School effectiveness is a topic of interest addressed by numerous research projects focused on clarifying which variables contribute to the explanation of educational performance. This research aims to find out to what extent social, cultural, and academic variables at the student and school levels, as perceived by families, influence performance,…

Dual language immersion (DLI) programs have emerged in the U.S. as effective ways to bring together language minority and language majority speakers in school settings with the goal of bilingualism and bi-literacy for all. However, the proliferation of these programs has raised concerns regarding issues of inequity and dissimilar power dynamics in…

Teachers have the ability to influence a child's sense of belonging and peer relationships in the classroom which are important for a child's social development. Currently, little is known about the ways in which they do this. Vygotsky's concept of the social situation of development and Hedegaard's model for learning and development were used to…

This study investigates preschool teachers' perceptions about the pedagogical use of digital play and, by using the Learning in Working Life framework as a theoretical point of departure, it also investigates how these perceptions are connected to the teachers' professional learning environment. Participants wrote a self-report essay about digital…

This paper describes research exploring discursive constructions of gender and discursive/material intra-actions in two PreK classrooms in the United States, specifically through documentation of children's play. Using a feminist poststructuralist lens, the research illustrates ways in which children are subjected through performative iterations…

The field of special education is recognized for conducting research designed to improve the quality of life for the children and families we serve. However, our field has been criticized for empirical approaches that are inconsistent with the values and beliefs we articulate as central to our scientific practice. As such, a shift in our research…

This article presents a case study on changing food practices from traditional cold sandwich meals to hot meals in a Norwegian kindergarten. Data were sourced from interviews, complemented by non-participatory video observation and observational notes. Building on Fullan's model for understanding a change process, this paper presents the…

Most US students attend coeducational classes, but to what extent do students feel integrated into the entire classroom of their peers, especially with other-gender (OG) peers? The major goal of this study was to investigate how variations in gender integration (GI), measured by students' expectancies about inclusion, efficacy, and social costs of…

Under dominant, autonomous views of literacy, students' humorous language use during literacy events is often dismissed as 'off task' behaviour. Taking a languaging perspective, this paper considers how third-grade, emergent bilingual students' humorous language use functioned in both 'official' and 'peer' worlds during eBook composing events…

In this article, parental role construction is framed from a sociocultural perspective. Applying this perspective foregrounds the need for researchers and practitioners to gain an insider's understanding of how families themselves construct their roles in supporting children's education. By doing so, the field can reimagine family-school…

Preschool teachers in Sweden are expected to document children's learning and assess their learning outcomes, for the purpose of long-term evaluation and to develop the educational preschool practice. Previous research shows that the tools for documenting individual learning are particularly focusing on children's cognitive knowledge, while the…

Most US students attend coeducational classes, but to what extent do students feel integrated into the entire classroom of their peers, especially with other-gender peers? The major goal of this research was to investigate how variations in gender integration (GI), measured by students' expectancies about inclusion, efficacy, and social costs of…

Children with non-Finnish cultural or linguistic background face challenges to interact socially in the early childhood education (ECE) context in Finland. The present study aims to clarify (1) what kind of social roles children typically have in ECE, and (2) what sort of activities and play are typical to children with Finnish and non-Finnish…

There is now a wealth of research on obesity both from biomedical and socially critical perspectives. However, less research has focused on the lived experiences of young children and particularly those who are perceived as 'sedentary'. This paper critically examines the issue of obesity as related to children's experiences of physical…

Children should have a say in matters that concern them such as the characteristics of their learning environments, and their imaginations can be used when designing these environments. This study aimed at revealing the dream school characteristics of children attending kindergarten classes and primary school, and was designed as a case study. The…