21/09/2022

The project Participatory and Inclusive Early Education is about the challenges and opportunities for early education in the Rio de Janeiro community of Rocinha. As part of our work, we realized that listening to children and being attentive to what they had to say even though it wasn’t always in words was critical. 

The CIESPI researchers Cristina Laclette Porto and Nathercia Lacerda developed a methodology to do this based on illustrations in children’s books and various play activities in order to capture the diverse languages children use to express themselves. The key themes in the project, inclusion, participation and safety, were approached through images and questions suitable for young children. 

Between May and June 2022, this methodology was used in four conversation circles which allowed a conversation with a total of thirty children between the ages of 3 and 7 who live in Rocinha. The results of this experience are described in Bulletin 7.

We noted that in addition to listening to the children on the key topics, the activities created a climate among the children, teachers and researchers which encouraged the perspectives of everyone to expand. And we hope the same will happen to you, our readers. We invite you to follow us on other stages of the project through various project publications and the report “Early childhood and community action in Rocinha: youth (re)discovering their childhoods”. 

Click here to read the report

More information about the project, click here.