MBH4000 Early childhood education and care as a research area Course description

Knowledge of recent research on children and early childhood education and care (ECEC) is essential to be able to contribute to enhancing this field of practice. This course provides a historical overview of ECEC research and presents the most recent research about children's everyday lives and ECEC centres as an institution in society. The course will provide insight into current research projects at the Department of Early Childhood Education and draw close thematic links to everyday activities in ECEC centres.  

Early childhood education and care as a research area also looks at how different governing documents and plans influence ECEC centres, and their staff and the children who attend them, and presents different directions in ECEC research, arts research and research ethics.

None

Knowledge

The student  

• has an advanced understanding/knowledge of children’s everyday lives in ECEC centres, as well as of the ECEC centre as an institution in society

• has in-depth knowledge of ECEC as a research area 

• has in-depth knowledge of scientific and artistic approaches to the field of ECEC

• has in-depth knowledge of current research and knowledge development in ECEC in a historical and current perspective

Skills

The student 

• can analyse recent ECEC research with particular weight on issues relating to children’s everyday lives in ECEC centres: play, learning, care, well-being, organisation and management

• can analyse relevant issues on the basis of ECEC research

• can analyse and take a critical approach to different research methods and research designs

General competence

The student 

• can analyse relevant research ethics issues related to ECEC research

• can apply knowledge of Norwegian and international ECEC research to structure, formulate and disseminate scholarly arguments 

The ECEC sector is an important institution in society that has changed considerably in recent years. An increase in the number of ECEC places and flexible forms of organisation have created challenges in the field of ECEC. Most children over the age of one now attend an ECEC centre, and most of the coming generation’s childhood will be linked to life in the institutional setting of an ECEC centre.

• Children’s everyday lives in ECEC centres

• Recent Norwegian and international ECEC and arts research

• ECEC centres as an institutional setting

• Play and learning

• ECEC centres as a research area

• Research ethics

• Organisation and management

Teaching activities comprise lectures, seminars, seminar group work, supervision, practical work and assignments between the teaching sessions. Work in seminar groups and between sessions will be related to relevant issues that have emerged in connection with the teaching activities. This work, along with the supervision, is intended to support the students’ work on the exam, and students are expected to participate in seminar groups and submit assignments between teaching sessions. 

At least two individual or group supervisory sessions related to the semester paper, lasting about 10 minutes each.

The exam comprises an individual written semester paper based on the required coursework with a scope of about 4,000 words (+/- 10%). 

Resit/rescheduled exams 

Resit/rescheduled exams are organised in the same way as ordinary exams. Students can submit a reworked version of the semester paper for the first resit or rescheduled exam. A new assignment must be submitted for subsequent attempts. It is the student’s responsibility to register for any resit/rescheduled exams by the deadline.

All aids are permitted, as long as the rules for source referencing are complied with.

Pass/fail

The exam will be assessed by two internal examiners. External programme supervisors are appointed to evaluate the coherence of the programme as a whole and the exams in each individual course.