds that later promote knowledge and wisdom, then the emotions and the impressions of the senses are the fertile soil in which the seeds must grow.’ .

(Carson & Pratt, 1965).

Deep or shalow ecology – ecosohy(Ness, Arne

1973)


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The cave


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The trolls made of ice

Per:« Do you know what this is?»

Me: «No»

Per: «It is the bones of the trolls prisoners. It is theentire family.» Per takes off his mittens placing his hands on the ice, smiling and nodding his head. «Right it is ice.» More children comes along. The play is goingon inside and outside the cave.

After a while one ice-troll is brought down to thefireplace. It transformes into water.Excitement and experiement. Scietific and imaginative explorations


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Negotiations in play - clans

The play of the Bakugas developed on a sandy part of the beach. It seemed to be an everlasting story that spring.

The malleability of the material is explored and manipulated in an imaginative and scientific way

All children involved during the weeks the play went on


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«OUH!!!!! Now she ruined everything» , one

girl is running across one of the Bakuga

spasceships made of sand.

Leif one of the main builders « Yes, but thet

was really fine, now we can build a new one.»


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Didactic implications

•Wonders , experiences and exploration on the agenda for the use of nature dominated landscapes and places

•Pedagogues should be able to find places that opens for play and playful learning and to use the landscapes and places for situated learning


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Results

Sensory experiences – the multi-sensoric aspects of the environments impact on children play and learningEnvironmental consciousness and the sense of wonder, two dimensions of environmental learningDidactic implications – Embodied experience exploration through movement connected to children’s learning. Social interaction and group organization in play, a way of learning for democracy


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References

• Abram, David(1997):: The spell of the sensous, perseption and language in a more that human world, New York: Vintage Books

• Casey, E(1992): Getting back into place, Bloomington&Indiana: Indiana University Press• Carson, R & Pratt, C(1965): The Sense of Wonder, New York: Harper & Row• Cladinin, D.J(2007): Handbook of narrative inquiry, mapping a methodology, Thousand Oaks Carlifornia: Sage• Connelly, M.F& Cladinin, DJ(2012): Stories of experience and narrative inquiry, in

Educational Researcher, vol 19, issue 5, p.2-14, USA : SagepubGeertz,,E(1993): The interpretation of cultures: Selected Essays, London: Fontana

• Jørgensen, K-A(2014): What is going on out there? - What does it mean for children's experiences when the kindergarten is moving their everyday activities into the nature - landscapes and its places, PhD, Universitu of Gothenborg

• Meyers,O.E, Saunders, C D(2002) Animals as links toward developing relationship, in: Kahn, P.H.jr., Kellert, S.R: Chlldren and nature, MassachusetsInsitute of technology

• Næss, Arne(1989) : Ecology, Community , Lifestyle, outline of an ecosophy, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press• Pink, Sarah(2009): Doing Sensory Ethnography, Los Angelse, London ,New Dehli, Sigapore, Washington DC: Sage• Pink, Sarah( 2012): Situating Everyday Life, Los Angelse, London ,New Dehli, Sigapore, Washington DC: Sage• Polkinghorne, D(1995) : Narrative configuration in qualitative analyses, in International Journal of Qualitative Studies in

Education, vol 8, issue 1 , p2-23, London: RoutledgeAll photos Copyright Kari-Anne Jørgensen

32Plymouth 10.01.2016

[email protected]

Bringing the jellyfish home - University of Plymouth · •Otto F.Bollnow Experienced space above mathematical space Plymouth ... The spell of the sensous, perseption and language

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