ABSTRACT
Children’s informal, interests-based learning is powerful. Play is an important and natural feature of childhood. The significance of children’s interests goes deeper than the activities, associated resources, and peers and adults they play with. This chapter connects children’s interests revealed in their play with funds of knowledge. This concept describes knowledge, capabilities, and practices embedded in everyday life in families and communities that enable analytical thinking about children’s interests. Examples of several children and their families show both the value and complexity of the concept, and some dilemmas if considered uncritically in its application to early childhood curriculum and pedagogy.
