Seeing Civics Through Visual Representations in U.S. and Ghanaian Kindergarten Classrooms

• In Event: 46.085 - Roundtable Session 15
  In Roundtable Session: 46.085-23 - Teaching Civics in the Classroom and Community

Abstract

This research is part of a larger comparative multi-case study of civic education in kindergarten classrooms serving low-income students in the U.S. and Ghana. The study focuses on how classroom wall displays capture ways of seeing the participatory context in which children are apprenticed and reflect conceptions of the dispositions and behaviors expected of citizens within different national contexts. Given that the physical environment of the early childhood classroom may serve as a catalyst for learning, our international research team explored the civic themes depicted in photos of 6 kindergarten classrooms and explored how use of the visual representations in the school spaces promoted normative meanings of “good students”, “good work”, and the role of children as apprentice citizens.

Authors

• Ilene R. Berson, University of South Florida

• Michael J. Berson, University of South Florida

• Hessa Alsuhail, University of South Florida

• Megan D Cross, University of South Florida

• Aaron Osafo Acquah, University of Cape Coast

• Ozge Ozel, University of South Florida

• Joyce Esi Bronteng, University of Cape Coast