Setting the ground for engagement – multimodal perspectives on exhibition design

Abstract

Little is known about preschoolers and their engagement with digital tab-lets. This article addresses this gap by drawing on findings from two research projects. The aim is to illustrate how children make meaning, transform and play while engaging with various applications comprised by the materiality of the digital tablets. Empirical video material has been multimodally tran-scribed and empirical examples are framed by a design theoretical perspective. Findings capture diverse experiences illustrating how preschoolers creatively manipulate and playfully transform didactic designs. The results illustrate how children´s self-initiated play with application's design shifts the balance of authority that typically exists between adults and children, and the article concludes in a suggestion of how the notion of play can be understood with a design theoretical perspective. p r e s c h o o l e r s a n d d i g i ta l ta b l e t s – c e l e b r at i o n s a n d c o n c e r n s Digital tablets mark a turning point for young children's meaning-making and play in formal and informal settings. Despite this, research has not been able to explain the complex interrelationship between the material charac-teristics, design and meaning potentials of these technological devices for children's learning and play. There is little research about digital tablets in preschool, obviously because it is a new tool, but probably also because of the lack of interest among public authorities in recognizing ICT – informa-tion-and communication technologies – in modern early childhood edu-cation (Bølgan, 2012). Digital tablets' size, weight and multipurpose design together with the allowing digital interface is viewed to offer powerful op-Digital tablets and applications in preschool – Preschoolers' creative transformation of didactic design