Research about science education in preschool has paid a lot of attention to investigating children’s conceptual development and cognitive learning about natural phenomena and processes, with methods based on observations and verbal interviews before and after a teaching period. Thus, there has been a strong focus on the effects of preschool teaching, while the processes of learning have been investigated to a lesser extent. Furthermore, there is a lack of knowledge about the youngest children’s primary physical (non-verbal) experiences of natural phenomena. This is important, since such experiences lay the foundation for all further learning. In this respect Zembylas (2009) expresses a need for complementing methods that make investigations of situated and practical learning possible, in order to acquire more knowledge about how toddlers expand their awareness of nature (see also Fleer and Robins 2003).

The purpose of this study has been to present and illustrate an approach that facilitates the analysis of practical meaning making in everyday activities, within Early Childhood Education. Practical meaning making means that we study actions in situations rather than cognitive and conceptual development. The study is largely based on John Dewey’s pragmatism and has a particular focus on his use of transaction, functional coordination, inquiry, educative experience and nature (Dewey 1999; 1929; 1938a; 1938b; 2002). When a toddler explores the surroundings by acting and undergoes the consequences of these actions it is with Dewey’s description an inquiry process (Dewey 1938b). According to this context, meaning making implies a learning and growing process in which new relations to the environment contribute to extended possibilities for further action. This means that our interest is directed towards how toddlers encounter natural phenomena in everyday activities, and the consequences of these encounters.

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