Just before pre-primary education: interplay between age and resources in the transition processes of diverse pre-primary education contexts

Abstract

This article describes the interplay between age and children’s resources during the transition from Finnish early childhood education and care (ECEC) to pre-primary education. We describe how age operates in the structures of ECEC during the time before the actual transition. We approach the transition to pre-primary education and the relation between age and resources with the concepts of capital and informal and formal practices. The data are drawn from ethnographic fieldwork and video records at two types of ECEC centres: one that provides pre-primary education and one that does not. The findings underscore transition practices and age as the main aspects providing diverse resources for the transferring children during the transition from ECEC to pre-primary education. Investigating the interplay between resources and age helps to understand how ECEC centres with different age-related group structures and locations of pre-primary education produce resources and distinctions between the children during the transition.