Children’s Movement in an Integrated Kindergarten Classroom

Design, Methods and Preliminary Findings

Abstract

Contemporary neuroscientific evidence indicates that unrestricted movement and gestures are necessary for optimal cognitive and communicative development. Indepth understanding of disabled and non-disabled children’s interactions with physical features of their school environments is limited. Describing the ways school environments enhance or inhibit movement may optimize all children’s health, social abilities and cognitive development. This paper documents an interdisciplinary, ethnographic study designed to capture children’s interactions with the physical features of an integrated kindergarten classroom. The innovative theoretical and methodological approaches used are detailed. Children’s bodies were conceptualized according to “what they could do,” and classrooms were conceptualized as being inherently “discoverable.” Preliminary findings indicate that certain environmental features trigger children to move in dynamic, non-habitual ways.