Picture-making has a special role in early childhood. It is an activity that bridges the young child’s sensory exploration of the world around them and their later engagement with graphic symbolic practices. Psychological and sociological studies have focused on young children’s pictures as both subjects of and tools in research. Yet these studies have conceptualized picture-making almost exclusively as a practice that occurs on paper using pencils, felt-tip pens or crayons as inscription devices. Despite the increasing presence of screen media in children’s lives, very little research has explored the influence that the screen medium has on picture-making and any similarities and differences that exist between picture-making on paper and on screen. Furthermore, almost no research has examined how key members in the ‘interpretive community’ (Fish, 1980) of early years education conceptualize and construct screen picture-making, or how children enact this activity in the naturalistic environment of the free-flowing early years classroom. The present research addressed these issues using a social semiotic approach in designing and conducting three related studies on screen picture-making. In the first study, 36 children were observed as they made pictures either on paper or on screen. Through the resulting comparisons, various material and social affordances of screen picturemaking were identified as having an influence on the processes and products of picture-making. In order to determine whether these affordances were equally applicable in everyday contexts, an observational study of screen picture-making in the early years classroom was conducted. The findings from that study provided further evidence of the importance of the affordances identified in the previous study, but also demonstrated the extent to which social interactions shape how the activity of screen picture-making is enacted. To explore this further, six practitioners were interviewed about their attitudes towards screen picture-making and the learning it entails. Their responses revealed the relationships between their perceptions of the activity and the way it was implemented and constructed in the classrooms where they work. Collectively, the findings from these studies demonstrate the importance of considering both the material and social aspects of the affordances of the screen medium and how these influence the expression of meaning through picture-making. Four key material properties of screen picture-making were seen to influence how children made pictures: abundance, rapidity, referential rule-breaking, and mouse manipulation. These properties need to be taken into account when determining the opportunities for early years learning presented by screen picture-making. Moreover, the research findings highlight the extent to which the construction of screen picture-making is the work of an ‘interpretive community’ surrounding each child. Thus, screen picture-making in the early years is best thought of as a social project, which unfolds according to the decisions made by those in the classroom. Through understanding the activity in this way, practitioners and children are empowered to discuss and decide how screen picturemaking should be integrated into the early years classroom and what new opportunities it should offer in the expression and construction of meaning.

The aim of the research was to explore the impact upon the young child's drawing behaviours of the cultural contexts and the views and beliefs of significant others across both home and preschool school settings. The theoretical framework was informed by four significant areas of recent research. Socio-cultural theory, (Vygotsky, 1962, 1978); Bronfenbrenner's (1979) ecological model of child development; Dyson's (1993a), identification of an important role for drawing as part of a continuum of symbol systems used by young children to communicate their intentions and Kress's (1997) recognition of the young child as a 'multi-modal meaning maker', and drawing as one of the available modes used to make sense of the world. Evidence was collected for one month, at beginning of the school year, about seven children's use of drawing across home, pre-school and school settings over a three-year period. Two key research approaches were used: 1. Booklets of each child's drawings and photographs of the activities and contexts in which they drew them, collected by the significant adults in each setting 2. Semi-structured interviews with significant adults and with the children. Contextual information was gathered via photographs/digital images taken in the home and pre-school school contexts and, during the first phase of the project, observations of the children in their settings. The views of adults and children were triangulated against the evidence of drawings and photographs. In the home context the findings particularly highlighted the impact upon drawing of gendered relationships, mothers' control over children's use of space and materials and the difference in experience for children with older or younger siblings. In Foundation Stage contexts drawing was a particularly meaningful activity for girls whilst boys spent more time in three-dimensional construction activity. In Key Stage One contexts the one art lesson each week was skill based and adult directed The study draws attention to the positioning of drawing, as part of a continuum of interrelated symbol systems, between play and writing. It argues for the recognition for its use by the young child within transformative meaning making and as a tool for thinking to be acknowledged in key policy documentation and through training provision for teachers.

Cyprus is currently at a transitional point of its societal history, due to rapid demographic alterations alongside other economical and political changes that inexorably affect the country's educational system. Simultaneously, education and schooling are currently undertaking major reform as they struggle for balance between discourses of monoculturalism and monolingualism, nationalism and ethnocentrism as opposed to multiculturalism, Europeanization and globalisation. All these complex processes of resistance and acceptance, interchange and transformation between society and education bring to the fore discussions about culture and tradition and how they influence the construction of contemporary, individual and relational values and identities. Grounded in primary education and influenced by the field of Cultural Studies, the present research is concerned to understand how Cypriot teachers and their pupils manifest their cultural values through the discipline of art education and whether they relate their teaching and learning processes accordingly, to tradition, multiculturalism and the current circumstances which occur in their nation state. This research is in agreement with Vygotsky's (1978) notion that thinking is social in origin and that culture and history are inevitably involved in this 'social' perspective of thinking and learning that takes place within institutional education environments. By incorporating an interpretative methodological framework, influenced by visual semiotics and hermeneutics, I provide an analysis of 'learning instances' that occur during three diverse art practices, focusing on the ways that cultural values are reproduced, negotiated and transformed according to related discourses. To do so, I draw on the theoretical work of Barthes (1972), Foucault (1984) and Bourdieu and Passeron (1990) as well as on the work of contemporary theorists such as Atkinson (2002; 2011) and Kress (2011) and their concepts of 'pedagogised identities' and 'recognition' respectively. _ The findings of this research underline the urgent need for implementing an intercultural approach to art education, aiming to develop Cypriot teachers' and children's awareness and understanding regarding their own and others' cultural identities, thus enabling them to become not only critical and creative learners but also equitable democratic citizens.

In asking how children's graphic representation can be understood as multimodal design, I argue that meaning-making is a complex process of semiotic interweaving. My definition of graphic representation for this thesis embraces the full range of marks made on any graphic surface. Multimodal design is the socioculturally shaped process of transformation where existing semiotic (meaning-making) resources are chosen, shaped and combined according to the individual's interest and his or her perception of the particular representational or communicational need. I propose that graphic representation might be thought about as multimodal compounds (co-present writing and image) and multimodal composites (an integration of the modes that make up the self-contained entities of writing and image). I explore how texts can be understood multimodally by examining what the semiotic resources of children's graphic representation are, how they carry meaning and how they interrelate. Through in-depth analysis of writing and drawing both discretely and appearing together in the same graphic text, I analyse paper-based and electronic texts produced at home and school for different purposes. I take my interpretations of the signs children have made and my theorization always to be hypotheses. Language-as-writing and drawing-as-image offer potentialities for different ways of making meaning but common and particularized semiotic modes such as presentation, layout and punctuation operate across graphic representation. These modes work together in a semiotic partnership. I suggest that semiotic principles across modes of communication including and going beyond the graphic might include criteriality, connectivity and salience. This implies the notion of a multimodal disposition. The multimodality of children's graphic representational design has implications for pedagogy, curriculum policy, professional development and the research community.

Written as a series of ‘stories’, this thesis asks ‘Can Stories change Children’s Drawing?’ and investigates this question using qualitative approaches. Part One includes an in depth investigation of what ‘story’ and ‘drawing’ mean, and provides a critical review of the literature on work with young children in ‘story’ and ‘drawing’. The thesis includes a small study of adults’ drawing abilities, which raises the question of how adults bring biased views to their appraisal of drawings, and how children’s drawings are judged against what is seen as the superior model provided by adults’ drawings. In Part two of the thesis, a Case Study approach is used to examine the process of ‘Story/Drawing’ and its apparent effect on individual children. Attention is focussed particularly on an ‘invisible’ child, and a child from a minority ethnic group. Defective ‘Story grammar’ is suggested as a reason the children forgot one story. The thesis includes an examination of the question of if/why children should draw in any particular way, and whether the idea of ‘accuracy’ in drawing is important. The thesis concludes with some possible implications for Early Years practice including how practitioners can include elements of story/drawing processes in the everyday activities of a Setting.

Σκοπό της παρούσας μελέτης αποτελεί η διερεύνηση του ζητήματος της Αξιολόγησης στην Εικαστική Αγωγή της Πρωτοβάθμιας Εκπαίδευσης. Πιο συγκεκριμένα, επιδιώκεται, μέσα από την επισκόπηση της σχετικής βιβλιογραφίας, η διαμόρφωση μιας εικόνας ως προς τις παραμέτρους που προκύπτουν για το πεδίο αυτό από τη συζήτηση του επιστημονικού συγκείμενου σε εθνικό και διεθνές επίπεδο και ως προς το λόγο της επίσημης ελληνικής εκπαιδευτικής πολιτικής, καθώς και η συγκριτική θεώρηση τους, φωτίζοντας τις τυχόν συνέχειες ή/και ασυνέχειες. Προκειμένου για την παρουσίαση και ανάλυση των δεδομένων, πραγματοποιήθηκε η οργάνωση των παραπάνω απόψεων και θέσεων σε δύο αντίστοιχα πλαίσια, ως προς τους εξής άξονες: τους φορείς υλοποίησης, τις μεθόδους και τις τεχνικές, τα αντικείμενα και τη στοχοθεσία της αξιολόγησης. Σύμφωνα με τα αποτελέσματα της μελέτης, παρά τη σύγκλιση που φαίνεται να υπάρχει μεταξύ των δύο πλαισίων ως προς τις γενικές αρχές της αξιολόγησης, στο πλαίσιο της επίσημης ελληνικής εκπαιδευτικής πολιτικής παρατηρούνται ουσιαστικές ασυνέχειες, καθώς η δόμηση του έχει βασιστεί ως επί το πλείστον στις γενικές κατευθυντήριες αρχές, που έχουν δοθεί σε κρατικό επίπεδο για την αξιολόγηση στη πρωτοβάθμια εκπαίδευση γενικότερα, ανεξαρτήτως γνωστικού αντικειμένου. Ειδικότερα, δε προχωρά στην ανάπτυξη διακριτών μέτρων και αξιολογικών μεθόδων που να συμβαδίζουν με τις διαδικασίες που υπεισέρχονται στο ιδιαίτερο πεδίο των προγραμμάτων εικαστικής αγωγής, δε λαμβάνει υπόψη στο καθορισμό των κριτηρίων αξιολόγησης τις ανάγκες των τοπικών σχολικών περιοχών και τη συμμετοχή όλων των μετόχων της εκπαιδευτικής διαδικασίας και εστιάζει σχεδόν αποκλειστικά στην αξιολόγηση της γνωστικής ανάπτυξης του μαθητή, χωρίς να δίνεται η απαιτούμενη προσοχή στην ανάπτυξη και αξιολόγηση των μεταγνωστικών και αναστοχαστικών δεξιοτήτων και στρατηγικών μάθησης των παιδιών. Ως εκ τούτου, από τα παραπάνω αποτελέσματα προκύπτει ένας εύλογος προβληματισμός ως προς το «κατά πόσο» και «πώς» αξιοποιούνται οι κατευθύνσεις αυτές από τους εκπαιδευτικούς στην εκπαιδευτική πράξη των προγραμμάτων εικαστικής αγωγής / The rational of this current thesis concerns the study of the assessment issue in primary visual art classroom. More precisely, the objective through a focused inquiry of visual art assessment literature is to form an image with regard to the parameters resulting from the consideration of the scientific context at national and international level and the official Greek educational policy, as well as their comparative consideration, enlightening consensus and disagreement. The presentation and analysis of the data were formed by organizing the fore mentioned viewpoints and stances in two frameworks respectively, according to the following criteria: carriers of materialization, methods and techniques, objects and setting the purposes of assessment. The results, despite the agreement that seems to arise between the two frameworks with regard to the philosophical base of the assessment, indicated essential disagreements in the framework of the official Greek educational policy, due to the fact that its construction is mostly based on the In brief, it does not lead to the development and the construction of separate and distinct assessment measures and methods to be used that concur with the procedures inserted in the field of the visual art programs, it does not take into consideration, as far as the setting of assessment criteria is concerned, the local school needs and the participation of all the stakeholders of the educational procedure and it exclusively focuses on the assessment of the cognitive development of the student without paying the required attention to the development and assessment of metacognitive and self-reflective skills of children’s learning strategies. All in all, we can safely infer a logical question of “how much” and “in what way” the most of these guidelines are made by teachers for practical implementation in visual art classes.