Pedagogy is seen as a "double-edged sword": it efficiently conveys information but may constrain the exploration of the causal structure of objects, suggesting that pedagogy and exploration are mutually exclusive learning processes. However, research on children's active involvement in concept acquisition implies that pedagogical signals…

The use of natural and non-natural play materials in early childhood education is a critical facilitator to children's learning and development. Different materials vary in their affordances for sophisticated play, imagination, and creativity, which contribute to children's complex thinking; with the current focus on technology, it has been…

"Research Findings:" Although the importance of block play to children's spatial ability has been recognized globally, little is known about children's use of spatial frames of reference during spatial processing. This study investigated the intervention with guided block play to promote children's use of their intrinsic frame of…

This article focuses on child participation in early childhood education (ECE). The theoretical basis for this study is a relational approach that highlights the significance of spatiality and materiality. Drawing from these theoretical perspectives, child participation is understood as a space that children actively do in various combinations of…

The Little Bosses' Market, now in its second year and organized by the Hualien Parent-Child Center, challenges the perspective that young children cannot learn about economics. The children participating in this activity took on the responsibilities of planning and selling their goods and services. They interacted with customers by noting prices,…

When given the opportunity to play with mathematical materials and ideas, children demonstrate their mathematical understanding in innovative ways. The open-ended nature of the "Pattern Blocks" activity provides agency for children to decide how to approach the tasks, ways to differentiate beyond more common pattern-block puzzle choices,…

The authors discuss loose parts -- pipe cleaners, acorns, fabric, stones, and so forth -- as versatile materials not originally intended for children's play that they can manipulate, modify, and use in their play activities. The authors review the historical foundations of loose parts play, focusing on influential individuals and theories, and…

The aim of the present study was to investigate the effects of block play on the creativity of children. The present study adopted a quasi-experimental research design, with pre- and post-test control groups. The study group consisted of a total of 52 children, enrolled at preschool education institutions in Ankara province in Turkey. The children…

Children begin to reason about gender and others' gender-typed preferences from early in life, yet not enough is known about whether their reasoning reflects only binary categorization or a more nuanced way understanding of variation in gender. Further, little is known about how children's conception of their own gender affects how they think…

The purpose of this study is to investigate how young children define trust and to find out if there is a relationship between the people whom they trust and the people with whom they share their favorite food and toy. The participants consist of 273 kindergarteners enrolled in five public kindergartens. Research assistants asked the participants…

Purpose: Much remains unknown about how young children orient to computational objects and how we as learning scientists can orient to young children as computational thinkers. While some research exists on how children learn programming, very little has been written about how they learn the technical skills needed to operate technologies or to…

Tangible coding toys have been promulgated as useful learning tools for young children to learn computer science and mathematics concepts and skills. Although research shows coding toys can support mathematics for early childhood aged children, little is known about the specific design features of coding toys that afford mathematical thinking…

This article feeds on new materialisms, especially the work of Barad, while re-turning and exploring child/LEGO/pedagogue/(re)searcher intra-actions in kindergarten and drawing attention to both human and non-human organisms as agentic forces that produce diffractions, affects and effects when they clash. The article places a special focus on one…

Play is a place of diverse meaning-making for young children and often central to family life. This paper reports on a family study in which the authors analyse Author One's family photos of young children's play across four generations. The photo analysis shows continuity and transformations in the types of play activities the young children…

The purpose of this study was to explore how kindergarten students (aged 5-6 years) engaged with mathematics as they learned programming with robot coding toys. We video-recorded 16 teaching sessions of kindergarten students' (N = 36) mathematical and programming activities. Students worked in small groups (4-5 students) with robot coding toys on…