Morris & Hiebert (2011) point out a number of important considerations for improvingteaching; their main focus is on "creating shared instructional products". The collaborative work among teachers, in combination with small assessments of the children’s learning, has been shown to be an excellent means of improving quality in teaching situations. The teachers’ assumptions are closely linked to Hattie’s (2012) arguments for getting teachers to plan lessons or learning activities collaboratively. However, it is not about finding the best activities or lessons, it is about studying what it takes to learn at different ages and in different subject areas. In the same way as researchers are supposed to build their knowledge on the shoulders of other researchers, the development of teaching should build on knowledge of previous praxis and its outcomes. Such iterative processes have been used in other cultures for decades. See e.g. lesson study in Japan (Lewis, Perri and Friedkin, 2009), for example, and learning study in Hong Kong (Lo, 2012). Both Hattie (2011) and the theoretical framework applied in learning study, i.e. variation theory, have been influenced by Bransford’s (2000) suggestions that classrooms must be learner-centered, knowledge-centered, assessment-rich and community-centered. Learning Study implies a way to arrange teaching which means that a specific and well-defined learning object is focused and emphasis is put on how the content is presented to the learners. This enables teachers to take the learners perspective and understand the critical aspects of a learning object. In this paper we argue for how learning study could be used to study and improve teaching and thereby put focus on quality in teaching. Our short examples from previous learning studies demonstrate how teachers’ awareness of children’s thinking and learning can create a learning environment of high quality.

Swedish preschools and schools are welfare institutions required to achieve and demonstrate high quality. The teachers’ extensive responsibility for quality development and evaluation is stated in the national curriculums. Many studies have contributed with quality definitions and suggestions on how quality can be achieved and measured. This paper discusses how discourse analysis can contribute to the studies of quality and quality work in school. Short extracts of data from the on-going project Quality work in Swedish pre-school are used in order to give an insight in the method’s potential and limitations. Our methodological framework is inspired by Foucault’s theories of discourse and knowledge relations, in which discourses are regarded as more or less systematic statements about how we should think about the world. According to Foucault discourses shape and created meaning systems which may gain the status of 'truth', and hereby dominate how we define and organize ourselves and our social world. Some discourses can constrain and dissent the production of knowledge, while others may enable 'new' knowledge. Discourses lead to mechanisms that control us, by construing some manners of speaking [or writing] and behaving as appropriate, true and good, while others are construed as inappropriate, untrue and undesired. Consequently the study of discourses is closely related to the study of power relations, focusing on how these relations are operating in the spoken [or written] words. The questions that arise within this framework are e.g. How do some discourses maintain their authority? Why do some 'voices' get heard whilst others are silenced? Who benefits and who does not? Critical discourse analysis is a method used to study discourses and their relations to sociocultural practices, which allows for a critical perspective on the society. Critical discourse analysis is especially suitable for studies of texts such as steering documents, interview transcripts etc. The analyses focus on how discourses express themselves, e.g. in teachers’ statements about quality. The method provides a number of analytical tools such as: Normalization [What is expressed as a ’truth’? What does this ‘truth’ encompass?]; Pronouns used [Who are made responsible?]; and Modality [How forceful are the statements?]

The short extracts from our analyses demonstrate how language contributes to create, consolidate and sometimes change the perceptions of quality in socio-political institutions such as the Swedish municipal preschool. We exemplify how power relations coexist or concur within this discourse, and illustrate the discursive shift which seems to have occurred.

Conclusively, discourse analysis neither describe quality nor prescribe how it can be achieved. It contributes to our knowledge about the ‘truths’ and power relations that are embedded in the spoken and written ‘talk’ about quality. This knowledge is not merely of academic interest. It can also prove useful for teachers trying to understand and relate to the circumstances under which they are expected to create and evaluate quality in a school setting.

Purpose - The aim of this paper is to describe pre-school children’s learning during a Learning Study, and their teachers’ awareness of each child’s learning possibilities in relation to what they actually learned. The aims of the study are twofold; firstly we focus on how to design Learning Study in pre-school settings, and secondly we study young children’s (aged 4-5) learning.

Design/methodology/approach - The data consists of three videotaped interviews with each participating child (n=39), three videotaped interventions and one videotaped interview each with three pre-school teachers.

Findings - The results show 1) an increased learning outcome in all three groups, 2) there is a discrepancy between what the children actually learned and the teachers’ awareness about the children’s possibilities. The teachers’ awareness of the children’s learning possibilities differ from what the children actually learned.

Originality/value - Learning study is usually used in school settings, but this paper shows its potential also in pre-school settings. Beside this, the results indicates that there is a risk that if teachers’ expectations are too high or too low, they will affect children’s abilities to learn in either a positive or a negative way by not offering the children sufficiently challenging tasks. By the use of Learning Study the teachers became aware of this discrepancy and were able to reassess their expectations for each child according to their abilities.

Traditionally Swedish pre-schools have been awarded full value, where a path of development and education has often been included. School preparatory learning was rarely emphasized (Brembeck, Johansson & Kampmann, 2004). In recent years pre-school has been given a clearer and partially changed mandate related to children's learning and development (Swedish National Agency for Education, 2010). This new tradition of increased focus on learning and goal achievements is challenging for the teachers (Ljung-Djärf & Tullgren, 2010). With this background the aim of the presentation is to give an overview of Swedish Learning Study projects among pre-school children and how these could impact on the teaching and learning in pre-school settings. The presented studies are Learning Studies and consist of two or three micro-cycle studies. Theoretically they are based upon variation theory and the concepts discernment, simultaneity and variation (Marton & Booth, 1997; Marton & Pang, 2006). When learning it is important for the learners to discern critical aspects of the learning object, discern different aspects simultaneously and whit variation and contrast in representation forms. In the studies special focus is put on generative learning (Holmqvist, Gustavsson & Wernberg, 2007) which could be described as the ability to develop knowledge about the learning object beyond the learning situation in the learning study. The studies show that it is possible to accomplish a Learning Study among young children. Learning Study offers the children, and the teachers, to put focus on a certain object of learning. Also more complex and compounded learning objects are possible for the children to gain and develop knowledge about. Learning Study not only enables the teachers to be aware of their on expectations of the children´s learning, but also spot the importance of the teachers and the teaching when it comes to the children´s learning.

Swedish preschools are welfare institutions required to achieve and demonstrate high quality. The preschool teachers are responsible not only for the quality of the daily activities at the preschool, but also for the evaluation and development of these activities. The latter can be problematic especially in times of diminishing financial resources. This raises question on how quality is defined and evaluated.

Our analysis of the national steering documents showed two coexisting discourses concerning quality and quality work in the Swedish preschools: I) a relational discourse within which quality was closely related to relations and reflections, and II) a new public management (NPM) discourse within which quality was related to measurability and effectiveness.

A following study of discursive expressions of quality and quality work among preschool teachers showed that the participants’ statements to a high extent corresponded with the relational discourse found in the national steering documents. The teachers regarded themselves responsible for maintain good relations to the children and their parents, and to their colleagues. The relational discourse was to some extent challenged by the NPM discourse. This discourse was found in statements stressing a correspondence between activities and curriculum, and the local guiding principle: perform, evaluate, and develop. Evaluations were made by mandatory reports to the municipal administration and locally produced inquiry forms to the parents.

In this paper we present a study which aims to explore discursive expressions about how quality could be achieved in preschool work among preschool teachers. The methodological frame of reference is inspired by critical discourse analysis, which enables the study of discourses and their relations to socio cultural practices, hereby allowing a critical perspective on society. Data was collected during a seminar where preschool teachers reflect upon their work and how they define quality or lack of quality.