Early childcare as arenas of inclusion: the contribution of staff to recognising parents with refugee backgrounds as significant stakeholders

Abstract

According to the Norwegian Kindergarten Act, educational staff should work in cooperation and understanding with the guardians of a child. In this article, it is argued that staff must ensure sufficient quality of interactions with all parents, provide them with satisfactory information, and facilitate parental participation, in order for children to have a safe educational environment. This study explores the ways in which early childcare staff could recognise parents with refugee backgrounds as significant stakeholders. The study has followed two early childcare institutions through several data collection methods. Eight staff members and the management has participated. Additionally, parents with refugee backgrounds have been interviewed. The analysis demonstrated that in order for staff to sufficiently recognise the parents with refugee backgrounds, the parents had to interact in the confines of the majority’s discourse. Both institutions recognised the parents’ backgrounds on an everyday basis; however, staff did not communicate their responsibility in this regard. Finally, parents generally appeared satisfied regarding their cooperation with staff; nevertheless, the staff had not sufficiently communicated the role and responsibility of early childcare to the parents.