Webs of relationships: Young children's engagement with Web searching

This chapter addresses the under-researched area of young children’s experiences when Web searching, with a predominant focus on Web searching in home and school contexts. It focuses on understandings that children are agentic in their interactions, and that they competently manage their social interactions with others, including with family members, teachers and peers. The chapter considers the digital and social resources that young children draw on to support their Web searching practices as they negotiate Internet and Web explorations, often in social contexts that include the participation of educators, peers and family members. Searching and selecting information from the Web involves learning and practising numerous skills. The earliest studies of young children’s interactions during Web searching include Davidson’s detailed examination of one family’s Web searching. The young children’s Web searches that involve co-locating real-life experiences with the topic of the Web search produce a hybrid relationship bringing together virtual and physical spaces