Polish mothers on Norwegian kindergartens – where to start trust building processes between international parents and the childcare institution?

Migration – childcare – trust – documentary method This paper investigates Polish mothers’ experiences and understandings of public Norwegian kindergartens and gives insight into social, cultural and institutional production of these meanings. The qualitative data - gathered in the academic year 2014/2015- comprise overt 15 narrative interviews and 2 group discussions with women permanently living in the region of Hordaland and Oslo, having their children (aged 0-6) in the Norwegian public kindergartens. While describing the Norwegian childcare the research participants point out three aspects: a) cheap and practical solutions overtaking children’s welfare, like: quick food of bad quality, children sleeping outside in the prams, unqualified kindergarten workers; b) waste of children’ learning and developmental potential; but also c) kindergartens’ respect for children, its focus on processes (not products) and social skills. The reconstructed understandings are rooted in different dimensions of possible social experiences: the cultural, the institutional and the personal. The last aspect c), rooted in personal situations with own children seem to initiate trust-building process between the newcomers and the kindergarten and open up for negotiating different national ideals of a good childhood and a good care.