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This empirical study analyses the qualitatively different ways in which teachers approach children's learning in and about nature. The empirical data consists of video observations of children and teachers communicating with one another around natural phenomena found during excursions into a forest. Variation theory is presented as a framework for analysing the opportunities teachers provide for children's learning. The study identifies three qualitatively different ways in which teachers communicate with children: one based on the principle of opening up dimensions of variation, the second building on presumed shared previous experience as a resource for making sense of a novel observation and the third involving children through using a make-believe playful approach. The implications of these three different approaches for children's learning are discussed. IntroductionAccounts of children's learning generally indicate a preference for exploration as the mechanism of learning. A clear example of this is Piagetian theory. In contrast, more recent theoretical accounts of children's learning have increasingly emphasised and empirically shown how participation in different kinds of conversations is decisive for the child's learning. Through implication, this latter view ascribes important roles to other participants in the child's everyday life, including other children and, most importantly, the teacher. For example, as shown by Sylva and her colleagues in the Effective provision of pre-school education (EPPE) project (Sylva et al. 2010; cf. Siraj-Blatchford and Manni 2008), providing good learning opportunities for children in early childhood education involves 'sustained shared thinking' (SirajBlatchford 2007). This concept denotes that interlocutors (in this context, typically a teacher and a child) are engaged over a prolonged time in a mutual task, such as telling a story together. Rather than simply emphasising that other people and communication are important to the child's learning, recent research has made clear that the nature of this communication is decisive. In other words, how the teacher and child communicate about a phenomenon is of vital importance to the child's emerging understanding of that phenomenon (e.g.

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The aim of the research project is to develop knowledge about teachers' different ways of seeing teaching and science as content in early childhood education before and after an in-service training period. The variation theory is used for analysis and can be described in terms of learning object, critical aspects, discernment, simultaneity and differences. 30 preschool teachers from nine different municipalities participated in the project. The empirical material consists of a questionnaire that the preschool teachers answered in the beginning and in the end of the training period and of group reports. The results can be discussed as a number of critical aspects in relation to teachers' learning as: ways of understand the concept of variation, to discern the object of learning and to discern a shared space of learning. BakgrundDenna forskningsstudie utgår från en kompetensutvecklingsinsats med målet att stärka de ingående arbetslagens kunskap om vad naturvetenskap i förskolan kan vara och samtidigt utveckla kompetens kring undervisningsbegreppets innebörd. Kompetensutvecklingsinsatsen skulle bidra till att de ingående arbetslagen genom ett reflekterande samarbete skulle utveckla ett professionellt yrkesspråk kring uppdrag och undervisning och samtidigt att utveckla den egna praktiken. Enligt Söderström (2004) anger lärare ofta tidsbrist som det vanligaste problemet i arbetet. Även i förskolans praktik talas det om tidsbrist som en faktor för att inte hinna reflektera över och utveckla verksamheten (Skolinspektionen , 2012). Detta kan enligt Söderström (2004) innebära att lärare tar sin utgångspunkt i ett erfarenhetslärande vilket hon menar lätt kan bli konserverande. "För att lära av erfarenheter krävs nya impulser som hjälper till att se ett problem ur olika perspektiv" (s. 95). För att den egna erfarenheten ska ges möjlighet att kopplas till mera generella förklaringsmodeller förutsätts det att man som Susanne Thulin är förskollärare och universitetslektor i pedagogik och programområdesansvarig för förskollärarut-bildningen vid Högskolan Kristianstad. Hennes forskning riktar sig mot förskolans arbete med naturvetenskap som innehåll i förskolans verksamhet.Laila Gustavsson är förskollärare och universitetslektor i pedagogiskt arbete och undervisar på lärarutbildningen vid Högskolan Kristianstad. Hennes forskning behandlar främst förskolans arbete med naturvetenskap som innehåll i förskolans verksamhet.

There is an identified need for research capable of enhancing understanding of effective practice in the embedding of Education for Sustainability (EfS) in Initial Early Childhood Teacher education (IECTE). Research further finds that innovative teaching strategies are needed to build new teachers’ capacity to prepare future citizens to manage critical sustainability challenges. This study meets this need by investigating how EfS is implemented in two IECTE programmes at two Swedish universities where EfS is embedded throughout the years of study, and the learning students demonstrate at the end of the programmes in relation to EfS. Findings reveal that students demonstrate a range of understandings related to EfS and the role of the early childhood teacher in EfS. Findings further suggest there is an overall need to deepen IECTE students’ EfS theoretical and pedagogical content knowledge to enable them to close a gap between the theory and teaching of EfS in early childhood education settings.