ABSTRACT

This chapter explores the hermeneutic potential of four vignettes of creative nonfiction written while collecting data for the study. It concludes with a discussion on how the observation of children is both a pedagogical and hermeneutic endeavor, one that orients us to children and their happiness. The first orbital is Storying, which describes the events without judgment or interpretation. The children who participated in the study, regardless of school type, articulated pleasure in terms of the comfortable spaces in the classroom that they gravitated to for work and play, eating food, and the act of having fun while at their favourite activity. Attention to difficulty can transform us from who-we-were in relation to children; attention to delight can show us who-we-might-become in relation to children. The chapter focuses on the re/learned the lesson that orienting ourself pedagogically to children is to share in the delight of their happiness and freedom.