Seeing, Thinking, Wondering: Cultivating Data Literacy in Preschool with Primary Sources

• In Event: Supporting Teachers to Engage in Meaningful Data Literacy and Data Science Practices Across Disciplines

Abstract

Objectives
This study investigates how preschool teachers can be supported to integrate primary sources as accessible forms of data to foster early data literacy. While early childhood data practices are often limited to basic numeracy, this research broadens the definition of data to include historical photographs, maps, and oral histories—offering rich opportunities for young children to observe, question, compare, and construct meaning. By exploring how preschoolers make sense of visual and spatial data through guided inquiry, this study illustrates how data literacy can emerge in developmentally appropriate, play-based contexts.
Research Questions
How do preschool teachers use primary sources as data in inquiry-based instruction?
What early data literacy practices do children demonstrate when exploring historical photographs and maps?

Theoretical Framework
The project is guided by a pedagogical framework that integrates the theory of wonder (Conijn et al., 2022; Schinkel, 2018, 2020) with social semiotics (Kress, 2010). In this approach, wonder encourages preschool children to see the extraordinary in the everyday, fostering deep engagement through reflective questions, imaginative exploration, and meaning-making (Authors, 2024). Social semiotics complements this by offering a lens to understand how children interpret multimodal data—such as images, maps, and artifacts—and express their interpretations through drawing, storytelling, and dramatic play. Together, these frameworks position data literacy as both analytical and imaginative.

Methods
Using a design-based research model, preschool teachers participated in iterative professional learning cycles focused on integrating primary sources as data within emergent, play-based inquiry. Teachers co-developed lessons using digitized images and maps from the Library of Congress and local archives. Topics included interpreting weather (through photographs of snow, wind, and rain), exploring light and safety (with historical images of lighthouses), and comparing how people and goods move (using archival photos of horse-drawn carts, early bicycles, and trolleys). Data were collected through teacher journals, classroom videos, and children’s multimodal expressions.

Analysis
We coded teacher facilitation strategies using Conijn et al.’s (2022) wonder framework, identifying how educators prompted inquiry and scaffolded representational practices. Children’s interactions were analyzed for evidence of emergent data literacy behaviors, including noticing patterns, generating questions, comparing across time, and constructing visual explanations. Cross-case analysis revealed consistent strategies for embedding data-rich primary sources into meaningful learning experiences.

Findings and Contributions
Preschoolers engaged in sophisticated early data practices, such as noticing clues in weather images to infer season and storm type, interpreting maps of lighthouse locations to reason about coastal safety, and sequencing transportation images to tell stories about community change. Teachers noted that children demonstrated an intuitive capacity to “read” visual data and generate testable ideas. These findings suggest that with intentional scaffolding, preschoolers can engage in representational modeling, express uncertainty, and begin to form data-based claims.
This study contributes to the evolving discourse on early data science education by emphasizing an approach rooted in inquiry, play, and wonder. It provides evidence that foundational data literacy in preschool can emerge not only through numeracy but also through children’s meaning-making with culturally and historically significant visual data.

Authors

• Ilene R. Berson, University of South Florida

• Michael J. Berson, University of South Florida