Visualizing a Common World of Entanglement through Multiple Viewpoints

• Published in: Video Journal of Education and Pedagogy
• Main Authors: Myrstad, Anne, Kleemann, Carola
• Format: Article in Journal/Newspaper
• Language: unknown
• Published: Brill 2021
• Subjects: Education; Arctic; Norway; Sámi
• Online Access: http://dx.doi.org/10.1163/23644583-bja10022; https://brill.com/view/journals/vjep/6/1/article-p1_007.xml; https://brill.com/downloadpdf/journals/vjep/6/1/article-p1_007.xml

Abstract The authors explore how multiple viewpoints can challenge our habitualised way of viewing and expand the area of thinking about children’s outdoor learning. They draw on micro-fieldwork in a Sámi kindergarten in Arctic Norway. There, learning through participation and practical experiences is a traditional strategy in child rearing. This method of learning is currently being transformed in Sámi kindergartens, wherein the goal is to strengthen the Sámi language, identity and culture . The authors’ aim is to explore how learning through participation in pedagogical practices could be made visible by employing different viewpoints. They used GoPro® cameras worn on children’s bodies, combined with their own gaze, as well as a handheld video camera used by one of the authors. Such a combination of viewpoints allowed gaining an insight into the complex outdoor kindergarten practices. Drawing on Jayne White’s polyphonic dialogical approach to video, the authors placed these diverse viewpoints in a dialogue during the process of analysis. These dialogues revealed our pre-defined human-centric view and effected a change in our theoretical approach, from socio-cultural learning theories to new materialist theories, to include the premise that children learn in all interactions and entanglements that they are part of in a socio-material world.