Beyond the screen: Reclaiming presence in infant toddler documentation

In an age of instant documentation and digital ease, this article explores the importance of reclaiming presence and intentionality when working with infants and toddlers in early learning settings.

 

In early childhood education documentation can be viewed as both a pedagogical tool and a professional responsibility.

 

Documentation is a way to tell stories of children’s learning and to make visible thinking. This article invites educators to pause before they click and to observe with intention, to interpret with care, and to reclaim presence in their documentation practices.

 

Some of the ways that Infants and toddlers communicate are through movement, vocalisations, eye contact, gesture, emotional expression, and sensory exploration.

 

Learning in infancy is embodied and relational, often unfolding in subtle ways that resist capture in a single frame.

 

When educators are too quick to capture images, the immediacy of the screen can interrupt the intimacy of the moment. We risk reducing rich experiences to snapshots, filtered through adult interpretations and constrained by what appears visually compelling.

 

Many contemporary documentation tools, particularly digital platforms offer efficiency and ease. They allow educators to share learning stories with families almost instantly. But these tools can also shift what we notice. A visually striking moment may be captured and shared, while deeper, less visible layers of learning such as negotiation, emotional attunement, or emerging agency go undocumented.

 

A child holding a paintbrush mid-air, the sunlight filtering through their hair, might make for a beautiful image, a moment that begs to be captured and shared. But what is missing from that frame? What about the quiet negotiation that came before, the gentle deliberation between colours and the moment of pause as the child considered blue or red, the tilt of the head, the glance at a peer’s work, the subtle shift in posture as they waited for space at the easel?

 

These moments are often passed over because they are less immediately visible, less easily documented. Yet it is in these in between spaces the decisions, hesitations, and social cues that rich learning resides.

 

These are not just background details; they are the essence of meaning making in infant toddler environments. To overlook them is to miss the depth of children’s thinking and relational engagement.

 

A single photograph may capture beauty, but without presence and reflection, it cannot reveal the complexity beneath it.

 

To ‘see with intention’ is to resist the impulse to record before understanding. It means placing our full attention on the child, tuning into the relational, contextual, and temporal dimensions of their experience.

 

It requires us to ask: What is happening here? What matters to this child? What do I understand about their intent, their history, their relationships? These are not questions a screen can answer.

 

This is not a call to abandon technology. Rather, it is a call to use them with intention.

 

When we approach documentation as a pedagogical practice rather than a performance, we begin to understand it as a process of noticing, thinking, and interpreting, not just of recording.

 

We become researchers in relationships, drawing meaning from experience, rather than curating it for others.

 

There are ethical considerations too. Infants and toddlers cannot give consent in the ways older children can. Their stories are told through us.

 

When we pause before documenting, we give ourselves space to ask: Is this moment mine to capture? Whose voice is being represented? What story am I telling—and for whom? Documentation, in this sense, becomes not just a pedagogical act, but a relational and ethical one.

 

There is also much to be gained in moments where we choose not to document.

 

Sitting beside a toddler stacking stones, or quietly sharing in the joy of a discovery, these are moments of deep pedagogical connection.

 

They may not result in a photograph, but they inform how we understand the child and shape how we respond. These moments are felt, not filtered.

 

When documentation emerges from presence rather than urgency, it can prompt deeper professional dialogue.

 

Consider the educator who chooses to reflect on a toddler’s repeated return to a quiet corner with a single book, rather than capturing a fleeting group activity.

 

In sharing this observation with colleagues, a deeper conversation can unfold, not just about the child’s interest, but about belonging, rhythm, autonomy, or identity.

 

This is documentation as inquiry: layered, slow, and attuned.

 

Importantly, this shift also disrupts the narrative that all learning must be made visible to be valued.

 

Infants and toddlers are always learning, often in ways that challenge what is readily observable. When educators take the time to see, before they document, they open new possibilities for understanding. They create space for complexity, ambiguity, and curiosity to thrive.

 

Reclaiming intention in documentation is a professional and political act. It repositions the educator as a thoughtful participant, not just a recorder of events.

 

It honours the richness of infant toddler experiences and affirms the idea that not all learning needs to be captured to be recognised.

 

So, before you click, pause, observe, listen, ask. Sometimes the most meaningful response is to simply be there.

 

Practice Provocations: Seeing with Intention

 

• What do I notice when I don’t have a device in my hand?
  Spend time each day simply observing a child or group without documenting. What emerges when you are fully present?
• Am I documenting what is visible, or what is meaningful?
  Consider the difference between an aesthetically pleasing moment and a pedagogically rich one. How might these intersect or not?
• Whose story am I telling through this documentation?
  Reflect on how your interpretations shape the way a moment is represented. How can you make space for the child’s perspective?
• How do I know when to ‘capture’ and when to ‘stay’?
  Explore your own decision making about when to record and when to remain in the moment. What guides your instinct?
• What might I learn if I revisit the same child or interaction without documenting it?
  Try returning to a moment across a few days without recording it. Does your understanding deepen?
• How do we create a culture of slow noticing within our team?
  Use team meetings to share not just documentation products, but stories of presence and attunement. What patterns or questions are surfacing?
• How do infants and toddlers invite us to be present?
  Pay attention to the subtle ways young children draw you into a relationship. How do these cues shape your pedagogical response?

 

Karen has a background in teaching, academic research, and consultancy, Karen’s work centres on pedagogy, ethics, and reflective practice inviting educators to engage with complexity rather than shy away from it.