Children’s participation when transitioning between early childhood education and care settings: potentials for readjusting institutional logics

Abstract

Through exploring children’s transitions within Norwegian early childhood education and care (ECEC) institutions, this article highlights an interconnectedness of children’s knowledge of institutional logics and children’s agentic actions. The theoretical framework conceptualises institutional logics as inherent structures and patterns (Thornton, Patricia H., and William Ocasio. 2008. “Institutional Logics.” In The SAGE Handbook of Organizational Institutionalism, edited by Royston Greenwood, Christine Oliver, Kerstin Sahlin, and Roy Suddaby, 99–129. London: SAGE) and children’s agentic actions through their participation in everyday activities in ECEC institutions (Juhl, Pernille. 2023. Exploring Young Children’s Agency in Everyday Transitions. London: Bloomsbury). This ethnographic study followed 13 children who transitioned from a department for toddlers to a department for older children. Through a thematic analysis of video observations and field notes, children’s forms of agentic actions were categorised as adaptation, resistance and transcendence. Adaptation denoted embracing institutional logics, whereas resistance involves openly opposing them. However, the third category, transcendence, denoted an interrelation between children’s adjustment and opposition to these logics, which enabled the children’s agency. This article argues that children’s institutional participation are interconnected forms of agentic action with potentials for readjusting institutional logics.