Browsing by Subject "avoimuus"

The aim of this thesis was to find out parent’s experiences of co-operation with staff at day care center. The purpose was to study what kind of views parents have of their own role in co-operation and their possibilities to participate in planning and assessing their child’s early childhood education and care. No hypothesis was defined for this study. Research material was collected by interviewing four parents who lived in capital region and had at least one year’s experience of co-operation with staff at day care center. Material was transcribed and analysed based on themes by content analysis. Two of the parents were not born in Finland, but there was no experimental setting defined. The experiences of the parents varied a lot between the parents. Parents felt that they had opportunity to tell their opinion in the discussion on their child’s ECEC plan. Parents who were not born in Finland felt that there was little co-operation and there were also challenges related to communication due to different mother tongue. Pictures and stories of the child’s day at day care center increased trust and openness. Trust and openness correlated with positive experience of co-operation with staff at day care center. Some parents didn’t share their thoughts and experiences with the staff at day care centers. Parents were openly sharing information about their children but did not share their wishes for their child’s early childhood education and care. Staff at day care center should discuss with the parents their values and views in their child’s care and education so that they can be taken into account in early childhood education and care. Enough information should be shared about the day-to-day education and care of the children so that parents have a possibility to assess their child’s early childhood education and care. In addition to that staff should find way for parent to influence more the early childhood education and care and dare to share their views.