The development of locomotor exploration and infants\' transition to ECEC settings: (pro)positions, negotiations and pathways

Author(s)

Natália Meireles Santos da Costa

• Document type: Doctoral Thesis
• Press: Ribeirão Preto.
• Institution: Universidade de São Paulo (USP). Faculdade de Filosofia, Ciências e Letras de Ribeirão Preto (PCARP/BC)
• Defense date: 2021-12-14

Examining board members

Katia de Souza Amorim; Gabriela Sousa de Melo Mietto; Ana Rosa Costa Picanço Moreira; Gabriela Guarnieri de Campos Tebet

• Advisor: Katia de Souza Amorim

Abstract

The theme of exploration in Psychology inherits the tradition of laboratory studies, which privilege the domestic baby and frequently overlook the historically and culturally situated nature of collective contextual dynamics. With the growing demand for early childhood education and care services for babies, trend that enhances the transition process, ECEC settings emerge as privileged stages for the study of motor and locomotor acquisitions. Therefore, this dissertation aimed to investigate how the different modes of locomotor exploration emerge and transform throughout the home-ECEC transition process. Seeking to apprehend the intersection and mutual constitution of contexts and experiences, the goal was to analyze how the institutional context affords and constrains the process of (co) building the exploration process with the baby. Based on the perspective of the Network of Meanings, focus infants (ages 5-10m) from three different ECEC centers were monitored through the Database from a larger project to which this study is linked. Empirical records were obtained from observation forms, video recordings, interviews and documents referring to the three initial months of attendance. The corpus of the analysis was built from the mapping and microgenetic analysis of episodes of actions unfolded in scenarios of locomotor challenges, the process being apprehended in its relationship with the physical and social environment throughout the transition process. Sofia began to have to master the sitting posture, constantly proposed by institutional practice. Her exploratory process was observed through the effort of controlling trunk leaning in attempts to reach for distal objects and in the prolongation and complexity of her exploratory flow. Isabela\'s exploration took place mostly in interactive situations with peers and interactional dynamics were shown to be intertwined with the complexification of her exploratory movements. Carolina, on the other hand, had her exploration regulated by the proximity of the adult, so relational and spatial strategies involving educators were key in her gradually directing her off the lap, and allowing her to move through outdoor spaces and between rooms. Hence, findings bring empirical evidence of the intertwining between transition processes and exploration through different ways in which varied bodily, postural and spatial resources were made available and negotiated in the infant-institution relationship, as certain modes of positioning and circulation were more encouraged or even hampered. In this sense, exploration and interactive flow could take place as movements that were synchronized, contrasted, facilitated or even hindered; relational processes mediated how the environment became more attractive or restrictive to exploration according to how infants\' movements occurred with greater amplitude, withdrawal, confidence or even ambivalence. Therefore, the transition was apprehended as an embodied process in the here-now that became materialized through movements of ambivalence, refusal, restricted mobility or greater capacity to transpose institutional delimitation. We suggest that the planning of the institutional transition in early years should take into account infants\' particularities, such as postures and more usual bodily experiences, spatial accessibility for a larger range of mobility (or non-mobility), alongside greater flexibility in terms of routines, spaces, objects, times and relationships. (AU)

• FAPESP's process: 16/24466-7 - Infants exploratory activity in adaptation process to daycare: case studies in Brazil
• Grantee: Natália Meireles Santos da Costa
• Support Opportunities: Scholarships in Brazil - Doctorate