Creating Uses - methods and findings from a project on creative uses of

digital technologies in daycare insitutions (2015)

Presentation at meeting with LEGO, Billund, December 4th 2015

Kjetil Sandvik, Associate Professor, Dept. of Media,

Cognition and Communication, University of Copenhagen

Project outline • Assignment by the Ministry for Children, Education and

Gender Equality • Creating a national network of daycare institutions in

Denmark • Mapping existing municipal and institutional strategies

and practices concerning uses of digital uses for learning and play

• Doing on-the-floor research with pedagogues and children developing new practices for uses of digital tools in daycare instutions (Next Practice Lab): 275 children and 31 pedagogues from 17 daycare institutions in 10 municipalities.

What users want? • We’ve been asking: is there a match between existing digital tools

on the market and the wants and needs in daycare institutions when it comes to pedagogical practices and children’s play

• Hard to answerer, because both market and daycare institutions are developing very fast.

• The existing technology is experimented with and explored and thus play practices develop which are including and interacting with various digital tools (e.g. iPads) – and as new practices develop new wants and needs develop too

• So – beside the obvious demand for digital technology which is robust, mobile, flexible, multi-functional, intuitive to use (e.g. not dependent on reading skills) - the actual needs of these particular users develop through their everyday practices

• As such digital ‘playware’ for daycare institutions needs to develop at ‘eye level’ in collaboration with the children and the pedagogues.

Method: Next Practice Labs

• Developing new uses of digital media (primarily iPads + accessories) in daycare institutions (3-6 year old children)

• Best described as a) open laboratories and b) experimenting communities

• a) does not close itself of from older methods and experiences, but builds on them

• b) focuses on collaborative testing, improvising, creating and ‘toying with’ digital technology between children, pedagogues, researchers and ideally designers.

Top-down: fixed and predictable use

Eye level: uses developing through play

Methods

• Action based research: creating and studying at the same time in collaboration pedagogues and children

• User-driven and co-creative development: creating frames for the children’s own creative experiments

• Process-oriented: both development and use practices are rooted in play activities (not in end-results: something to watch or show)

The pedagogue

The children The researcher

iPads decides

Pedagogues decides Children decides

Intended use vs creative use

Skepticism vs open-mindedness Habits vs creativity

Appropriating possibilities Challenging possibilities

Eye level deve-

lopment

Three modes in creating new practices

• Learning and exploring (controlled by pedagogues): to get acquainted to the iPad, to see its possibilities etc. It is important with planning and well-defined frames for all to feel comfortable (both pedagogues and children)

Three modes in creating new practices

• Setting the iPad free (controlled by both pedagogues and children): to improvise and use the iPad in impulsive ways, letting children teach children, insisting on process, not product oriented

Three modes in creating new practices

• iPad fully integrated in children's play (control-led by children): iPads are used for play, iPads are inspiring play (maybe even without being physically present in the play activity: moving like in 'reverse camera', imagining landscapes as if using 'green screen' etc.)

Concluding remarks

• It is not a matter of replacing top-down with bottom-up

• Next Practice Lab strategies are about finding a common ground for collaboration between the pedagogues setting the frames and the children co-creatively creating and engaging in new play practices

• Focuses on the importance of process, of open-mindedness towards change, and on key operating modes like participation, collaboration and co-creation

New project 2016: uses of digital media among 1-2,5 year olds

• Studying how small children's curiosity may be the driving force in their first experience with digital media: play and learning thorugh movement, senses and creativity

• using digital media in exploring, experiencing and understanding the children's surrounding world.

• Creating and testing new ideas for how digital media may support and interact with play and learning activities

• Developing new ways of working with digital media and the learning plan themes and doing this at 'eye-level' in collaborative and experimental processes between children, pedagogues and researchers

• Laboratory: the daycare institution Paddehatten, Vejle • Participant: children, pedagogues, researchers (Klaus Thestrup,

Carsten Jessen, Jacob Knudsen, Stine Liv Johansen, Kjetil Sandvik • Period: 2016