I et spejl, i en gåde

Målinger og metodologisk positivisme i professionsforskning

Abstract

This paper examines and compares two models of quality, which are very influential in the professional work in Danish childcare institutions: The database of Nordic Research in Early Childhood Education and Care, NB-ECEC, and the international quality measurement tool for Early Childhood Education, ECERS-3. The empirical data consists in the observation manuals and guides for both models, along with a number of documents from social educational practice, training and administrative, which refer to the two models. I show the two models to have methodological common ground, methodological positivism, which enable them to function as state simplifications, and have constitutive effects in early childhood education and care practice, as well as research. The two models combine in (re)producing methodological positivism as a naturalized methodology in research into professional practices.