Learning in the early years: Social interactions around picturebooks, puzzles and digital technologies

Computers & Education 59 (2012) 38–49

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Learning in the early years: Social interactions around picturebooks, puzzles and digital technologies Sarah Eagle* Graduate School of Education, University of Bristol, 35 Berkeley Square, Bristol BS8 1JA, UK

a r t i c l e i n f o

a b s t r a c t

Article history: Received 8 May 2011 Received in revised form 18 October 2011 Accepted 25 October 2011

This paper develops an approach to thinking about young children, digital technologies and learning, drawing on research literature that relates children’s learning to the use of books, and on literature that discusses the nature of interaction between adults and children and its relationship to children’s learning. An analysis is given of parents and children using devices marketed as supporting young children’s learning, identifying, within the interactions that take place, the adult’s conception of appropriate use, and showing how this influences the nature of adult–child interaction. The findings are then related to literature on social interaction and learning, and discussed in relation to the assumptions that underpin the design of the devices used. The paper suggests that the artefact can influence adult– child interaction via a conception of appropriate use, which relates to traditions or practices with which the adult is familiar but also to the design features of the artefact. It suggests that it may be time to rethink the design of technologies to support young children’s learning. Ó 2011 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.

Keywords: Lifelong learning Teaching/learning strategies Interface design

1. Introduction This paper explores the idea that we can design interactive technologies that will help young children to learn, in the sense that children’s learning can be assisted through the use of designed artefacts. The perspective taken is inspired by considering another kind of artefact, one that pre-exists digital technologies. The use of books in early childhood has been a subject for research for at least three decades. Investigations of the association between the use of books in the home and young children’s preparedness for school has shown that they can best be understood by considering social aspects of book use at home, including children’s experience of other people’s use of books and literacy materials. Meanwhile, investigations of the nature of social interactions between young children and others during shared use of books have suggested that the power of the artefact is in the way it supports and stimulates social interaction between young children and others. It is this observation that is the inspiration for the theme of this paper, which is the connection between the artefact and social interaction, and the connection between social interaction and learning. As such, the paper presents an approach to understanding the relationship between design and learning for young children, one that complements and develops contemporary research concerned with the design of technologies to support intergenerational relationships (e.g. Chiong, 2009; Davis, Vetere, Gibbs, & Francis, in press) and research that draws on theories of collaborative learning in support of frameworks of design for young children (e.g. Antle, Bevans, Tanenbaum, Seaborn, & Wang, 2011). The paper begins with a brief examination of research literature on the use of books in early childhood and the nature of social interactions between adults and children during the use of artefacts such as puzzles. Useful insights are provided by these studies; first, they show that the artefact influences the nature of interaction because it informs the adult’s conception of the appropriate way to interact with the child during its use; second, they have inspired a critique and discussion of that social interaction that supports learning. On the basis of the first of these insights, two examples of adult–child use of a particular variety of interactive digital technology are examined to explore how the artefact informed the participants’ respective conceptions of appropriate use and to examine the nature of interaction between adult and child in those two instances. The paper concludes with a consideration of the issues raised for designers.

* Tel.: þ44 7880644594 (mobile), þ44 1173314265 (office), þ44 1179355340 (home). E-mail address: [email protected]. 0360-1315/$ – see front matter Ó 2011 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved. doi:10.1016/j.compedu.2011.10.013

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2. Artefacts and learning in the home The idea that it is possible to design artefacts that will help children to learn is by no means new. In particular, there has been a longstanding association between one particular variety of artefact and young children’s learning; this is the illustrated storybook or picturebook. The association made between the use of books in early childhood and subsequent progress in school can be illustrated by the recommendation made in the UK government report ‘A language for life’ (D.E.S., 1975): the best way to prepare the very young child for reading is to hold him [sic] on our lap and read aloud to him stories he likes, over and over again (.) We believe that a priority need is.to help parents recognise the value of sharing the experience of books with their children (D.E.S., 1975, s. 7.2) The authors of the report allude to a notion that exposure to stories and rhymes provide opportunities to accumulate knowledge, and instils in them a respect for the printed word. The use of books by adults and young children has been studied by researchers from a variety of disciplines, including psychologists (Hewison, 1988; Leseman & de Jong, 1998; Tizard & Hughes, 1984; Tizard, Schofield, & Hewison, 1982) anthropologists, e.g. Heath (1982, 1983) and educators, e.g. Cochran Smith (1984), Lysaker (2006), Wells (1985, 1986), which has demonstrated that what is of particular significance is the nature of the social interaction that takes place during and in connection with joint storybook reading. What lies behind the educational gains that young children derive from early experiences is familiarity with books themselves and the way that they are used, and, importantly, the opportunity to initiate and engage in talk through which they can relate new concepts and vocabulary to their own experience and knowledge of the world. One might interpret the findings as an indication that the nature and quality of talk inspired by picturebook would be in some way related to the design features of picturebook. However, the nature of interaction during shared use of a picturebook may owe as much or more to the traditions or practices with which family members are familiar as to the nature of the book itself. A variety of studies have shown that families read books with children in ways that they are familiar with, that is, the way that they take for granted a book should be read (Heath, 1982, 1983; Leseman & de Jong, 1998). The interaction that takes place between adults and young children in the course of using artefacts has been studied in detail in the context of use of puzzles and similar artefacts. Problem-solving studies, like the research on books outlined above, have demonstrated that adults’ notions of appropriate ways to use artefacts are significant in influencing the nature of the interaction, and have also stimulated a line of discussion about the nature of interaction that supports young children’s learning. This research literature is discussed in further detail below. 2.1. Insights from studies of adult–child interactions around artefacts The best-known study of adult–child interaction during a problem-solving task is entitled The Role of Tutoring in Problem-solving (Wood, Bruner, & Ross, 1976). The concept of scaffolding is derived from this paper, which describes a tutor’s activity with children aged 3–5. Further problem-solving studies include a study of the completion of a truck puzzle by Wertsch, McNamee, McLane, and Budwig (1980), followed by studies of problem-solving amongst dyads of different educational and social backgrounds (Wertsch, Minick, & Arns, 1984). Investigations stimulated by these studies were published in a special edition of Learning and Instruction (e.g. González, 1996; Hoogsteder, Maier, & Elbers, 1996; Nilholm & Säljö, 1996). In this volume, Nilholm and Säljö comment that the way the adults interact with the child during problemsolving tasks involving puzzles and other tasks relates to their prior experiences, not only of puzzle completion and problem-solving, but also of social situations. The behaviour that is the subject of the study arises from the parents’ conceptions of the nature of the situation: Nilholm and Säljö refer to it as playing a particular game in a semi-public setting (Nilholm & Säljö, 1996, p. 342). A variety of factors influence the nature of the ‘game’, amongst them the fact that their interactions with the child were of interest to the researchers, but also, and of significance for this paper, their ideas of what constitutes appropriate ways of interacting with children and appropriate behaviour with a particular kind of artefact. This was demonstrated particularly clearly in the cross-cultural studies of González, and of Wertsch et al. (1984). Both the studies of picturebooks in childhood and problem-solving studies indicate that interactions between adults and children in the context of an artefact are not determined or driven by the artefact. Instead, they arise from, and enact, the ways of doing things that are taken for granted as appropriate in the situation, of which the artefact is part. 2.2. Modes of interaction Having shown that it is possible for artefacts in some way to influence the nature of social interaction that supports young children’s learning, it is now appropriate to turn to consider research that examines the nature of social interaction between young children and others, and what is known about the relationship of social interaction and young children’s learning. The starting point is a discussion of the nature of adult–child interaction that was stimulated by the problem-solving studies mentioned above. 2.2.1. The instructional mode of interaction An insightful criticism was made of the study that Wertsch and colleagues made of adults and children completing a puzzle of a truck (Wertsch et al., 1984). Elbers, Maier, Hoekstra, and Hoogsteder (1992) point out that the pattern of interaction that Wertsch and colleagues studied is actively produced by both partners and that an emphasis on the adults role as a tutor impedes consideration of the child’s role in co-determining the situation. They term the pattern of interaction studied in problem-solving and tutoring studies ‘an instructional mode of interaction’ and clarify the roles and responsibilities of each partner thus: In such a teacher–pupil relationship the pupil expects the teacher to take the responsibility for the task, and the pupil is willing to adopt the teacher’s situation definition (Elbers et al., 1992, p. 115). In a more recent discussion, Park and Moro draw out the relationship between the instructional mode of interaction and the perception of goals in the situation. There is an implicit assumption that the learner’s role is to solve a problem or to achieve a goal which is set by someone else (Park & Moro, 2006, p. 103). The learner is not encouraged or assisted to define the task or set their own goal nor to collaborate with the instructor in doing so.

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2.2.2. Passages of intellectual search The instructional mode of interaction that Elbers and colleagues highlighted may be contrasted with a form of talk which arises from a child’s questioning, and in which the child sustains the interaction, often with persistent questioning. Tizard and Hughes noticed that this pattern was frequent in everyday conversations of four-year old children in their homes (Tizard & Hughes, 1984). Drawing attention to the child as an active agent in puzzling out things that they found interesting or unfamiliar, Tizard and Hughes described this form of talk ‘Passages of intellectual search’. In contrast to the ‘instructional mode of interaction’, the goal towards which the search is directed is set by the child, and the child sustains the interaction. 2.2.3. Guided participation Regardless of whether adults set goals for children to accomplish or solve, children learn through their continuing involvement as observers in the overall process of everyday activity. Much of everyday activity has a purpose or goal, but this is considered to be self-evident and rarely made explicit (Rogoff, 1990; Rogoff et al., 1993). Rogoff, who works in an anthropological tradition, makes the point that a concern with the establishment of goals in interaction between adults and children is cultural rather than universal. Instructional dialogue and situations that involve problems and goals are widely accepted as a way of organising learning in some cultures, while others prioritise learning through ‘keen observation and listening-in’. Rogoff and her colleagues observe that in cultures that organise learning in the former manner, children are encouraged to be attentive during organised activity; when they are not immediately involved in an activity, their attention may often be more limited. In contrast, learning is organised in accordance with ‘keen observation and listening-in’, certain skills are likely to be encouraged, such as autonomy and keen observation, along with development of skills in organizing and taking responsibility with initiative (Rogoff, Paradise, Arauz, Correa-Chavez, & Angelillo, 2003, p. 191). 2.2.4. Joint imaginative play A fourth mode of interaction, and again one which does not involve the explicit determination of a goal, is joint imaginative play. Joint imaginative play, as described by Elbers and colleagues (Elbers et al., 1992; Hoogsteder et al., 1996) is a mode in which participants pretend, or adopt fictional identities, use forms of communication in the register of their adopted identities, and their responsibilities for sustaining the interaction are equal or symmetrical. This mode of interaction is, to use Cloran’s words, one that is somewhat fragile (Cloran, 1999, p. 42). She observed that when parents took up their child’s definition of the interaction as an imaginative game, this was often closely followed by the parent directing it in a way which allowed them to introduce information, an observation that was also made by Tizard and Hughes (1984). These observations suggest that, at least amongst the families in the UK and Australia whose interactions were studied by that Cloran and by Tizard and Hughes, parents consider involving themselves in imaginative play and imaginative talk to be less significant than instruction for developing children’s thinking and learning. However, make-believe and imaginative play may have a crucial role to play in the development of thinking, reasoning and learning itself. Harris suggests that it is the means by which children develop their ability to imagine alternative possibilities and to work out their implications (Harris, 2000): When children start to engage in joint pretence, they must be alert to the stipulations that their play partner introduces. These stipulations can fly in the face of reality – they can imply that an empty teapot contains tea.(.). Thus, pretend play is a very early context in which children are called on to accept premises introduced by their partner, and to respond in a consequential fashion. (Harris, 2000, p. 111) Harris argues that imaginative play, especially joint pretend play, enables humans to release themselves from the empirical present and to think about situations that they have not experienced. He goes on to highlight the observation that during pretend play, and during the ‘passages of intellectual search’ that they initiate, children have a receptive stance to premises that do not fit their experience or that lie outside it. Crucially, in order to learn from interactions of an instructional nature, children need to have developed a receptive stance to information that is introduced by another person: a plausible effect of schooling, (.) is gradually to teach children to extend the receptive stance that they adopt during joint pretend play or during a dialogue that is initiated by their own curiosity to the didactic monologue that they first encounter in school. (Harris, 2000, pp. 114–115) 2.2.5. Summary: modes of interaction and learning A protracted discussion on the merits and demerits of the four modes of interaction outlined above is outside the scope of this paper. The points to be drawn out are, firstly, that child-initiated conversations, playful interaction and learning through involvement in everyday activity contrast with the adult-initiated and adult-sustained dialogue that is associated with lessons and schooling. Secondly, the observations set out in this brief survey of literature suggest that instructional dialogue might be a rather poor means of supporting children’s learning at home, and, perhaps surprisingly, also a poor means of preparing young children for the more instructional learning that is likely to be part of their experience in school.

3. The affordances of artefacts and modes of interaction The preceding discussion argues for a consideration of the relationship between artefacts and interaction via the way that interacting participants take for granted that they should behave in the context of the artefact. These observations suggest that a means of examining whether and how an interactive digital technology can assist young children’s learning would be:  to consider the relationship between the design of an artefact and an adult’s conceptions of appropriate ways to interact with a child in that context  to examine what form, or mode, such interaction takes.

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The paper now turns to examine the interactions of adults and young children during the use of some of the interactive digital artefacts that they owned. Adults’ conceptions of appropriate ways of interacting with a child and modes of interaction are investigated through consideration of episodes of adult–child interaction during the use of the interactive digital artefacts in question. Transcripts of interaction are analysed to foreground what the adult takes for granted is the appropriate way of doing things, and the meaning that the child makes of the situation. While the mode of interaction refers to the overall nature of interaction, which is jointly constructed by interacting partners, the analytic interest is on the adult’s interpretation. This is to say that the focus is on the extent to which the mode of interaction is an enactment of the adult’s conception of appropriate ways of interacting in that situation, and on the status ascribed by the adult to the emerging interpretations of the child.

4. A study of adult–child interactions during use of digital technologies The empirical data presented is drawn from a study of interactive digital technologies in preschool children’s lives (Author, 2011). Extracts of video recordings are represented by transcripts of adults and children’s use of Electronic Learning Aids (ELAs) (Strommen, 2004). The extracts were selected from video recordings made by families who participated in case studies, and were made, using their own video cameras, in response to a request for recordings that illustrated a range of occasions when young children were using technologies with another person. Young children’s communication typically involves a range of communicative resources, including gesture, noises, gaze, facial expression and body movement as well as words (Flewitt, 2005) and there is potential difficulty for the researcher in arriving at an interpretation of interactions captured on video. Recognising this, participating families were asked, where possible, to position the video camera in such a way as to capture as much of the artefact, the child’s hands and face, and the interacting partner as possible. This turned out to be a more demanding request than anticipated and there was considerable variability between the quality of data. The data chosen for analysis were selected partly on the basis that camera angles and lighting levels allowed for visibility of gesture and gaze and because a relatively high proportion of verbal communication took place, which contribute to the ease by which representations of social interactions can be produced. Transcripts show the dialogue recorded as audio on the video camera and information about the gestures, directions of gaze and action that are visible on the screen are described alongside lines of dialogue (for co-occurring action) or between lines of dialogue where action and dialogue did not co-occur. Illustrations are included to show the relative positions of child, adult and artefact are included to aid the reader to visualise the interactions. Nearly all of the families in the study owned a device that would be described as an ELA. In each case, the device had been handed down from a sibling or from another family. This variety of artefact is chosen as the interactive digital artefact examined in relation to the questions outlined above on the basis that of all the technologies that children used, these were ones that the families in question had said they felt could help prepare their children for school. The framework for analysis of interactions is derived from that of Marjanovi c-Shane and Beljanski-Risti c (2008), for whom communication involves three entities: an active subject (me), a relational subject (you) and a communicative object (topic). Communicative gestures (comments) establish and shape the relationships between the three entities. Here a simplified version of their framework is used: where one communicative partner draws the attention of the other partner to something, a topic is established. The topic can be developed by a means of a comment made by either partner; each partner builds, changes and/or reinvents the topic developed by the other through his or her own comment. This means of analysis allows the relative agency of the partners in the interaction to be traced, such that it can be examined in relation to the modes of interaction described in Section 2.2. Beth’s LeapPad Beth’s family owned a My First LeapPad, which consisted of a plastic console, a spiral bound Flip Book with thick cardboard pages, and a pen. For each Flip Book there is a corresponding cartridge and this is inserted into a slot. When set up with Flip Book and cartridge, pressure applied by the tip of the pen on areas of the page resulted in the console playing tunes, jingles or verbal instructions, clues and encouragement. Figs. 1 and 2 are included to illustrate the device and the instructions provided for the user. David’s V-Tech Laptop David’s V-tech Laptop (illustrated in Fig. 3) looked very like an everyday laptop, opening up to reveal a keyboard. It has a detachable mouse. The screen is composed of two parts: at the centre, a small grey and black LED screen on which simple animations are displayed, and,

Fig. 1. My First LeapPad.

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Fig. 2. Instructions accompanying My First LeapPad.

taking up the larger portion of the screen space, a colourful surround on which are printed the names of three sets of activities, Word Fun, Math Mania, and Creative Arcade, and the titles of the games within each set with code numbers alongside them. Fig. 4 gives example of one game from each set. In each case the description is taken from the instruction book that is packaged with the V-tech laptop. 4.1. Interactions between a child and her father using a LeapPad The data presented below is a transcript of a 6-min video recording of Beth, who at the time was aged two and a half, using a LeapPad. In the video recording, which was made by Beth’s mother, Beth was sitting on a bed in a child’s bedroom, dressed in pyjamas and holding a toddlers’ drinking cup, and leaning against her father Alan, who was leaning up behind her. Alan’s right arm encircled his daughter. The LeapPad was in front of Beth; in her hand she held a pen connected to the LeapPad. This is illustrated by the screenshot from the video in Fig. 5 below. Extract 1: Beth and her father enjoy noises from the LeapPad 1 2 3 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15

(Beth is pressing with the pen on the LeapPad) Again (looking down at the LeapPad) (Beth looks at the LeapPad and presses a green button with her finger) (musical jingle) ha! (looks at Beth) ha! (meets Alan’s gaze) (takes the interactive pen from Alan’s hand) (smiles and leans forward to watch Beth’s hand movements as she moves the pen to touch an area of the pad) (Another jingle) (Beth turns to look at Alan and smiles, at the same time moving the pen to her mouth) ha! (As Beth turns and smiles, Alan turns to look at Beth and meets her gaze) Good! (both look down at the LeapPad (puts her pen on the green button and taps) (Music begins to play) (looks at Beth, begins to rock from side to side) (both rock in time to the music)

Alan: LeapPad Alan: Beth: Beth Alan LeapPad Beth: Alan: Alan and Beth Beth LeapPad Alan Alan and Beth

Beth’s father closely followed her activity, making visible his focus of attention through verbal and non-verbal means (his direction of gaze, his body movements). In lines 1–3 his line of gaze established Beth’s button pressing as the focus of his attention as well as hers, thus proposing a topic. His “ha” (line 4) was a comment on the noise from the LeapPad, which developed the topic; celebration of noises produced through button pressing. Beth’s comment (saying “ha” and meeting his gaze(line 5)) further developed the topic as one that involved shared pleasure. After the next noise from the LeapPad, their interaction followed a similar pattern (9–10) but differed in that this time it was Beth who initiated (through looking at Alan and smiling) and Alan who followed (through turning to meet Beth’s gaze and saying ‘good’ (line 10)). The pattern of communication in lines 9–10 therefore mirrors the pattern in lines 1–5. A similar pattern of topic development took place in lines 13–16; Alan looked at Beth and rocked to the music, and Beth’s rocking communicated her sharing of his focus of attention on the music and pleasure in it. In the following episode taken from a few minutes later in the same video recording, Beth continued to respond to noises according to the pattern that she and Alan had established, but met a different form of response from Alan. Extract 2: Alan refers to the recorded voice in the LeapPad 90 91 92

LeapPad Beth LeapPad Alan

93 94

LeapPad Alan

95

Beth

jingle (smiles and makes eye contact with her father) “you found the number four” (holding eye contact with Beth, raising eyebrows, tilting head) ...“four” “can you find the number five” (continuing to hold eye contact, raised eyebrows and tilted head) ...“five” (nods) (returns eye contact and raises eyebrows)

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Fig. 3. V-tech learning laptop.

Beth responded to the jingle with the same form of comment as she had in the sequences in Extract 1, initiating a sequence of activity that previously resulted in a shared topic of expression of pleasure and enjoyment. Rather than responding to her smile and eye contact with a smile, congratulation or physical movement, Alan co-ordinated eye contact, gesture, facial expression and verbal comment to indicate the voice of the LeapPad as the focus of his attention. Alan’s communicative comment therefore proposed a new topic, one that differed from the topic that he and Beth had developed in their earlier activity. At this point, the topic that Alan was proposing was one in which attention to the voice was a priority, while Beth’s comments continued to develop the former topic, one of shared appreciation of noises. Beth responded to Alan as follows. She abandoned the development of the former topic, ceasing to smile and instead, imitating Alan’s “listening look”. Beth’s imitation of Alan’s look cannot be taken as referring to the topic he had proposed, that is, attending the voice from the LeapPad, nor can it be taken as indicating an orientation to the instruction that it gave. In his “listening look”, Alan emphasised the voice: Beth had returned his gesture. This communicative act has the sense of a lack of understanding rather than a reconciliation of differences that had emerged between the ways they respectively framed the situation. Extract 3: Alan highlights the voice as a source of instructions and clues A voice from the LeapPad had said: “Let’s play a game, I’m thinking of an animal on the farm. Can you guess which animal it is?” Beth had pressed on a dog. 110 111 112 113 114 115 116 117 118 119 120 121 122 123 124 125 126 127 128 129 130

LeapPad: Beth: Alan: LeapPad: Beth: LeapPad: Alan: Beth: LeapPad: Alan: Beth LeapPad: Beth: Alan: Beth: Alan: Beth LeapPad: Alan: Beth: LeapPad:

“whoops” noise (turns to look at Alan: smiles) (looks at Beth) You found a dog (smiles. lifts mug of milk to her mouth) The animal I’m thinking of sounds like this (puts his right hand on Beth’s shoulder) (drinks from cup, looks towards father and then at mother/camera) hoo, hoo, hoo (turns to look at Beth) Which animal makes that noise? (presses on the LeapPad with the tip of the pen) (Error noise). You found a dog. The animal I’m thinking of is playing on the fence (puts pen to mouth) (moves Beth’s hand away from her mouth) (moves pen to another part of LeapPad) which one is on the fence? (looks at Beth, puts his right hand on her shoulder) (moves pen to touch another part of LeapPad, and presses) You found a pig. I was thinking of a cat. To play again, touch the orange lily pad at the bottom of the page (index finger of his left hand points at button marked with orange lily pad) (moves the pen to press button) musical noise

Beth continued to use the pen and the LeapPad continued to produce noises. Beth communicated sharing of attention and comment as she had earlier in Extract 1, proposing a topic as she had done before. Alan responded in the same manner as he had done earlier in Extract 2; rather than commenting in such a way as to establish the topic she had proposed, his comment emphasised his attention to the voice from the device. He accompanied the verbal and gestural means he used to indicate his own focus of attention with a further form of communication,

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WORD FUN Letter Input the letter displayed on the LCD screen by Sounds pressing the letter keys. If you input correctly, the screen will show you a corresponding animation and the letter will be announced. MATH MANIA Count Some objects will appear on the screen one by Out one. Your task is to count the number of the objects displayed. Select the correct answer with the mouse or left/right arrow keys. Then press the ENTER key to confirm the answer. CREATIVE ARCADE Piano Piano Artist allows you to play music freely. To Play make songs, press the keys with musical notes.

Fig. 4. Excerpt from instructions for V-tech learning laptop.

physical touch. He moved his arm to rest his hand on Beth’s shoulder, which, although not restraining her movement, suggested a pause in activity. This combination of gestures indicated his focus of attention on the voice from the LeapPad; then, when the LeapPad produced a statement he looked at Beth, asking her a question which was an elaboration of the statement that had just come from the LeapPad. In asking this question, he made the focus of his attention yet more explicit, at the same time clarifying the proposal of a new topic; significantly, this was a proposal that emanated from the LeapPad. Beth responded to Alan’s suggestion, pressing on a picture of a dog. As before, Beth’s response to Alan’s suggestion cannot be taken as expressing shared focus on the voice from the LeapPad nor an orientation to the instruction that it gave, and therefore it cannot be said that Alan and Beth had established or developed a new topic. However, something had changed for Beth: when the LeapPad produced an error noise and another instruction, unlike her earlier response to that noise (line 113), and for the first time in this video recording, Beth did not turn to smile at her father; therefore, this time she did not propose a topic. Alan demonstrated for a third time that the voice from the LeapPad was his focus of attention. In asking a question that repeated and elaborated on the instruction from the LeapPad and at the same time putting his hand on her shoulder. He also used this means to communicate that Beth’s actions should be oriented in accordance with the voice. A summary of the three extracts is as follows: In Extract 1, Beth and Alan established a pattern in which one partner responded to a noise from the LeapPad with a comment, in the form of a gesture communicating enjoyment of a noise, and the other further developed the topic proposed by their partner’s gesture. In Extracts 2 and 3, Beth smiled and initiated eye contact, continuing the pattern of topic proposal and development that she and Alan had established in Extract 1, but Alan did not respond to her comments by smiling; thus, her development of the topic was not accepted. Instead, he made a comment, by means of gesture, demonstrating that his focus of attention was the voice from the LeapPad, and later (in extract 3) he further emphasised this through another comment, co-ordinating the timing of his responses to indicate a pause from activity and attention to the voice from the LeapPad. Beth and Alan: discussion As they began their shared use of the LeapPad, Beth’s activity with the pen produced noises which were musical jingles. Both Beth and Alan responded to these noises from the device as enjoyable events, sharing both focus of attention (topic) and evaluation (developing the topic). As they continued their use, Beth continued to respond to the noises, whether jingles and “whoops!” noises. When the LeapPad played “whoops!” noises, they were followed by a recorded voice giving clues and instructions. Alan’s communicative activity was organised not to communicate shared focus with Beth, but to demonstrate his attention to the nature of the noises and voice from the LeapPad, and then to demonstrate his interpretation of the noises and instructions and to guide Beth in responding to them.

Fig. 5. Screenshot from video of Beth and her father using the LeapPad.

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Fig. 6. Screenshot from video extract showing David using the V-tech laptop.

The LeapPad games presuppose that a user organises his or her activity according to the nature of the noises and instructions and aims to maximise the quantity of musical jingle noises and minimise the “whoops” error noises. Using the LeapPad in this way requires a user to ascribe authority to the voice from the device, to listen and not act while it is playing, and then to act according to its instructions or suggestions. The practice of listening and not acting while a question or instruction is being delivered is familiar as a normative way of behaving in classrooms in response to a teacher, a genre which we may reasonably presume was familiar to Alan from experience of formal educational settings, and we may presume that it was unfamiliar to Beth. On this basis, we can surmise that in arriving at a conception of appropriate use of the LeapPad, Alan recognised the LeapPad as invoking a teacher–pupil metaphor. For him, the appropriate way of using the LeapPad was an instructive one. Rather as the pupil is expected to follow the lead of the teacher, the user is expected to follow the voice from the LeapPad and to respond to what it says. In addition to this, the way that Alan interacted with Beth suggests that his conception of appropriate behaviour when using the LeapPad with a young child was to show or teach her how to use it in this way. 4.2. Interactions between a child and his mother using a V-tech laptop Extract 4: David says he wants to press horsie At the time of the video recording presented below David was aged two and a half, the same age as Beth at the time of the video recording of her use of the LeapPad with her father described above. In this video recording, David was using his older brother’s V-tech Learning Laptop with his mother. David was sitting on a chair in front of the table, and his mother, Fran, sat to one side of the table, just out of sight of the camera except when she leaned forward to press the keyboard (see Fig. 6 below). The game David and his mother were playing in the extract below is selected by entering the number 10, and is entitled Letter Sounds. The manual explains the game as follows: Input the letter displayed on the screen by pressing letter keys. If you input appropriately, the screen will show you a corresponding animation and a voice about the letter will also be heard. In the following transcript, audio output from the V-tech laptop is indicated as VtL. 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9

David: Fran: David:

10

Fran:

Fran: David:

VtL:

(looking at the screen) I want to (looks down at keyboard, presses keys) press horsie first (looks at Fran, still pressing keys) Press ten (moves her hand towards the keyboard) (looks from Fran to the keyboard) Ten! (presses keyboard repeatedly) No, (presses one key on left of keyboard and then one on right naming as she does so:) One. Zero. Hmm (pushes Fran’s hand away from his left hand, moves his left hand towards the area on the right in which she had pressed a key when saying “zero”). Ten (holds hand up, looks at mother with delight) Two, (looks back towards keyboard, returns his left hand to the same area on the right) That! Find, find the answer. This is the answer. K is for king (display shows an image of a king, which is then replaced with the letter U) Right type U, fi.

There are two observations to make in relation to the above extract. First, David appeared to be familiar with the V-tech Laptop. His statement, which was made when the V-tech laptop was first switched on, that he wanted to press horsie (line 1) suggests that he was aware of at least some of its features,1 and his naming of a number and pressing keys (in lines 4–8) suggest that he was familiar with use the device as involving the naming of numbers and pressing keys. The second observation is that it is ambiguous in this extract whether his mother Fran’s contributions were responses to David’s. Her response to David’s press ten (line 2) taken as a response to I want to press horsie, appears to mean if we press ten, we will be able to see the horsie. Her no (in line 5) was a response to his key pressing, after which her attention shifted to the screen, and read out the letter U displayed, interpreted into an instruction right, type U.

1

The horsie that David wanted to see was an animation of a unicorn displayed on the screen.

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According to the analytic framework derived from that of Marjanovi c-Shane and Beljanski-Risti c, although the parent and child were taking turns to speak and act, and both appeared to attend to the activity of key pressing, a shared focus or topic was not established. A more detailed analysis of this extract is given below, in conjunction with Extract 5, which represents interactions that took place very soon after those in Extract 4. Extract 5: A dispute about pressing horsie The following extract took place approximately 1 mi after Extract 4 presented above. Between the two was a series of interactions in which Fran indicated the letter displayed on the screen, then the corresponding key on the keyboard, and David pressed the key. The example at the beginning of the extract below is representative of the series. The letter U had appeared on the screen; Fran indicated the letter U on the keyboard: David pressed it, and an animated image of a unicorn was displayed on the screen. 25 26 27 28 29 30 31 32 33

David: VtL: David: David Fran: David: Fran: David: Fran

(looking at screen, moves his hands away from VtL towards his body) This is the answer. U is for (posture and hands indicate attention to screen and voice) Me! (gives a little jump) I want to press horsie P, where is P I want to press that horsie first, mum I haven’t touched it David No you touch it You touch it then, press that one (pointing at letter P)

Given his delight at the animated unicorn and his re-iteration I want to press horsie when it disappeared (line 28) it is possible to conclude that I want to press horsie, the statement that David had made earlier (in Extract 4, line 1), expressed his knowledge that the Laptop sometimes displayed an animated unicorn and that pressing was the means to make it happen. Thus, he proposed a topic, which can be understood, in the light of both extracts taken together, as “I want to press buttons and see the unicorn”. When Fran responded to David (Extract 4, line 2) she had given him the name of a number to press (press ten). Her response had been related to his expressed interest in pressing horsie at least in the sense that it repeated the word press, but it was not clear whether or not press ten meant “if we press ten, we will be able to see the horsie”. Thus, it was not clear whether her focus of attention was on his statement and whether the comment she made developed his topic. In Extract 5, (lines 28–33 above) when David said I want to press horsie, the response Fran gave referred to P (P, where is P), and was more clearly not referring to what he had said. Given that David repeated his statement with more force (I want to press that horsie first), it appears that he interpreted Fran’s response as ignoring and not responding to him. In terms of the analytic framework, rather than making a comment which developed David’s topic, Fran had effectively proposed a new topic. I want to press that horsie first could be interpreted as David meaning that he meant first in the sense of before he began doing any other activity, or that he wanted to press horsie before Fran did. Fran’s response, (I haven’t touched it) (line 31) suggests that she made the latter interpretation. David responded to I haven’t touched it by saying No you touch it (line 32). At this point the exchange became a disagreement about whether or not she had touched something, the identity of which at the time seemed to be horsie. However, Fran’s subsequent response, pointing at P, made clear that, regardless of whether she had earlier used the word it to refer to horsie (in line 31), she was now referring to a letter on the keyboard. David’s subsequent gesture, pressing P, suggested acceptance of this interpretation. Both partners commented as if there was a focus of attention, but, the contribution from the partner in the subsequent interactive turn demonstrates that this was not the case. Following line 33, a sequence of interactions (transcription not given) took place, which fall into a rough pattern, as follows: Fran read the letter on screen, pointed at a key, and David pressed the key. After eight such turns, David brought up the subject of the horse again; Extract 6: The dispute continues 85 86 87 88 89 90 91 92 93 94 95 96 97 98 99 100 101 102 103 104 105 106 107 108 109 110

David: Fran: David: VtL: Fran: David: VtL: Fran: David: Fran: David: Fran: David: Fran: David: Fran: David: Fran: David: Fran: VtL: Fran: David: VtL: Fran: David:

I want to see a hor I want to Well let’s get back to the horse then. Press the Y, can you see that? Presses the key she indicates Y is for yoyo, (jingle; flashing lights) Shake my hand, very clever (shakes Fran’s hand, smiles, and jiggles) Uhuhuh (in time to his jiggle) Well done Well DONE! That WELL done (pointing at the screen) Well done David! (takes David’s chin in her hand) No (brings his hand up) YOU well done! (pushes his mother’s hand away from his chin) Ouch, uh souse me (looks crossly at mother, wipes chin with sleeve) What do you say, don’t hit me You WELL done (pointing at his mother) Don’t hit me You well DONE (beginning to move off the chair) You finished? Do you want another go? Look, do the L, there, where’s a L I’m not finished (pulls laptop shut) If you are finished, we have to turn it off, and say bye bye L is for lamb Let’s turn it off then, with the big green button (presses button) Play again soon Now close it Cl (closing the laptop)

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Extracts 4 and 5 were chosen and analysed to trace the fate of the topic that David proposed, that is, I want to press horsie1. In Extract 4 the analysis demonstrated that shared focus on David’s proposed topic was not established. In Extract 5 there was disagreement over pressing it in which it appeared to refer, for David, to horsie, where for Fran, it referred to the pressing of a key. In Extract 6 David reiterated his original proposal: I want to see a hor(se) (line 85) This time it was followed by Fran’s suggestion that he pressed a key, following which both she and the Vtech laptop produced a series of congratulations, none of which referred to the horsie. It is possible that David’s evident frustration following these congratulations expresses his disappointment that his proposal was never established as a shared topic and his goal never achieved. David and Fran: discussion The purpose of the analysis is not to discuss the reasons for David’s frustrations but to follow the proposal and development of topics and to draw out the establishment, or otherwise, of a shared understanding of the activity, or, the way it was framed by the participants. Fran’s approach was to show David what to do, in the sense of using the V-tech laptop in the ‘right way’, a way that is consistent with the instructional game designed into the device. A series of tasks in which an item is displayed and the user is asked to find the initial letter supposes that he or she will organise his or her attention to an instruction (and not to any other features or activities he or she finds interesting), understands the instruction, is motivated to carry it out, continues to be sufficiently interested to attend to the next instruction, and so on. In common with the LeapPad game that Beth and Alan were using, the design presupposes that a user is motivated to respond to the instructions in a way that will maximise the quantity of congratulations and to minimise error noises. The genre is familiar to those of us who have experience of games in which a player or players aim for a ‘high score’. The analysis suggests that for Fran, the appropriate thing for her to do in this context was to show David what to do to achieve scores. In the course of doing so, she did not herself attend to the topic he had proposed and her comments were not organised to elaborate on or to draw out his meaning-making in a way that might facilitate a shared understanding. Although David made contributions, Fran’s conception of an appropriate way of acting in the situation, as evidenced by the interactions in the video extract, precludes an expectation that David might participate with her in determining the nature and purpose of the activity. 5. Discussion This paper has developed an approach to thinking about young children, digital technologies and learning, drawing on research literature that relates children’s learning to the use of books, and on literature that discusses the nature of interaction between adults and children and its relationship to children’s learning. In an examination of the relationship of modes of interaction and learning, the argument put forward was that modes of interaction in which children were more closely involved in establishing goals, and in sustaining the interaction, were a more effective way of supporting children’s learning than other modes in which goals were established for children and the responsibility for sustaining the interaction was that of the adult. Research literature concerned with adult–child interaction during the use of books and during the course of problem-solving activities suggests that the relationship between designed artefacts and modes of interaction is as follows: in interacting with children in the context of the artefact, adults draw on what they take for granted is an appropriate way of interacting in that situation. Thus, one means of examining how an interactive digital technology might assist young children’s learning is through a consideration of the mode or modes of interaction that that adults take for granted as appropriate in the context of their use of that artefact with young children. The empirical examples given in this paper were transcribed extracts of parents’ and children’s use of Electronic Learning Aids (ELAs). The analysis revealed that the parents recognised the activities provided by the ELAs as requiring a certain kind of use. The parents’ conception of an appropriate way of acting in the situation was to show the child what to do, in the sense of using the ELA in the ‘correct way’ as they understood it. During shared use, children made contributions which the adults did not attend to nor take up. In terms of the modes of interaction described in Section 2.2, the mode of interaction was instructional. There was an implicit assumption that the child’s role was to solve a problem or to achieve a goal set by someone else. In the examples presented, the adult did not expect the child to be involved in defining the nature of the task or in establishing a goal for the activity, and treated his or her meaning-making contributions as external to the task or as erroneous. The power of the artefact to influence the interaction was through the adult’s familiarity with the assumptions behind the design of the devices, which derive from instructional practices of schooling. The idea that underpins instruction is that the instructor teacher has information to impart, the child has knowledge to acquire from the teacher, and the child will learn if he or she attends to the teacher’s instructions and complies with them. In the examples given, the parents organised their activity so as to provide a further layer of instruction which was organised to show or help the child to behave appropriately in an instructional situation. The mode of interaction is unequivocally instructional; indeed, the adults concern might be characterised as instructing the children in how to be instructed. If, as argued in this paper, the more child-directed, child-sustained, exploratory modes of interaction are a more fruitful way of supporting children’s learning at home and of preparing children for the instructional modes of interaction they will encounter at school, what are the issues for designers of technologies? It must be taken into consideration that parental beliefs and values about what constitutes learning and notions of teaching inform not only conceptions of appropriate ways of using artefacts but also the justification for providing them to children. Strommen points out that devices for children marketed according to notions of classroom learning have been more readily marketable than other varieties of device: ELAs lend themselves to sound bites or curriculum shorthand. “Will teach your child to read,” is always stronger than “Encourages exploration, creativity, and problem-solving.” (Strommen, 2004). The conception of instructional design as appropriate for children’s use would thus appear to underpin the decisions of purchasers of technologies. Research that has explored the use of technologies in the homes of young children and the relationships between children’s activities and parental perspectives on learning (e.g. O’Hara, 2011; Plowman, Stephen, & McPake, 2010) has suggested that for some families, children’s learning of some skills (for example, sound/letter correspondence) is attributed to their experience with instructional toys and devices, obscuring the recognition of the relevance of the wider environment in supporting the child’s learning of those skills. For there to be a shift away from a general preoccupation with instruction as the means by which children’s learning can best be supported, and towards a valuing of child-initiated, social interaction, social changes are needed as well as change in approaches to design. The issues are similar in nature to those for designers of environments to support people to generate innovative solutions to open-ended

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and multidisciplinary problems which do not have “right” answers. Fischer and Shipman outline the form of participation that environments should support as being one that allows and encourages participants to express themselves in ways that enable and encourage all voices to be heard, different perspectives combined, a form of participation in which interaction between more-knowledgeable and lessknowledgeable participants is recognised as a potential source for new insights (Fischer & Shipman, 2011). Noting that this kind of participation requires social changes as well as new design rationale, they suggest that the nature of the shift for designers should be away from an older model by which users are regarded as passive consumers and to whom the system delivers information, and towards a newer one by which users are regarded as informed participants who can express and share their creative ideas. Such an environment should provide the opportunity and resources for social debate and discussion. Fischer and Shipman’s analysis provides a useful parallel for designers of environments for young children. Slightly reframed, the equivalent approach to design would be to support the participation of both more- and less-knowledgeable users alike, where both should be regarded as participants who can express and share their creative ideas. The designed artefact should facilitate opportunities for interaction, and provide resources to support and stimulate it. A shift in interest towards such artefacts and environments has already begun: amongst designers of technology there is an evident interest in supporting shared activity between adults and children by providing opportunities and resources for social enjoyment and interaction. One line of enquiry is into the potential for technologies to support intergenerational relationships (e.g. Chiong, 2009; Othlinghaus, Gerling, & Masuch, 2011; Voida & Greenberg, 2009) Approaches taken include the development of design perspectives from studies of play in natural settings; for example, Davis et al. (in press) investigated face-to-face play within families to provide insights into the nature and characteristics of intergenerational play, through which to inform design decisions. A related approach was used by Rennick Egglestone, Walker, Marshall, Benford, and McAuley (2011) who investigated play in outdoor playgrounds to yield ‘sensitising concepts’ for design. Alongside a developing interest amongst designers in using play as a basis for design and an interest in supporting open-ended, playful interaction, there is a shift away from the need to market to a generalised user, reducing the constraints that Strommen described as operating on designs for young children. In a consideration of the changing face of the world within which the largely design based discipline of Human Computer Interaction is situated, Dix observes that mobile and ubiquitous computing and tangible interfaces have meant that the computer has escaped from the desktop into the outside world. Partly in consequence of these technological changes, we are seeing a move from a small number of applications used by many people to a ‘long tail’ where large numbers of applications are used by small numbers of people (Dix, 2010, p. 13). The challenge of designing to fit the needs of many is replaced by a challenge to design for ‘peak experience’ – what is best for some, rather than what is ‘good enough’ for all. The nature of the world of the ‘long tail’ reduces the pressure on designers to develop products to appeal to normative ideas of how children learn. In the world of the ‘long tail’ where products are recommended by user to use and uptake spreads virally, designs that at first are appealing to relatively small groups of people, to whom they deliver ‘peak experience’, are potentially more successful than designs that aim to appeal to a wider population. In such an environment, it is possible to imagine that applications that are highly successful in supporting open-ended and playful interaction between adults and children will generate interest and stimulate uptake amongst other people. It may be through this means that the doors will open to a wider interest in applications that adults and children can use together, for mutual enjoyment. If we are to see a societal shift towards recognition of the value of more playful modes of interaction for young children’s learning, that shift may be stimulated by increased prevalance of designed artefacts that support intergenerational play, and recognition of their value may develop through the debate and discussion that their existence provokes. Acknowledgements The author wishes to acknowledge the support and encouragement of Professor Rosamund Sutherland and the late Professor Martin Hughes, to whose memory this paper is dedicated. The study from which the paper is drawn was funded by an ESRC Research Studentship Award. References Antle, A. N., Bevans, A., Tanenbaum, J., Seaborn, K., & Wang, S. (2011). Futura: design for collaborative learning and game play on a multi-touch digital tabletop. Paper presented at Conference on tangibles, embodied and embedded interaction, Funchal, Madeira, Portugal. Author. (2011). 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