Researching Young Children's Everyday Uses of Technology in the Family Home

Studies of the everyday uses of technology in family homes have tended to overlook the role of children and, in particular, young children. A study that was framed by an ecocultural approach focusing on children's play and learning with toys and technologies is used to illustrate some of the methodological challenges of conducting research with young children in the home. This theoretical framework enabled us to identify and develop a range of methods that illuminated the home's unique mix of inhabitants, learning opportunities and resources and to investigate parents' ethnotheories, or cultural beliefs, that gave rise to the complex of practices, values and attitudes and their intersections with technology and support for learning in the home. This resulted in a better understanding of the role of technology in the lives of these 3-and 4-year-old children.