The care as an ontological dimension in child education: on bodies, spaces and movements in the constitution of being-in-the-world

Abstract

The text discusses care as the ontological dimension and constitutive power of the human. It is based on a theoretical matrix that links authors from the area of Early Childhood Education with the ontology of Martin Heidegger. It presents the concept of care (sorge) – care/curation in an ontological dimension – of Heidegger, and takes it as an articulating axis from which corporeality and spatiality are thought. The concept of tact, by Helmholtz, is also developed in order to support the notion of contact, brought to the fore by Marta Nörnberg. It ratifies the author's argument that the institutions of early childhood education should be considered domus, that is, common abodes where the status of being-in-the-world-with-things-with-others is favored by means of a careful/curator commitment. Highlighted, even briefly, the importance of the act of playing and the need for a careful/curator look both at the play and at the environments and bodies. Finally, he argues that the institutions of Early Childhood Education should be cares/caregivers environments that propitiate familiarity and contact, indicating the constituent ways of being-in-the-world.