Browsing by Author "Välivaara, Pihla"

Aims. The aim of this study is to research preschool childrens’ thoughts and experiences of bullying. The previous studies have shown that bullying appears in early childhood education in many forms. The studies have also verified that bullying in early childhood has long-term impact to the future. Preventing bullying is very important especially with young children. This study consentrated on how preschool children understand bullying. Aditionally it was studied what kind of feelings do children combine with bullying experiences. This study also examined are the children’s peer relationships and experiences of bullying in day-care group possibly interrelated. Methods. I conducted my study in Helsinki University’s practical training. Fourteen of fifteen children from the day-care group got permission to participate in my study. Half of them were girls and half of them were boys. The study group had three five-year-olds and eleven six-year-olds. I interviewed children in small groups utilizing storybooks, buttons, drama method and emotion cards. I videotaped the interviews so that I could observe the situation afterwards. I analysed the transcribed material using the content analysis principles. Sosiometric inquiry helped me to study the daycare group’s peer relations and I compared them to childrens’ answers in the interviews. The inquiry was conducted interviewing children individually. The children were asked to list their three most favorable playmates. I drew a sociogram of the sosiometric inquiry. Results and conclusions. Children recognized bullying and its different forms: physical, verbal, psychical and object related bullying. They had also experiences of bullying. Children combined the feeling of loneliness with bullying experiences and situations were they had been left out from the play. Children adduced that they would tell adult if they were bullied. Most of them would tell to teacher in kindergarden and to mum or dad at home. Children thought that bullying includes negative feelings, like sorrow. Bully was seen more aggressive and harried more sad and depressed. Gender differencies could be found in answers. The sosiogram showed that there were children in the study group who were more popular than the others and also children who were outsiders. The results of this study is supported by earlier studies.