Browsing by Author "Laitila, Krista"

Studies have shown us, that factors influencing our career choices are based on the lifelong development of identity and self-perception. These have great importance on what kind of career starts to interest person and what kind of professional identity he or she may develop. On the top of interior motivation, there are many external factors, that effect on person’s choices. For example, does person feel the job valuable and relevant? Students ponder these themes before graduation. The goal of this research is to resolve, how kindergarten teacher students evaluate their own education at Helsinki university. The research aims to bring up the reasons why students change their education after or during the early childhood education program, and on the other hand, why students chose to become a kindergarten teacher, even it was not his or hers primary choice of career. Furthermore the aim is to find out, why the students chose to apply for early childhood education and how they evaluate the working field, so the education can support the development of person’s professional identity and provide the needed knowledge and skills. In this research eight students, who had started their studies at 2013, were interviewed. Half of the interviewee had applied to change career during the early childhood education and half of the interviewee had decided to stay in the program, even it was not their primary choice of career. The method of research was half-structured interview with some features of theme interview. Only relevant material collected by interview was retained, and the remaining material was categorized and split into themes. In one theme was placed all the material with common features. No matter, if the student was about to change the education, or had decided to work as kindergarten teacher, the evaluation of the education program was excellent. Negative comments were mostly related to the working field. The students experienced the education to be interesting and inspiring, but they were worried of the challenging situation of the kindergartens in Helsinki metropolitan area: lack of resources, growing group of children and low salary don’t necessarily lure students to become a kindergarten teacher.