Preschool children’s assessment of participating in a case study

Abstract

This article explores children’s assessment of participating in research on makerspaces in preschool in Iceland. The study is based on data gathered during the spring and summer of 2018. Nine five-year-old children participated in temporary makerspace set up in their preschool. Six workshops were conducted where the children were given opportunities to play with digital toys, Lego and other creative materials. During the workshop, researchers gathered data through different methods, such as using a video camera on tripod and a camera controlled by the researchers, as well as a GoPro camera and iPad which the children controlled. Field notes and research diaries were written and interviews conducted. The children’s teacher led the makerspace workshops. The members of the children’s group, four girls and five boys, were elected by the teacher. The group was supposed to reflect the diversity of both the whole class and their preschool, in gender, social status and learning dispositions. Informed consent was gathered form all concerned, children included. After each workshop the children filled out an evaluation form, first alone and then with their teacher who wrote down comments. The evaluation form contained three emoji; smiling, neutral and downcast faces as well as a space to give comments. Ten weeks after the workshops were concluded a focus group interview with all the children was conducted with support materials, such as photos to revisit the children’s time in the makerspace. In between the workshops and the focus group interview the whole class had access to the digital toys. The study was based on the view that children are powerful and enabled persons with their own voices who can and do have something to say about their learning, participation and experiences. In this article the data from the focus group and the evaluation forms from the children were analysed and the field notes used to give a fuller account of the data.

The main findings indicate that children are both able and have something to say about their experiences during the workshops and research. When looking at the data from the evaluation forms, it is clear that most marked the smiling (45 out of 56 emoji), five the neutral and six the downcast emoji. The children considered activities they had most control over as most important and fun; those included a Blue Bot, GoPro camera and an iPad which they used to interview each other. They liked to use the GoPro camera as part of their play and to observe one another. In the beginning, the GoPro was positioned at their chest, but when the researchers noticed that they wanted to be able to have a look at the screen, the GoPro was loosened to give the children opportunities to use it as they wanted. How the children used the emoji was of great interest to the researchers and triggered questions about how children understand and use emoji. The emoji did not stand alone as an evaluation; the children’s comments and explanations made the researchers aware that they used the emoji to explain parts of the workshops, not the overall feelings. For example if they had problems with coding or getting to use the GoPro or iPad, they chose a downcast emoji even if they were satisfied with the remainder of the workshop. The focus group interview took place ten weeks after the workshops finished and the researchers were a little worried that too much time had passed and the children might not be interested in talking about their experiences. They even wondered whether the children had forgotten their experiences. This was not the case, the children were both interested and had a lot of opinions about the project. They discussed, reflected and made critical comments about their experiences. The children made comments about the researchers and their role in the workshops. They thought the adults could be disturbing, especially when the cameras were in their face, so to speak. They also made remarks about the number of grown-ups in the room and did not want more people.

What stands out as learning is that children are able participants in research, but at the same time the researchers have to be careful in their roles and not overstep the children’s boundaries.