Dialogicity in diapers : attunement and misattunement at the nursery school

This chapter describes a systematic study of adult-child interactions at the nursery school in Italy and France. The research is based on the assumption that these interactions can play an important role in creating an inclusive educational context and ensuring children’s well being in it. Within the framework of communicative musicality theory and drawing on video microanalysis, we focus on the interactions occurring during the main transition moments of the nursery everyday life: the welcome-separation and reunion phase at the beginning and the end of the school day. We identify and describe two profile of interaction respectively characterized by attunement and misattunement, and make a case of their dramatic difference in ensuring a “good enough” transition between the two main contexts of children’s development, the home and the school.