Research into preschool education has paid a lot of attention to investigating children's conceptual development and cognitive learning bout nature, with methods based on observations and verbal interviews before and after a teaching period. The purpose of this study has been to present and illustrate an approach that facilitates the analysis of practical meaning making in Early Childhood Education. The study is largely based on John Dewey's pragmatism and has a particular focus on his use of transaction, functional coordination, inquiry, educative experience and nature. In this context meaning making is understood as growing, learning process that contributes to further actions in extended ways. A transactional approach to physical experience, with a focus on analyses of toddlers' bodily actions in nature encounters, is illustrated by a video recording of a toddler's encounter with icy and clay surfaces. This encounter was analyses using Practical Epistemological Analysis. Toddlers' inquiry processes were studied with a specific focus on functional coordination i.e. relations between different actions and their consequences when meeting the environment. The methodological approach contributes to further research by focusing on practical and physical learning processes. It can also be seen as a contribution to Early Childhood Science Education by showing the relation between previous experiences of natural phenomena and meaning making for further actions in extended ways. (author abstract)