Questioning continuity: On children's transition from day-care to kindergarten class in Denmark

Transition to school is recurrently pointed out as key to children’s imme-diate well-being at school start, as well as to their long-term educational endeavors.Aspirations towards continuity during transition is a common denominator acrossresearch, policy, and practice, in Denmark as well as internationally. This theore-tical-conceptual paper problematizes continuity as a fluent or empty signifier wi-thin the transition field. This implies that, within transition theory and practice, thequestion of how continuity may be institutionally organized, as well as professionallyfacilitated, is a complex issue. By highlighting how Danish transition practices in-stantiate an ambivalence between a Nordic, child-centered kindergarten legacy fromFröbel, and an Angloamerican approach to academic accomplishments, the questionof continuity is theoretically problematized. This leads to a socio-culturally infor-med discussion of change as a constitutive factor in transition, and of continuity asa matter of children’s trajectories of experience, learning, and development acrossdivergent institutional settings. The findings imply a fundamental questioning ofambitions towards smoothing out transitions as a means for ensuring continuity.This has the implication that, within the fundamentally ambivalent Danish early chi-ldhood educational landscape, change and transformation may be valorized, ratherthan merely problematized. In addition, continuity may be approached as a matterof children’s trajectories of sense-making across diverse institutional settings. Thisreconceptualization may also inspire international transition practices.