Religious diversity in kindergartens

Kindergartens are often the first institutions where children are confronted with people who have different religiousbackgrounds, othercultures, and other values. Religious difference is a topic of children as the few empirical studies on religious diversity in Early Childhood Research indicate (e.g. Hoffmann 2009, Edelbrock/Schweitzer/Biesinger 2010, Connolly 2009). The research project takes the happening of the whole kindergarten under consideration and focuses on the childrens awareness of religious diversity. The two-part research question is: How do Islamic and Catholic kindergartens in Vienna handle religious diversity and how do young children talk about religious diversity? The research project has an ethnographic approach and the fundamentals of Grounded Theory combined with Thematic Coding were followed. Observations, group discussion with the children and the kindergarten teachers and interviews with the heads of the kindergartens were conducted during the kindergarten year from September 2013 until June 2014.The exploratory research took place in two kindergartens in Austria, in Vienna. Children with different religions attended the kindergartens. The considerations about religion and religious diversity, the recognisable elements of religious diversity and the communication about religous diversity show the dominance of the major religion and little recognition of the minor religions. The interest in religion, the question of belonging and the discussion of different opinions differs between the children. One difference is seen in the diverse communication about religion and religious diversity by the children of the major and the children of the minor religions in the kindergartens. There might be a correlation between the dominance of the major religion and the way the children talk about religious differences. As only the children of the major religion talk about their religion and religious diversity, children of the minor religions do not seem to consider the kindergarten as a place where they want to mention religion or religious diversity. Therefore it seems to be important to develop a culture of recognition in the kindergartens. Kindergartens should become places where everybody has the feeling to be welcome and where everyone is allowed to talk about their own religion or religious expressions. The focus could be on the organisational development, personal development and the development of learning opportunities in the kindergartens.