Documenting in Preschool Education

The article discusses two discourses of documenting in preschool practice: discourse of power and participatory discourse. The discourse of power shapes documenting as a mean of power over children and over teachers and develops a model of documenting as a way of controlling of educational process. In this discourse we have identified several possible meanings of documenting: documenting as technical solution and control; as invisible practice; as an obligation; as individual responsibility of teachers; as observation and monitoring of children’s needs and interests and as a perspective. In the participatory discourse pedagogical documentation becomes a tool for reflective practice of teachers with a purpose of getting a deeper understanding of own practice. The meanings of documenting in the participatory discourse can be: documenting as emancipation and dialogue; as research and reflection; as process of collaboration; as visible learning; as multi-perspective; as retrospective and perspective; as reconstructing roles of the child and teacher and as a synthesis. A critical analysis of the meaning in the two discourses may contribute to the reconstruction of ethical foundationsand to defining directions in the operationalisation of a purpose and function of documenting.