OEES: The Oslo Early Education Study. A Collaborative and Knowledge-building Project

The Oslo Early Education Study (OEES) was initiated as a researcher-sector partnership-project to develop, implement, and assess the effects of an intervention aimed at preparing multi-ethnic preschools to utilize their potential to support children's language learning. Project partners are the Department of education and the Center for science education at the University of Oslo, and the preschool leadership in five city districts and the pedagogical-psychological counseling service in Oslo municipality. We have developed a website for the project where we have posted information videos in many different languages (spraksterk.no). OEES is financed by the Research Council of Norway and the Program for childhood and education, Oslo municipality (Områdesatsingen i Oslo). Professor Veslemøy Rydland and Associate Professor Ratib Lekhal are the principal investigators. In this project we will further design, implement and assess the effects of the OEES intervention in multiethnic preschools. The intervention includes three components: (1) practice-based professional development; (2) pedagogical content to further enhance preschool practitioners' capacity to support child participation in shared reading, peer play and natural science exploration; and (3) collaboration between teachers and parents to further create continuity in children's language learning experiences. During the spring and autumn of 2021, we recruited approx. 60 preschools and an average of 3-4 classrooms/groups per preschool. In addition, we have recruited approx. 900 children aged 1 to 4 years old. The participating preschools have been randomly assigned into one of two groups: An intervention group and a comparison group. The intervention group will implement all parts of the intervention over a period of two years. All teachers and practitioners in the intervention and the comparison groups have participated in two half-day courses during the autumn of 2021. The intervention classrooms have begun to implement the intervention. The preschool teachers are offered regular mentoring through the pedagogical-psychological counseling services and the Center for science education. In addition, the principal investigators and the mentors have regular follow-up meetings. Through close collaboration with the participating city districts and the pedagogical-psychological counseling service in Oslo municipality, we focus on strengthening the implementation of the professional development model and as well as the conditions that are important for continuing this model in the city districts over time. We will evaluate the effects of the intervention by studying qualities in adult-child interaction and children's language learning. The first data collection was completed in the autumn of 2021. The two subsequent data collections will be completed in the spring of 2022 and the spring of 2023. In the autumn of 2021, the data collection has been carried out by the pedagogical-psychological counselors in addition to research assistants who are students at the Department of Education, UiO. These students are training to become pedagogical-psychological counselors. Through a close collaboration with pedagogical-psychological counseling services, the research assistants have received training and coaching to enable them to conduct systematic observation in the participation classrooms, and in giving feedback to teachers and practitioners who have been observed. In the forthcoming data collections, preschool professionals in the city-districts will also be involved in this training. In close collaboration with EngageLab at the Department of Education, we have developed a database for data management and an app to support communication with the families in the project (the OEES-app). The project researchers and sector partners have regular meetings in addition to smaller collaborative meetings among the different participants. The principal investigators also regularly report to the Program for childhood and education, Oslo municipality. Two reference groups have been established to assist in the design and implementation of the intervention: a preschool reference group consisting of representatives from the city districts and another group that represents parental perspectives. Both of these groups have regular meetings with the researchers in the project. We have also established an international and national expert group. The international expert group comprises researchers from Harvard and the University of California, among others. We have had several meetings with the international experts. The national expert group consists of researchers and professionals from the preschool teacher education and different support services for children and families. The start-up meeting with the national expert group is in January 2022.

Universally accessible Early Childhood Education and Care (ECEC) is high on the international agenda. The Barcelona Objectives states that by 2020, 90% of children from age three should attend ECEC. Children in Norway have had the right to ECEC from year one. As a result, ECEC centers serve a more diverse population. It is increasingly acknowledged that children's language learning trajectories can only significantly be altered using a broad approach, one that targets children from an early age and can be sustained over time. Recent intervention approaches to support practitioners and parents in multiethnic ECEC centers through collaboration with relevant community services have yielded important insights about the feasibility of such efforts. Still, we need to know much more about what such system-level developments should look like, also within the Norwegian context. The OEES study contributes to this need by developing, implementing, and evaluating the effects of an intervention that encompasses ECEC professional development and collaboration with parents in multiethnic city districts, supported by the Pedagogical-Psychological counseling service and conducted within a researcher–sector collaboration. Such a study requires user involvement in all phases of the project, information about user perspectives and conditions for high-quality implementation. The OEES intervention has three components that will be implemented successively over two years: 1) a practice-based professional development model that incorporates cycles of modeling, observation, feedback, and reflection with peers and mentors; 2) pedagogical content to enhance ECEC caretakers’ capacity to support child exploration and participation in extended dialogues during shared reading, natural science activities, and peer play; and 3) an ECEC–home component to augment the collaboration between teachers and parents in a way that creates continuity in and enrich children’s language learning experiences.