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(2024)The formation of children's forest relations and environmental sensitivity is part of the development of children's identity and later affects their attitudes towards the forest and the environment. The purpose of this master's thesis is to describe, analyze and interpret preschool children's views and experiences of working in the natural environment and especially in the forest. The research examines more closely what kind of effect forest-focused preschool education has on children's forest relations and environmental sensitivity as experiences they describe themselves. This thesis is a qualitative study in which I analyze the children's drawings and interview material using content analysis to identify meaningful changes in children's forest relations and their environmental sensitivity after the implementation of forest-focused preschool education. Forest-focused preschool education groups implemented preschool education in their local forest two mornings a week. For the study, children (28) from two forest-based preschool groups drew pictures of the forest before and three months after the forest preschool activities. After the drawing sessions, the preschoolers were interviewed about their drawings and the forest topic. The research was an abductive process, where the theory guided the analysis of the material. The framework examined five central theories related to environmental sensitivity and forest relations and related concepts, which were used in the analysis of the data by forming meaning dimensions describing the environmental sensitivity and forest relations of the data. The effect of forest-focused preschool education on preschool children's forest relations and environmental sensitivity was structured into five meaning dimensions: sensory, emotional, social and functional, and value dimension. Forest offers a rich and versatile learning environment for children. After the forest activity, the sensory dimension expanded and the depiction of living and non-living environment increased in the drawings. Forest excursions involve moving around and observing the surroundings of the preschool, which is why the description of non-forest environments, such as the built environment, became more diverse. According to the results, preschool forest activities are an important enabler of equal education and change the social environment of forest experiences, bringing friendships in addition to family, expanding the social dimension. The social dimension also includes the effects of family and other adults on values and forest relations, as well as the effect of adults' activities on the utilization of the opportunities offered by the forest and thus on children's forest experiences. Before preschool, the forest was generally perceived positively. The most significant change after the forest activities was the awakening of preschool children's place attachment to the forest used in preschool education and the increase in attachment to trees. In the functional dimension, before and after preschool education, a diverse picture of children's experiences of learning in and about the forest was obtained. In the value dimension, the awareness of the importance of the forest was visible and the desire to acting for the forest appeared stronger after the implemented forest pre-school education. Working in the forest also evoked more challenging feelings in few children, which were related to the experience of boredom during freer activities or challenges in friendships. But that still did not reduce the preschoolers' thoughts about the importance of forests. Based on the data from this study, forest activities in preschool education develop children's forest relations and environmental sensitivity.
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(2023)Children’s mental health and its promotion have been featured a lot both in research and public debate within recent years. Concerns regarding the well-being of children and adolescent have arisen, as there is an increasing prevalence of mental health among children worldwide. In particular, the COVID19 pandemic brought children’s well-being to the surface. The long-term consequences of the pandemic are still the subject of research and cause long queues for mental health treatment in healthcare. The purpose of this thesis was to find out class teachers’ perceptions of children’s mental health and its promotion in the school context. School is an important environment that promotes equally all students’ mental health. This thesis aims to deepen the understanding of the promotion of children’s mental health at school and to present a current picture of the class teachers’ perceived role in promoting mental health. The thesis was carried out between March and October 2023. The data was collected between August and October with semi-structured thematic interviews. The sample of the thesis consisted of five elementary school classroom teachers, all of whom were interested in promoting children’s mental health. The data analysis process was carried out qualitatively during September and October using databased content analysis. The thesis revealed that teachers define children’s mental health more through ill-health than well-being. The state of mental health was seen to affect everything. The teachers emphasized the effects of the child’s mental health in both schoolwork and social relationships in the school context. In addition, the research results highlighted the importance of teachers’ role in promoting children’s mental health. The results emphasized cooperation with parents and the student welfare team. The results also highlighted the perceived relevance of mental health speech to attitudes and well-being. This thesis creates up-to-date information about the experiences of teachers regarding the visibility and promotion of children’s mental health, as well as the experienced challenges, which can be considered to support children’s well-being.
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(2022)Objectives. The ability to have compassion is crucial for the survival of the human spe-cies and the well-being of communities and individuals. Acts of compassion are mostly done when another person expresses displeasure. The causes of displeasure often depend on time and place. Acts of compassion have been studied extensively in early childhood education in recent years but acts of compassion in a flexible scheduled early childhood education and care have remained unexamined. Flexible scheduled ECEC offers children a different environment, and for this reason, acts of compassion that take place in that context should be studied. This study aimed to find out which moments of displeasure occur in children between the ages of 1 and 5 in flexible scheduled ECEC and which acts of compassion children and adults do in the same context. The study brings an important addition to the field of compassion research, where displeasure and compassion in flexible scheduled ECEC have not yet been studied. Methods. The material is 25 hours of video footage filmed in flexible scheduled ECEC, written notes and a photo. I have identified 42 episodes in which children express displeasure and/or children or adults show compassion. The duration of the episodes varies from a few seconds to more than ten minutes. I have processed the material using the method of qualitative content analysis. I have also analyzed interaction that happens in the moments of compassion. The method has been influenced by the ethnographic approach. Conclusions. The results complement the understanding of the development of dis-pleasure and compassion in early childhood education. Children experience displeasure, for example, in situations where their own will is not fulfilled and their abilities are limited. In times of displeasure, especially adults do acts of compassion. Children also did acts of compassion and compassion initiatives, but these differed from what adults did and there were fewer of them. Children's agency in doing acts of compassion should be strengthened. The acts of compassion they do should be given time and space. Due to the varied composition and age of the group of children in early childhood care, there are plenty of opportunities for developing compassion when the children practice working side by side with different children of different ages.
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(2023)Objectives. The ability to show compassion has developed in humans to strengthen social relationships and to enable social functions. Compassion is conceived as a state of concern for others suffering and as a desire to alleviate it. Previous studies have determined that compassion in the early childhood education and care (ECEC) is constructed culturally and that it is dependent on the actions of the adults. This study describes how children react when they confront a crying child in the ECEC setting and explores how children take part in showing compassion to crying children. Methods. The research data was 50 hours of video footage. There was identified 27 episodes where children were crying. The children participating in the study were aged between 1-4 years old. Firstly theory-based content analysis was applied in the data and then the categories that were formed were analysed by multimodal interaction analysis. Conclusions. This study highlights the previous studies in which it was defined that compassionate acts in the ECEC are most often performed by the adults. It was determined that the children mostly continued their previous actions or gazed at the compassionate acts that were performed when other children were crying. The children could also refuse to show compassion to the crying child. The compassionate acts that the children performed were made with the support of the adults, together with the adults or independently. In this study compassion was always shown to the crying child. It should be established how to increase children’s compassion in the ECEC and how to utilize the adult’s role in it.
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(2023)Objectives. According to studies, pedagogical documentation is not implemented with sufficient quality in Finnish early childhood education. Because of this kindergartens in Helsinki have introduced digital portfolios as a new way of doing pedagogical documentation. But because portfolios are a new working method, constant evaluation and development is needed. The purpose of this study was to find out children’s experiences with digital portfolios, what is meaningful to children in portfolios and how they see their own participation in making portfolios. The results of this study were used by the city of Helsinki in a project that aimed at developing digital portfolios and having children’s participation as their active agents. Methods. This qualitative study used photo elicitation and children’s group interviews as a research method. 36 children aged between four to six participated in the interviews. The interviews were conducted in kindergartens in Helsinki in the spring of 2023. The material was analyzed using thematic analysis. Conclusions. In this study, the important thing for children were the pictures in the portfolios and especially who was shown in them. According to the children, the purpose of the portfolios is to show what has been done in the kindergarten. Based on this, it can be interpreted that portfolios mostly contain past-oriented documentation, which does not reach the criteria of pedagogical documentation. In this study children hardly mention the planning, evaluation and development that is essential in pedagogical documentation. The children’s own experiences of their participation in making portfolios appeared passive. The children felt that they were viewers of the portfolio and not active creators. Some children wished for a more active role in making portfolios. The children had many development ideas of how to make portfolios more interesting for them. They wished portfolios would be less serious and contain more pictures and colors. The children also hoped that portfolios would contain pleasant evaluation symbols such as emojis.
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(2023)Objectives. The meanings created by the contract fire department's youth work in this thesis as told by children and adolescents in their free time and everyday life. Hobbies are one of society's means of maintaining the well-being of children and young people. Hobbies have many different aspects of an individual's well-being, such as physical, psychological, and social. The experience of community through doing things together is also an effective way to prevent marginalization among young people. Previous studies (OKM, 2019) have shown that active leisure activities are an important part of development and growth. They develop different skills, such as creating social relationships, self- development and maintaining interaction. One of the key factors of youth work is that it is done by responsible people who get along with children and adolescents. The youth work in the contract fire department teaches children and young adolescents civic and rescue skills. Through the hobby, a lifelong continuum is created where the fire department offers various tasks from alarm operations to educational activities. Methods. The data for this study was collected from the youth department of a contract fire department located in the capital region by interviewing and observing their exercises. The data consisted of interviews with six children and young people and two instructions. The analysis of the data was analyzed by using content analysis. First, the obtained results were coded, after which were classified into themes. Results and conclusions. Based on the results of the research, the contract fire municipality's youth work has different meanings for the children, adolescents and their instructors who engage in it. Through the interviews, it emerged that the young people in question consider the skills they learn to be important for society. The children and adolescents pointed out that they felt that through the contract fire brigade they had gained important useful skills that every member of society should know. Learning and teaching civic skills is beneficial both for the individual and the community. The hobby also creates an opportunity to create new social skills and practice different interaction situations. The results also showed that the children and adolescents who participated were able to use the learned skills and knowledge in their free time as well as in the school. Even though the skills were learned could not be used in everyday life, those interviewees pointed out that they are useful, for example, if you want to apply for a job in the rescue industry. The instructors, on the other hand, pointed out that youth activities in the contracted fire department are also important for the fire department, so that it remains vibrant and at- tracts new actors to the activity.
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(2022)The purpose of this master’s thesis is to produce information on the appearance of children’s fear and anxiety in the context of early childhood education and care (ECEC). By drawing attention to the daily actions and situations where fear and anxiety typically take place, it is possible to gather valuable information about children’s wellbeing in the various situations of ECEC. This study examines the situations in which children experience fear and anxiety and how these emotions reflect the children’s behavior. In addition, the study aims to find out how the ECEC personnel relates to the fear or anxiousness of the child. The study was conducted using the Finnish nationwide Progressive Feedback method. The research data was gathered during 2017–2021. A total of 2653 ECEC groups from 18 municipalities participated in the study. The research method used was systematic random sample observation, which included all activities in ECEC between 8 AM to 4 PM. Quantitative methods were used to analyse the data. The observations of fear and anxiety were cross-tabulated with the observations of the general frame of activity, the child’s social orientation, and the actions of the nearest adult. It was found that children show highlighted levels of fear and anxiety when being outdoors or participating in indoor guided activities. Withdrawn and independent social orientations were highlighted among children experiencing fear and anxiety. When examining adults’ reactions to children’s fear and anxiety receptive and negative attitudes were overrepresented. However, negative attitudes should be considered with caution due to the limitations of the data. A closer inspection into the matter revealed that both children’s and personnel’s attitude towards fear and anxiety was context-related. Article manuscript “Children’s observed fear and anxiety in early childhood education” is to be published in the Finnish journal of Psychology.
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(2018)The aim of this study was to examine first grade student’s mindsets about learning and how these mindsets are to be seen in the classroom context. Main research question were: 1. What kind of mindsets related to learning did there emerge? And 2. Was the any differences or connection to the pre tested mindset. This stydy is based on the mindset theory by Dweck (2000), in witch is studied growth mindset and fixed mindset and their affect to person’s behaviour. The theory presumes that growth mindset leads to thinking where human qualities are malleable. Whereas fixed mindset is thought to lead thinking where human qualities and skills are set. In this qualitative case study the aim was to study to student with different mindsets and their behaviour in the classroom. The data of this study included observations, videotaping and stimulated recall interviews. The analyse of the data was done theory based, based on Dweck`s (2000) mindset theory. In the stydy the mindset pre-test is also used. The results suggest that student’s pre tested mindsets influence to the situation and behaviour that is seen in the classroom. In the behaviour of the pre tested student with clearer growth mindset it was seen more growth mindset situations and in the behaviour of with the pre tested fixed mindset sudent, it was seen more situation with fixed mindset interpretation. Student own interpretations from the situations levelled out the difference between students and their mindset behaviour. In both student it was seen both fixed mindset behaviour and growth mindset behaviour. To make more precise conclusions it would need more boarder study and longer observation period and more interviews with the same student.
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(2019)Aims. The aim of this study was to find out how kindergarten teachers implement children's food education in day-care homes in Helsinki. Food education was raised as a part of early childhood education goals in 2017 and the first meal recommendations for early childhood education and care were published in January 2018 to guide early childhood food education. In recent years more attention has been paid to eating situations and food education of early childhood education when overweigh and reladed diseases have worryingly increased among children. Healthy eating habits as a child also often carry on to adulthood. In earlier studies the importance of food education to children's food behavior and habits has been found from several perspectives. However, a new study was necessary because early childhood eating and food education have been given new goals and recommendations to follow in the future. Methods. The research was carried out as a qualitative study and the material was collected by focused interviews. Eight kindergarten teachers working in kindergartens from different parts of Helsinki participated in the interviews. The interviews were conducted in November 2018 - February 2019. The data was analyzed using data-based content analysis. Results and conclusions. According to research results, kindergarten teachers' food education largely corresponds to the goals of food education in the early childhood education plan and the food education given has a positive effect on the formation of children's eating habits. As The most important goal of food education the kindergarten teachers raised food joy. In addition to food joy, the main goals of food education were to influence eating habits and to teach food habits. The kindergarten teachers used food talk, food dispensing, involment of children, food pictures, model learning and cooperation with parents as ways of food education. Besides the eating situations, food education was usually combined in children's play, where the teacher participated by responding to the child's questions. The challenges to food education were found mostly in the food education sessions outside of the eating situations.
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(2011)Children's involvement is a key quality factor in Early Years Education. As a process variable it concentrates on children's actions and experiences. The involved children are operating in their zone of proximal development. The aim of this study was to find out how the children involved themselves in the Finnish day care centres. The problems of the study were: (1) how the children are involved in different situations between the hours 8.00 and 12.00, (2) how do the skills of children whose involvement level is high differ from the skills of children whose involvement level is low and (3) how do the learning environments of the children whose involvement level is high differ from the learning environments of the children whose involvement level is low? The research method was observation and children's involvement levels were assessed using LIS-YC Scale. In addition, the kindergarten teachers evaluated the children's skills and the team workers did the evaluations of the educational settings. The data used in this study was a part of the 'Orientaation lähteillä' research. The 802 children, who took part in the study, were from 48 different groups of eight different municipalities in Central Uusimaa. There were 18358 observations of children's involvement and the quantitative data was analyzed using correlation, cross tabulation and t-test. Children's involvement was an average at a moderate level. The involvement levels were the highest during playing time and adult guided tasks and lowest during eating and basic care situations. The level of involvement was higher if the children were adaptable, proactive, self-motivated and good players. The involvement lever was lower if the children needed some special care. The children's involvement is supported if the educators had at least once a week a meeting and if children's confidence and identity construction was frequently considered in educational discussions. Furthermore, the appreciation of the ethical issues and positive atmosphere appeared to confirm the involvement. The children's involvement is decreased if the educators had been perpetually short of time or resources or there has been lack of joy and humour in the group.
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(2017)The purpose of this study is to compare children's actions and social orientations in the forest kindergartens to their actions and social orientations in more commonplace kindergartens. The child's social orientations were studied with the help of Reunamo's (2007) orientation -theory. Reunamo's theory is formed by four orientations: participative, adaptive, dominant and withdrawn orientation. These orientations show how the child acts towards the environment (agency) and how they view their relationships (perception). In this study, the forest kindergartens are kindergartens operating mainly in the forest or in another nature environment. In the forest kindergarten children play and learn outside every day throughout the whole year. Finnish forest kindergartens have connections with Swedish "I ut och Skur" -kindergartens and German adventure education. Prior research has shown connections between forest kindergarten and children's strong self-esteem, social skills, good health, motor skills, close relationship with nature and rich play environment (Bentsen & Jensen, 2012; Fjortoft, 2001; Knight, 2009; Kyttä, 2003; Rickinson, 2004; Tovey, 2007). This is a quantitative study. The data was collected by using systematic observation in three forest kindergarten groups in Southern Finland. There were 18 observation days in the forest kindergartens at 8am-12pm. The collected data was compared with data from a Helsinki University ongoing "Orientation Project", where children's every day activities, feelings, social relationships and involvement in early childhood education have been researched. In the Orientation project the data has been collected in 132 kindergarten groups in Southern Finland using the same method and systematic observation. The data collected for this study and data from the Orientation project was analyzed by using cross tabulation and chi square -test. This study shows that children were more often participative and less often dominant or withdrawn in the forest kindergartens than in the comparison groups. In the forest kindergartens, children's higher participation was connected to more social interaction with others and higher physical activity than in comparison groups.
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(2017)This study examines children's social skills in nonstandard hour child care. According to previous studies varying situations stress children and challenge employees. This study will assess children's social skills, the quality of nonstandard hour child care and parents' wishes for supporting children's skills. Research was carried out in two nonstandard hour child care centres in Uusimaa. The study involved 45 children and 10 groups. The study was conducted as a survey to parents and staff and by observing the kindergarten group activities and learning environment. The study was a mixed methods study, which utilized both qualitative and quantitative research data. Quality of learning environment varied between the groups to some extent. The results are in line with research conducted in integrated special groups. The quality in preschool groups was higher than in other groups. Social skills develop with age but there is a drop of emotional skills at the age of four and there are differences in social skills between girls and boys. Parents wish support to children's social skills in nonstandard hour child care. The metric used for the quality assessment could be used for learning environment evaluation in the future. There is good opportunity for supporting children's emotional and social skills in nonstandard hour child care. With the support of the sensitive adult children can join in the play and enjoy peers in changing social situations.
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(2019)The aim of the study was to investigate the link between the nature of the level of stress-activation and the level of engagement of toddlers, 1-4-year-old children, stress reactivation and engagement. The goal approached with two research tasks. First (1) to determine whether there is a link between the levels of stress response activation and children involvement to action and second (2) whether a link between variables maintained by the cortisol daily variation after a breakdown into a typical and atypical group and do these groups differ in relation to the level of commitment Earlier studies have shown that there is a link between children's cognitive abilities, memory, and alertness at the level of children's stress response activation. Similarly, higher levels of cognitive skills are also required for involvement, which reflects children's emotional well-being, interest, and relevance. Observing involvement to children's activities gives the educator important information about the child's world, interests, skills and needs. This study assumed (H1) that with decreasing stress activation in children, the level of involvement would increase. The study focused on the calamities of kindergartens in the Helsinki Metropolitan Area. The study used the material of the University of Helsinki's LASSO project Taaperot research by analyzing the level of engagement of the children involved in the research using the LIS-YC scale and comparing the levels of engagement thus obtained to the stress response measurements from children. Stress response measurements consisted of the concentrations of alpha-amylase and cortisol collected from children, which used to determine the AOCg value of these concentrations in the final analysis. A statistically significant negative relationship found between the levels of stress in children and the level of engagement in the study. The connection was observed at the time of the stress response measurement for the target level of binding (p <0.05) and for the entire material (p <0.01). The results of the study provided indicative information on the relationship between children's stress responses and engagementt to action.
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(2018)Objectives. According to the Child Welfare Act (417/2007, 3a §) the vital parties in preventive child welfare are public services, including educational administration. Preventive child welfare aims in guaranteeing welfare when the child is not a customer of child welfare. The goal is to support children at an early stage, during which it is still possible to prevent problems escalating any further. (Bardy, 2013.) Furthermore, the aim of this study was to map teachers' experiences on child welfare in school environment. The study looks at how teachers at primary schools perceive their awareness of child welfare work, how child welfare concerns of primary school teachers show up, and what kind of experiences primary school teachers have with regards to the cooperation with child welfare. Methods. The thesis was carried out as a qualitative research, based on the phenomenological approach. The study was conducted at an elementary school with seven teachers participating in the theme interviews, five individual interviews, and one pair interview. Out of all the participants, three were class teachers, two subject teachers, and two special education teachers. In addition to theme interviews, an email containing three open-ended questions was sent to all the participants in August 2017. The data was analysed via theme-analysis. Results and Conclusions. Teachers felt they were able to partly put into practice the child welfare act, despite the bigger picture of it being unclear. Teachers' awareness of child welfare came mainly as a result of their own work and experience. Teachers' perceptions of preventative child welfare work at the school were related to student work, school curator activities, co-operation with parents, and teachers' pedagogical methods in the classroom. The raise of concern regarding child welfare was affected by troubles at school, behavior, general appearance, home life, and the negligence of parents toward the school life of their children. The concerns that raised from the students' behavior were often seen as multi-dimensional and aggregated. Teachers' child welfare concerns awakening is often affected by the child's school, problems, behavior, general appearance, home life, or the parents' indifference towards school-going. Ways to deal with concerns were open discussion and, as a last resort, a child welfare notice. Experiences in co-operation with child protection were varied, but often the co-operation was not working well enough. In particular, the flow of information was considered inadequate. Nearly all of the teachers hoped for better co-operation between schools and the child welfare.
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(2019)Professional identity is a social construction, which is formed as individuals interpret themselves and their experiences in relation to the surrounding world. According to earlier studies, the professional identity of kindergarten teachers (early childhood education teachers) has been derogated by unclear job descriptions and the difficulty to analyse and articulate professional competence or the essence of one’s professionalism. This thesis examines the background and history of the formation of kindergarten teachers’ professional identity as reviewed through editorials of the Hanna magazine issues 1997–2007, published by The Kindergarten Teachers Union in Finland (LTOL). As a professional agent, the chair of the union has taken part in constructing and moulding the professional identity of kindergarten teachers in editorials, challenging or reinforcing the positions offered to kindergarten teachers by the social operational environment. Research questions are: 1) In what ways is the kindergarten teachers’ professional identity constructed in the editorials? and 2) How has the social operational environment affected the formation of kindergarten teachers’ professional identity? The method in this thesis was critical discourse analysis. Material consisted of editorials of the Hanna magazine from 1997 to 2007. The material was analysed through linguistic analysis of subject positions, which were examined in relation to the social operational environment. The analysis showed that the chair of The Kindergarten Teachers Union has promoted a uniform professional identity for kindergarten teachers, its core consisting of the following roles: academic kindergarten teacher, expert in childhood and early childhood education, social influencer, campaigner for better wages, and expert in education and teaching. Cracks in the professional identity were especially caused by the fact that kindergarten teachers were at the time administered under social welfare services. The results show that, from the point-ofview of their professional identity, a more appropriate professional framework is now being provided for kindergarten teachers by the education administration and legislation.
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(2014)The purpose of this narrative study is to ascertain how kindergarten teachers perceive their pedagogical responsibility in the context of the distributed organization and how they feel their responsibilities have changed expertise in the development of the over time. Changes in the social environment and the shift towards an increasingly distributed organization model in early childhood education are reflected in to need to review and redefine the pedagogical responsibility of the kindergarten teacher. The aim of the study is to define kindergarten teacher's pedagogical responsibility in a postmodern society and to describe its evolution in the wake of the changing nature of the expertise in question of kindergarten teaching. The study analysed views regarding the pedagogical responsibility from the perspective of different teacher generations. The three generations that became apparent from the study were the generation that witnessed the expansion of children's day care outside the home, the experienced early childhood educators, and the latest generation of early childhood educators who are at the beginning of their career. The theoretical framework for the study is formed by research into both kindergarten teacher expertise and distributed organization. The data included eleven (11) kindergarten teacher's diaries. The data was analysed using the methods of structural narrative analysis (Labov 1967) and content analysis. The data acquisition and analysis methods support the objective in narrative research, which is to "give a voice" to the target group of the research. The research findings show that kindergarten teachers have a clear and structured understanding of pedagogical responsibility and the area of its content that falls under their remit. The evolution of pedagogical responsibility is an on going process, affected by personal characteristics as well as societal and particularly early childhood educators at the beginning of their careers felt a lack of confidence in taking pedagogical responsibility in relation to the other members of their team. Kindergarten teachers voiced a wish that directors of day care centers and the organisation would lend their support to their professional development and to carrying out their pedagogical responsibility. The research findings highlighted the importance of pedagogical leadership as a precondition for high-quality early childhood education. The pedagogical responsibility of kindergarten teachers was studied investigated in the present study exclusively in relation to each kindergarten teacher's own team. However, the shift towards shared pedagogical leadership may be deemed a necessary developmental path in the distributed early childhood education organisation.
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(2013)Pro gradu -työn tavoitteena oli selvittää miten paljon päiväkodeissa työskentelevät lastentarhanopettajat käyttävät aikaa erilaisiin työtehtäviin. Tutkimuksessa selvitettiin myös eri koulutustaustaisten lastentarhanopettajan tehtävissä toimivien ajankäytön välisiä eroja. Tutkimus suoritettiin osana Helsingin yliopistossa tehtävää Eeva-Leena Onnismaan, Leena Tahkokallion ja Lasse Lipposen tutkimushanketta Koulutuksesta ammattiin siirtyminen ja työssä pysyminen lastentarhanopettajien työuralla, josta sain käyttööni osan keväällä 2012 tehdyn kyselyn aineistoa. Kyselyyn vastasi 491 lastentarhanopettajan tehtävissä toimivaa Helsingistä, Espoosta, Kauniaisista, Nurmijärveltä ja Vantaalta. Vastaajia pyydettiin arvioimaan, paljonko he käyttävät keskimäärin aikaa päivässä, viikossa tai kuukaudessa erilaisiin tehtäviin. Tehtävät oli etukäteen määritelty kysymyslomakkeella. Analyysia varten vastaukset muokattiin sellaiseen muotoon, että oli mahdollista vertailla keskenään erilaisiin tehtäviin viikoittain käytettävää aikaa. Harvemmin toistuvien tehtävien kohdalla vertailtiin niihin kuukausittain käytettävää aikaa. Tuloksia tarkasteltiin keskiarvoina ja mediaaneina. Kvantitatiivisen analyysin perusteella saatua käsitystä työtehtävistä täydennettiin avoimen kysymyksen kvalitatiivisella tarkastelulla. Tässä kysymyksessä vastaajia pyydettiin mainitsemaan työtehtäviä, jotka eivät heidän mielestään kuuluisi lastentarhanopettajalle. Kyselyn perusteella lastentarhanopettajat käyttävät suunniteltuun pedagogiseen toimintaan keskimäärin 4 tuntia 26 minuuttia ja tilanteesta tai lasten aloitteesta nousevaan pedagogiseen toimintaan 2 tuntia 58 minuuttia viikoittain. Toiminnan suunnitteluun ja valmisteluun vastaajat käyttivät keskimäärin 1 tunnin 22 minuuttia viikoittaisesta työajasta. Tämä on 3,6 % viikkotyöajasta, alle puolet KVTES:issa määritellystä lastentarhanopettajan suunnitteluajasta (8 %). Perushoitoon ja lasten ulkoilun valvontaan kuluu puolestaan 14 tuntia 26 minuuttia viikossa. Siivous- ja puhtaanapitotehtäviin lastentarhanopettajalla menee viikoittain aikaa 1 tunti 48 minuuttia. Vastaajat eivät näe siivous ja puhtaanapitotehtävien kuuluvan lastentarhanopettajan tehtäviin. Vertailtaessa eri koulutustaustaisia vastaajia, lastentarhanopettajan koulutuksen saaneet käyttävät enemmän aikaan pedagogiseen toimintaan ja sen suunnitteluun ja valmisteluun kuin sosiaalialan koulutuksen saaneet. Erot ryhmien välillä olivat tilastollisesti merkitseviä.
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(2016)It's been only lately since the research of early education has started to pay attention to kindergarten teachers job demands and resources or their work engagement. International researches according teachers work engagement to date have mainly concerned school teachers, and they are not directly generalizable to kindergarten teachers due to some major differences in job descriptions. This study aimed to find out which factors contribute to the work engagement of kindergarten teachers. There were four research problems: 1) What are the job resources of kindergarten teachers work? 2) What are the job demands of kindergarten teachers work? 3) What are the tensions between the job resources and demands of kindergarten teachers work? 4) How work engagement is formed? This study was carried out as a part of a study in University of Helsinki called Koulutuksesta valmistuminen ja työssä pysyminen lastentarhanopettajan työuralla. This study was conducted as a qualitative survey. The data used in this study was part of University of Helsinki study Koulutuksesta valmistuminen ja työssä pysyminen lastentarhanopettajan työuralla and included two open-ended questions (n = 490). The subject of the study were kindergarten teachers working in the metropolitan area and the surrounding municipalities (a total of five municipalities). The data was analysed using Content Analysis and to support the analysis were used JD-R (Job Demands – Resources) –model. The results of the study brought out that the job resources of kindergarten teachers work were children, pedagogical skills, good working environment and working atmosphere and the superior. Demands on the other hand were the small size of the salary, increased labor challenges, large class sizes, unclear job descriptions and lack of appreciation of the industry. Tensions between the job resources and demands were caused by conflicts between experiencing one's work meaningful and the social recognition of the profession, the disproportion between the salary and job demands, lack of labor peace and blurred job as also increasing in writing and administrative work, that do not match the given resources. Work engagement was formed working with and for the children, personal job resources, appreciation of one's work, self-challenging and adequate time for one's work. The results of this study can be used developing kindergarten teachers work conditions and supporting the work of adhesion.
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(2017)Objectives. Previous studies show that there is need for more cooperation between the preschool education and primary education to ensure the child's smooth start to school. The purpose of this qualitative study was to find out what kinds of views do kindergarten teachers and class teachers have on the cooperation between the preschool education and primary education. Today, there has been a lot of talk about the importance of the cooperation between the preschool education and primary education for the child's smooth transition from preschool to primary education. The research questions helped to identify how useful do kindergarten teachers and class teachers find the cooperation, how frequently cooperation is carried out, which types of cooperation there is, how can the cooperation be developed and whether kindergarten teachers and class teachers have ideas how to develop the current cooperation. Methods. The study material consisted of three kindergarten teachers and four class teachers working in the metropolitan area. The research strategy used in this study was qualitative research in which theme interviews were used. The collected data were analyzed by means of data-driven content analysis. Results and Conclusions. This study showed that kindergarten teachers and class teachers felt the cooperation between the preschool education and primary education important. In addition, responses emphasized the cooperation to encompass the same basic formula but the organization of additional forms of cooperation depends on the year and on the activity of the preschool teachers and primary teachers. The implementation of cooperation between preschool education and primary education was performed weekly, monthly, once every two months or 2-6 times a year. In the autumn preschool teachers and primary school teachers will invest in joint planning of activities in the presence of preschool children in the classroom. In the spring a joint evaluation meeting, the introduction of preschool children to school and primary school teachers and the meeting of a pupil care team for children moving to school. All teachers felt that the current cooperation between the preschool education and primary education is positive and they do not want to make a lot of changes or develop the existing cooperation. Kindergarten teachers and class teachers would like to see closer cooperation between preschool and primary school teacher for example by adding joint debates and common planning time. They also wished that kindergarten and school would be in the same building. Kindergarten teachers and class teachers had different content development suggestions for cooperation between preschool education and primary education. Improvement alternatives included for example adding various events, ensuring data transfer from kindergarten to school, effortless school visits and joint training.
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(2018)Aims. The aim of the thesis was to find out kindergarten teachers' views about early childhood education learning environment and how the learning environment interlinks with the realization of the early childhood visual arts education. It was surveyed what kind of visual arts education methods the interviewees use and how they take advantage of the kindergarten's learning environment in their teaching. The aim was also to find out benefits and challenges the learning environments bring for the visual arts education and what kind of views the kindergarten teachers have about the design of the learning environments. The topic of the thesis connects essentially with the field of research that encompasses the Finnish early childhood education learning environments and how visual arts education is realized in them. This thesis got under way inspired by my bachelor's thesis (Tuovinen, 2013) in which it was studied how the kindergarten teachers realize the visual arts education in practice. In this pro gradu – thesis the learning environment's possible effect on the visual arts education is incorporated. Methods. The research strategy was qualitative and as a research setting a phenomenographic approach was used. The main material consists of themed interviews of four (4) kindergarten teachers. The interviewees who took part in the research worked in the Helsinki metropolitan area in municipal kindergartens with 3- to 5-year-old children. In the process of analyzing and breaking down the gathered results Manninen et al's (2007) classification of the learning environments and Rusanen's (2009) classification of early childhood visual arts education was used. As a method of analysis a theory-driven content analysis based on half-structured theme interviews was used. The results are presented both with tables and with various transcribed passages. Results and conclusions. The results of the thesis show that kindergarten teachers experienced the visual arts education possibilities in early childhood education learning environments mainly positively. The factors that were considered meaningful for visual arts education in early childhood learning environments were atelier, separate rooms, working in small groups and ensuring enough time, kindergarten staff members and high-class mediums for the visual arts education. Visual arts education in the learning environments was realized mainly through artwork expression and aesthetic experience of the environment. The children's personal experiences and trips to local outdoor environments thus formed the body of the visual arts education. Comparing research results to different aspects of learning environment depicts how successful visual arts education needs physical, but also social, local and technical aspects of the learning environment to be successful. Kindergarten teachers viewed their role as learning environment builders in two different ways - as modifiers and as preservers.
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