Article

The Distribution of Clean-Up Jobs in Japanese Kindergarten Classrooms: An Exploratory Study of Young Children’s Views on Sharing Work Responsibilities

Author

Yuko Hashimoto,Atsuko Ikemori,Yuichi Toda

Information

pp. 141~159 / 2012 Vol.6 No.1

Abstract

Although children’s reasoning about the allocation of rewards has been studied extensively, littleresearch has questioned how children address the distribution of work responsibilities. The present studyinterviewed 5-year-olds in a kindergarten (“Yochien”) in Japan, showing a series of pictures illustratingfree-play time and clean-up time, and asked how they thought the clean-up jobs in the classrooms shouldbe distributed. The results confirmed previous studies that children’s distribution of tasks were stronglyguided by the player’s responsibility norm, that is, the task of cleaning up after play time should be doneby the person who used the play materials. However, some kindergarteners consider classroom clean-upshould be shared among class members and that it is not the sole responsibility of the player. Variousrationales for sharing the clean-up work such as saving time/labor, being more enjoyable and beinghelpful were given. The results also revealed that at least some kindergarteners varied the amount ofwork loads distributed according to the situational factors (needs, benefits of playing) but that agedifference was not a factor affecting their distributions. Implications for future studies are discussed.

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