Transition Structures across Early Childhood Education and Care, School and After-School Care in the Faroe Islands: Documented Pathways and Potential Conditions for 5-7-Year-Olds’ Continuity of Learning

This article maps and interprets transitions for 5–7-year-old children as organised and represented in municipal and policy documents across early childhood education and care, school and after-school care in the Faroe Islands. A qualitative document analysis of municipalities identified five distinct transition structures, ranging from simple daycare-to-school pathways to more complex routes involving pre-or preparatory classes and after-school care. Drawing on a bioecological perspective, the analysis shows how these documented structures vary in stability, coordination and exposure to different learning environments. Including after-school care in the mapping highlights how transition pathways extend across the whole school day and year, with horizontal and vertical shifts occurring not only at school entry but also within the year children turn six. When interpreted through the continuity framework, findings illustrate how municipal arrangements may support coherence through relational stability, shared pedagogical aims or play-based approaches or introduce risks of fragmentation if the purposes and practices of different settings are weakly aligned. References to play, often framed as a social or preparatory focus, reveal varying pedagogical orientationsthat shape children’s opportunities for meaning-making and agency across settings.The study contributes to research on early years transitions by providing a system-wide overview of how organisational diversity in a small, decentralised context shapes potential conditions for continuity of Copyright© 2026The Author(s). This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International LicenceTo cite this articleOlsen,S.,Ólafsdóttir,S.M., & Vijayavarathan-R, K.(2026). Transition Structures across Early Childhood Education and Care, School and After-School Care in the Faroe Islands: Documented Pathways and Potential Conditions for 5-7-Year-Olds’ Continuity of Learning. International Journal of Educational and Life Transitions, 5(1): 7, pp. 1-21. DOI: https://doi.org/10.20933/788w6a39Submitted: 8 December 2025Accepted: 21 May2026Published: 17June2026International Journal of Educational and Life Transitions is an open access journal published by University of Dundee.
2learning across early childhood education and care, school, and after-school care. It suggests that coherence depends not only on structural design but also on the quality of communication, collaboration and play-supportive practices that connect children’s everyday environments.