Refugee children’s agency in a host country’s Early Childhood Education Program : Ethnographic case study in Berlin, Germany

Abstract

Despite host countries’ efforts to follow international conventions in protecting the childhood of refugee children through quality education, there has hardly been any research conducted on the complex childhoods of refugee children and academic representations of it is scarce. As the rate of forced displacement increases, qualitative studies play an important role in inviting readers to listen to the real stories of refugee children behind the statistics. In this ethnographic case study, a group of young refugee children (n=9) and teachers (n=4) in an early childhood education program in Berlin, Germany: Frühe Bildung vor Ort (FBO), were observed and interviewed. The researcher, who had previously worked in the FBO, re-visited the group as a participant-observer, collected data, and analyzed it by using qualitative thematic analysis. The results show that refugee children exercise their agency as they communicate using different tools, personalize their play activities, participate in activities with peers, and adapt to the existing educational systems they are placed into. Moreover, the teachers demonstrated their support for children’s agency by leading activities based on children’s interests and ideas, engaging in interactive dialogues, caring, and recognizing the importance of parental engagement. This study challenges a deficit-conception of refugee children as ‘not-yet-integrated’ and suggests an agency-based perspective for policymakers, educators, frontline workers, or volunteers working with refugee children when organizing educational programs with them.