Narratives in Early Childhood Education

Communication, Sense Making and Lived Experience

Susanne Garvis, Niklas Pramling, Susanne Garvis, Niklas Pramling

• Publisher: Routledge
• Year: 2017
• eBook ISBN: 9781317277323
• Edition: 1
• Topic: Education
• Subtopic: Education General

Over the past few decades, a growing body of literature has developed which examines children's perspectives of their own lives, viewing them as social actors and experts in their understanding of the world. Focusing specifically on narratives, this unique and timely book provides an analysis of these new directions in contemporary research approaches to explore the lived experiences of children and teachers in early childhood education, in addition to presenting original research on children's narratives.

The book brings together a variety of well-regarded international researchers in the field to highlight the importance of narrative in young children's development from local and global perspectives. While narrative is clearly understood within different countries, this is one of the first texts to build an international understanding, acknowledging the importance of culture and context. It presents up-to-date research on the latest research methods and analysis techniques, using a variety of different approaches in order to critically reflect on the future for narrative research and its insights into early childhood education

Narratives in Early Childhood Education will be of interest to postgraduate students, academics and researchers in early childhood education, as well as early childhood professionals, government policy makers and early childhood organisations and associations.

Chapter 1

An introduction to narrative research

Susanne Garvis

Introduction

In the last three decades, narrative research has increased its profile in social science research, following what has been referred to as a ‘narrative turn’ similar to other disciplines such as history and literary studies (Hyvärinen, 2010). While it has grown in popularity, it is sometimes difficult to understand and discuss. Within narrative traditions there are also different types of methods, analysis and understanding, often leaving the reader overwhelmed with multiple interpretations and understanding of what is studied. Even the term ‘narrative’ is in dispute, as is the need for having a definition in the first place (Tamboukou, 2008).

Despite the problems with narrative, many of us who work within narrative research want to continue this important work, especially with and alongside children. By focusing on narrative we are able to investigate how stories are structured and the ways in which they work, who produces them and how they are produced, understanding how narratives are consumed, as well as how narrative are silenced, contested or accepted by people. Narratives have the potential to trace the experience of human lives and create an understanding of living in the world.

The intention of this chapter is to briefly introduce narrative research and the theoretical divisions of this field. This will allow the reader to have some understanding before reading the current collection of research we have gathered from around the world on narrative and young children. We will conclude with details about the organisation of the book, showing the many narrative pathways chosen by the international authors.

Brief history of narrative research

Before we move into understanding the theoretical divisions in narrative research, we must start with a brief history of where narrative research has come from. When researching the emergence of narrative research, two academic approaches emerge (Andrews, Sclater, Rustin, Squire, & Treacher, 2004). The first is the rise of humanist approaches within Western sociology and psychology post-war. These approaches are based on person-centred approach, against positivist empiricism, and pay close attention to individual case studies (Bruner, 1990; Clandinin & Connelly, 1996; Polkinghorne, 1977). The second is based on the Russian structuralist movement and later French poststructuralist (Barthes, 1977; Culler, 2002, Foucault, 1972), psychoanalytic (Lacan, 1977) and deconstructionist (Derrida, 1977) approaches to the humanities.

Despite the theoretical differences, there are many common threads that draw both traditions together. This includes the investigation of individuals’ experiences and stories within the contexts of their lives. For example, some narrative researchers use life histories in order to understand the lives that people traverse and associated social change (Andrews, 2007). Other researchers engage with narrative therapy or use story material that enables collective storytelling (Sliep, Weingarten, & Gilbert, 2004).

While there are similarities between the two approaches, differences still exist, however, between the theoretical assumptions associated with subjectivity, language, the social and the concept of narrative itself (Andrews, Squire & Tamboukou, 2013). According to Andrews et al. (2013, p. 5), however, ‘many researchers think it is important to do useful and innovative work across the contradictions, rather than trying to resolve conflicting positions that are historically and disciplinarily distinct, as well as logically incommensurable’. The intention of the book then is to also look across the breadth and depths of narrative research gathered and look beyond the sometimes found contradictions. The book will also make explicit differences between approaches and perspectives.

Theoretical divisions in narrative research

The different perspectives within narrative are related to differences in what is studied, how it is studied and what is considered important. The first theoretical diversion explored is the focus on the spoken recounts of a past event, described in Labov’s work on event narratives (Labov & Waletsky, 1967) and within Squire’s (2005) work on experience-centred work. In this approach, stories are explored that range in length from interviews to life histories, often considered by many as within the heuristic traditions (Andrews et al., 2013). The event-centred or experience-centred research approach can also extend beyond speech to include media, including writing, visual materials (such as photos and video diaries) and narratives inhering in objects and actions (Seale, 2004). This approach also acknowledges that representations may vary over time and that different stories may be produced.

The second type of narrative is based on co-constructed narratives and includes conversations and exchanges between people. It assumes that stories may be socially constructed and representations of affective states of being. Narratives within this type can also be viewed as a form of social code, addressing stories as dialogically constructed (Bakhtin, 1981). Researchers in this particular type of narrative research are interested in the patterns of the story, the sequence of the story and conversations as well as the creation of broad cultural narratives (Abell, Stokoe, & Billig, 2004: Bamberg, 2006; Squire, 2007).

Narrative researchers also diverge over whether stories symbolise an internal individual state or external social circumstances (Andrews et al., 2013). For some narrative researchers, the personal narrative is considered the most interesting as it reveals individual thinking and feelings, where the importance of the narrative is about the personal experience of an event (Labov, 1997). Other researchers are interested in the social production of narrative and the associated conversational sequence within people’s talk (Bamberg, 2006) and the performance of social identities in a common space of meaning (Riesman, 1993). Some researchers are even interested in social and cultural storytelling (Plummer, 2001) or even the researcher’s own story and how this varies depending on the social and historical place (Riessman, 2002).

Recent movements within the different types of narrative research have taken the form of focusing on ‘small’ against ‘big’ stories (Bamberg, 2006; Freeman, 2006). Researchers within the context of ‘small’ narratives argue that more attention on the micro-linguistic and social structure of the everyday small narrative phenomena is needed. The focus on ‘small’ stories aligns the Labovian research approach of ‘natural stories’ with conversation-analytic as well as discourse-analytic approaches (Bamburg, 2006). The alternative to the ‘small’ is the ‘big’ story where researchers like Freeman (2006) argue for biographical and life story research that provide experiential richness, and reflectiveness.

Narrative inquiry is another type of narrative research, interested in the lived experience of individuals where ‘feelings, desires, values and esthetics are viewed as simultaneously social’ (Clandinin, 2013, p. 40). Experience is described as a ‘changing stream that is characterised by the continuous interaction of human thought with the personal, social and material environment’ (Clandinin & Rosiek, 2007, p. 39). As such, narrative inquirers search for understanding, where the research design is framed as a puzzle as opposed to research questions (Clandinin, 2013).

Another field within narrative research is ‘narrative analysis’ that ‘refers to a family of methods for interpreting texts that have in common a storied form’ (Riessman, 2008, p. 11). This could include oral, written or visual ‘texts’. A good narrative analysis prompts ‘the reader to think beyond the surface of a text, and there is a move toward a broader commentary’ (Riessman, 2008, p. 13). The work of Riessman (2008) provides some clarification to the types of analysis engaged within narrative research. She suggests four types of narrative analysis including

• thematic analysis,
• structural analysis,
• dialogic/performance analysis, and
• visual analysis.

Thematic analysis is used by researchers interested in the ‘content’. The approach is probably the most common method of narrative analysis and perhaps the most straightforward in applied settings (Riessman, 2008). Out of all of the methods, it is considered the most similar to grounded theory and interpretative phenomenological analysis. Thematic analysis, according to Riessman (2008), is often represented with attention to form and language. It can be further represented as an extended count of a story, a bounded segment of interview text after an event or a life story.

Structural analysis is similar to thematic analysis with a focus on content, however attention to narrative form is included. It focuses on the overall ‘storyline’ or the structure. Classic work on narrative structure occurred in education and was part of a movement in the United States ‘to address racial injustice by drawing attention to diverse forms of children’s storytelling and the relationship to the legacy of slavery’ (Riessman, 2008, p. 79). The model developed by Labov and Waletsky (1967) and then used by Gee (1991) is also often used as a starting point to analyse occurring conversations. Structural analysis is represented as clauses on lines or prosodic units, with a focus on the topic-centred, temporally ordered segment of speech.

Dialogic/performance analysis is described by Riessman (2008) as a broad and varied interpretative approach to oral narratives, where interrogation is made of how speakers interactively (dialogically) produce and perform narratives. It attempts to deal with questions that are often applied to ethnographic and interview data about identities. It is often informed by literacy theory from Bakhtin (1981). Dialogic/performance analysis is represented as segments of interviews (unedited or edited) with a focus on a specific feature of a performance narrative. For some researchers, this includes the pauses, interruptions, non-lexical utterances and expressions.

Visual analysis acknowledges that words are only one form of communication. Aesthetic representation can also occur with the communication of images. This type of analysis includes how researchers tell a story with images and also how researchers tell a story about images that tell a story. This could include the integration of photography, drawings, paintings, pictures, videos, images and more. Narrative within the study is based on the investigation of the experience of an event. Riessman (2008) acknowledges that working with visuals can thicken interpretation and provide a compelling appeal to realism.

Overall, narrative research is a multilevel and interdisciplinary field with many approaches and theoretical understandings. Riessman (2008) has classified four areas of analysis to help researchers. However, she also acknowledges that differences still exist within and across narrative analysis. It is important to understand these as we traverse the world of children and narratives. The intention of this book is to explore current research within the field of narratives and early childhood education. In particular, the focus is on what research is being conducted, where it is being conducted and how it is being conducted. From this collection, we are able to reflect on the field of narratives and early childhood education.

Organisation of the book

The book is organised into three sections. The first section is entitled ‘Stories told’ and includes the perspectives of children, teachers and their families. The second chapter by Marni J. Binder engages with the work of Vivian Paley’s story curriculum through story play. A multimodal storied voice approach provides opportunities to explore identity and develop a community ethos of care with junior and kindergarten children in Canada. The next chapter by Min-Ling Tsai (Chapter 3) explores time narratives with three different groups of kindergarten children in Taiwan. The study reports on distinctive characteristics of Taiwanese children’s narratives that differ from those in other studies. Chapter 4 provides insights into the use of storytelling as a pedagogical tool for indigenous children. Georgina Barton and Robert Barton show how storytelling is an important part of development for young indigenous children’s learning and highlights the importance of suitable pedagogies in schooling contexts. They share a model for indigenous storytelling. The fifth chapter by Tiri Bergesen Shei and Elin Eriksen Ødegaard shares findings from a narrative inquiry to understand a teacher’s subject positioning and self-staging. Seventy-seven kindergarten teachers presented themselves with autobiographical accounts and self-presentations. Next, Kuan-Ling Lin in Chapter 6 implements Riessman’s dialogic/performance analysis to explore resilience stories of preschool children in Taiwan. Her work illuminates the different systems for consideration within Bronfenbrenner’s ecological systems theory. Chapter 7 explores how children orally retell stories for peers who may not have heard the story before. Agneta Pihl, Louise Peterson and Niklas Pramling implement an interaction analysis grounded within a socio-cultural perspective on communication and learning. The study was conducted in Sweden with children aged four and five.

Section two is called ‘storied investigation’. Chapter 8 begins the section with Anne Kultti exploring the concept of narrative elaboration, showing that it may mean something else in the context of dual language learning in early childhood contexts in the context of majority language speakers. The next chapter (Chapter 9 by Macarena Silva) focuses specifically on early reading comprehension and the contribution of early narrative making. The chapter provides examples of how to promote narrative development before children start formal instruction in reading. Chapter 10 shares findings from a study on the organisational patterns of 64 Mandarin-Chinese speaking first graders on three narrative tasks. Kao, Sin-Mei reports that formal instruction plays an important role in helping children develop higher levels of organisation.

The final section is called ‘Rethinking what we know’. The chapters provide insight into possible futures for narrative work with young children. Chapter 11 by Mona Sakr explores the narratives children create during art-making with a specific focus on digital art-making experiences. The chap...

Table of contents

• Cover
• Title
• Copyright
• Contents
• List of figures
• List of tables
• List of contributors
• 1 An introduction to narrative research
• Section A Stories told
• Section B Storied investigation
• Section C Rethinking what we know
• Index