- Is there a Scandinavian or a Nordic Model – reality or myth? Attention to this issue appears highly timely as pre-school is gradually being moved from the jurisdiction of the Ministry of Social Affairs to the Ministry of Education nationally and is placed within the portfolio of education among transnational agencies like the OECD and EU. Within the OECD pre-school has become part of the Directorate of Education, sub-group school and pre-school etc. Pre-school and school are increasingly seen as part of comprehensive schooling and life-long and life-wide learning in so-called knowledge economies. In the wake of transnational initiatives national education strategies increasingly integrate pre-school and comprehensive school strategies. Learning discourse is dominant in school, but even displaces the previously dominant playing discourse in pre-school. The group looks into what happens to pre-school as well as comprehensive school in these processes. We cherish the hypothesis that it makes sense, and that many insights about these processes can be reaped/produced by comparing and contrasting what happens to these previously rather distinct institutions.