Crying as a form of infants’ resistance to caregiving and educational actions during mealtime in Early Childhood Education

ABSTRACT This paper aims to analyze how infants, through crying, resist, guide, transform and redirect the caregiving and educational actions of their teachers a mealtime in a municipal early childhood education center (EMEI) in Belo Horizonte, Minas Gerais. The theoretical-methodological assumption of the Network of Meanings was the primary reference, combined with studies in Early Childhood Education. Data were collected through participant observation in a class composed of twelve infants and four teachers. The analysis highlighted the need to understand mealtime as an essential component of a curriculum that prioritizes the inseparable work of caring for and educating infants in daycare, as well as the relevance of infants’ crying as a relevant aspect in the planning and reflection on pedagogical practices in Early Childhood Education institutions.