Sustainability through the lens of children’s agency. Approaching children’s perspectives in early childhood education for sustainability through collaborative research.

In Nordic research on Environment and Sustainability Education, democratic participation has been a central focus since the 1990s (Læssøe & Öhmann, 2010). Within Nordic studies specifically addressing sustainability in early childhood education and care, the inclusion of children’s perspectives and agency is widely emphasized (Grindheim et al., 2019; Pramling Samuelsson & Park, 2017). However, fewer studies engage with these issues empirically and methodologically (Madsen & Jørgensen, 2025). This paper aims to contribute to ongoing research discussions on sustainability within the Nordic early childhood education tradition by exploring empirical and methodological dilemmas, tensions, opportunities, and potentials related to children's agency.

The paper draws on a literature review of research on early childhood education for sustainability in the Nordic region from 2014 to 2024 (Madsen & Jørgensen, 2025), as well as empirical material generated within the NAVADA project. NAVADA (2023–2027) is a large-scale, collaborative research and development initiative involving early childhood pedagogues and educational researchers in Denmark. The project explores and develops how young children’s engagement with their surrounding world is addressed through science, mathematics, nature, and sustainability education. Spanning five years, the project comprises five interconnected work packages employing both qualitative and quantitative methods, and involves 60 early childhood pedagogues, 10 daycare institutions, and 13 researchers from diverse disciplinary backgrounds.