Children's perspectives on the ideal preschool classroom community: An ethnographic case study

This study aims to examine how young children construct their existing and ideal preschool classroom community through imagination and implementation by featuring them as co-researchers and including them as active participants in making changes for their classroom community. The study drives from children rights movement, the new sociology of childhood, and interpretive reproduction theory and critical pedagogy. An ethnographic case study was conducted in the preschool center of a public university in Turkey. Ten children aged 5-to-6 along with the classroom teacher participated in the study. Implementation was carried out in two daily procedures: (1) During the first half of the day, children constructed and implemented their ideal classroom community practices as co-researchers, and (2) during the second half of the day, they described and shared their ideal and existing classroom community practices and experiences via child participatory activities. The data included intensive and thick field notes of classroom observations, informal semi-structured child conferencing, and teacher journal reflection notes. The results expanded on the understanding of a child-centered preschool classroom community from children's perspective. This study offers relevant implications for methodological approaches including children as co-researchers as well as child participation and child-centered paradigm in early childhood education for practitioners.