Early Childhood Friendships as a Significant Value of Education for Sustainability: The Voices of Young Children and Educators

In this chapter, three studies on young children’s friendships compose a methodological and thematic mosaic of research with different designs to understand how these peer relations build values that are the basis for sustainable education, especially its social dimension. The first intrinsic exploratory case study was conducted within a friendship-oriented early childhood programme to nurture the children’s friendships and support their social status in institutional education. The second, a qualitative study involving a phenomenological approach supported by bioecological developmental theory, aimed at investigating children’s words about friendship. The third study used play-based focus groups with children and semi-structured individual interviews with educators to investigate the power of friendship in developing a sense of social sustainability. Altogether, these three studies identified the following findings: peer status in the group can be improved by nurturing friendships among children; children’s culture reflected in friendships is developing in their microsystem, but external influences can be visible in it, too; and interactions supported by friendship have the potential to support a curriculum in developing a sense of belonging and being. Therefore, children’s and teachers’ voices about friendship present the basis for a pedagogical approach and curriculum strategies to sustainability that promotes respect for others and partnership from an early age.