Browsing by study line "Förskolepedagogik"

Objectives. This study examines career change into early childhood education (ECE) teaching. According to research literature, second career teachers differ significantly from first career teachers. In the field of ECE, the phenomenon has not been examined before. The purpose of this study is to find out second career ECE teachers´ career choice motives; examine the fulfillment of their expectations of ECE teaching and satisfaction of their career change; and investigate factors that increase their job satisfaction and dissatisfaction. The theoretical framework is based, among other things, on the Factors Influencing Teaching Choice -scale (Watt & Richardson, 2007) and Herzberg's motivation theory (1957). According to previous studies, the career choice of ECE teachers is influenced by internal motives, such as teaching as a calling and the desire to work with children. Children, the social dimension of work, perceived autonomy at work and skilled leadership increases teachers' job satisfaction. Job dissatisfaction is caused by insufficient resources, unclear job description, the structure of ECE and dysfunctional teamwork. Methods. This research was carried out as an electronic survey research (n=76). The data was collected on Facebook through groups of the student organizations of the universities of Helsinki and Tampere and two groups on early childhood education. In addition, the survey was sent to second career teacher students at the University of Helsinki. The data was analyzed using data-based content analysis, cross-tabulation and Spearman's correlation coefficient. Results and conclusions. The most significant career choice motives of second career ECE teachers were interest, meaning, employment prospects and stress from previous work. Interest towards ECE teaching acted as a protective factor against new career change intentions. The second career ECE teachers were quite satisfied with their career changes, and their expectations of the work as an ECE teacher had been fulfilled quite well. Still, 46% of second career ECE teachers considered changing fields again. The most significant factors leading to job satisfaction were children, job description, positive feelings related to the job and social factors. Job dissatisfaction was experienced because of insufficient resources, salary and high job demands.

Tiivistelmä - Referat – Abstract Several studies show that early childhood education and care, and in particular pre-primary education, play a key role in supporting and preventing learning difficulties. However, it is common for a child to not receive a learning difficulty diagnosis before school age. Late diagnosis is often caused by the individuality and comorbidity of learning difficulties with other developmental challenges. It is important that early childhood education teachers, who work in pre-primary education, identify children at potential risk of learning difficulties. At the same time, they must also be familiar with the mechanisms of learning difficulties and effective methods for supporting and preventing potential difficulties at school. The aim of this study was to study the methods used in pre-primary education to support and prevent learning difficulties. The aim was also to find out how consciously and on what grounds preschool teachers choose different methods to support their teaching. At the center of this study were methods related to reading and mathematical skills. Three research questions were used to find answers to these topics. The research data was collected in December 2020 and January 2021 by interviewing five early childhood education teachers. They all worked in a preschool from the City of Helsinki daycare. The data was collected by a semi-structured theme interview and the analysis method was the qualitative content analysis. Based on this study, teachers considered it important to support and prevent learning difficulties already in pre-primary education. They felt that they had sufficient capacity and knowledge regarding learning difficulties and that they could identify the children who might need support for learning. Teachers used mostly general pedagogical methods to support children's learning in reading and mathematics. Methods were mostly based on curriculum for the primary education. Teachers emphasized physical activity, functionality, and integration with other learning content to support reading and mathematical skills. Awareness of available methods related to the prevention of learning difficulties was clearly low and incomplete. Furthermore, the use of various materials and methods was not clearly justified in relation to the prevention of possible difficulties. Teachers chose methods, based on their own habits and material that was available in the daycare center. Preschool-teachers' overall awareness of learning difficulties, their occurrence, and preventive factors and methods, appears to be low and incomplete.

Climate change is a fundamental phenomenon and challenge of our time and it should be dealt with in all areas of life. However, climate change education is being implemented very limitedly. During recent years there has been increasing amount of research on climate change education, but climate change education in early childhood education has been studied very sparingly. According to previous research, news about climate change can arouse many kinds of emotions and thoughts in children. Based on research, it has been proposed that through art-driven teaching methods it is possible to deal with emotions and thoughts aroused by climate change and strengthen hopefulness and belief in one’s own influence. Of the forms of art education, drama education as a method of climate change education has hardly been studied. The aim of this study was to add knowledge of what climate change education could be in early childhood education. The study investigates early childhood education specialists’ definitions of climate change education and their views on what possibilities drama education methods can offer for implementation of climate change education. I designed and implemented climate drama workshops for early childhood education specialists and collected the research data in the context of the workshops. Participants of the study produced short writings and in addition two of the workshops were videotaped. I analyzed the writing data and the video data qualitatively using the method of theory-based content analysis. Aa a basis for the analysis I used primarily the holistic bicycle model on climate change education (Tolppanen ym. 2017). The early childhood education specialists who participated in the study defined adding knowledge and understanding, encouraging to action, developing values and conceptions of the world and dealing with emotions as contents of climate change education. Specialists’ uncertainty and worries about arousing difficult emotions in children appeared as barriers for implementing climate change education in early childhood education. From the perspective of the study subjects, drama education methods seemed to have possibilities for implementing several parts of climate change education. Drama educations possibilities related to adding knowledge, developing thinking skills, building conceptions of the world, empowering and dealing with emotions were brought up. Methods of drama education offer practical ways for implementing and developing climate change education in early childhood education.

Aims The purpose of this study is to describe the interaction between a special education teacher and a child with a developmental disability in special needs groups. The aim of the study is to find out how the teacher engages interaction with the child in different situations, and how the reciprocal interaction manifests. The study is based on theories of social interaction. Methods The ethnological approach was chosen, as the aim of the study was to describe the interaction between the teacher and child in everyday situations. The data was collected from three special needs groups in early childhood education, in the Helsinki metropolitan area. The data included 351 video recordings, about 4 hours in total. The analysis was limited to 2 hours 42 minutes of video. Data was analyzed in two steps. First the teachers´ engagement to interaction with the child was analyzed using the Suhonen's (2009) form, which is based on the AES (adult engagement scale) developed by Pascall (1995). Then the 17 video literates were analyzed with conversational analysis. The analysis focused on the elements of social interaction, teacher-child interaction initiatives, responding to initiatives and the formation of reciprocal interaction. Findings and conclusions Teachers’ engagement to interaction with the child varied according to situation. Engagement was strongest in teaching activities and weakest in care situations. Successful interaction was formed when the teachers were able to throw themselves in, enable the child's natural initiatives and succeed in recognizing and responding to them. The use of augmentative and alternative communication (AAC) strengthened the interaction. Most genuine connection was formed in idle moments, when spontaneous plays formed between teacher and child. Interaction between a teacher and a child with developmental disabilities is built on the pedagogical activities of the more skilled interaction partner, the teacher. Forming a connection takes time and sensitivity in recognizing the natural interaction methods of the child.

The physical activity of children has a significant meaning impact in the holistic and safe growth, development, and learning of children. Children’s natural way to release energy and emotions is through exercise. The aim of physical education is for the child to adopt an active and healthy lifestyle, gain positive experiences from exercise and learn physical skills. Physical activity has a positive effect on a child's health and wellbeing. The aim of this qualitative case study is to investigate the views of preschool children about physical activity and to determine what they think physical activity is. The theme is current and significant, because only 10-20 percent of children under school age achieve the amount of physical activity required for normal growth and development. The study also considers the effect of gender on physical activity. 23 preschool-age children, 13 girls and 10 boys, participated in the study. The data collection method was an interview and the analysis method was quantification. The research results show that exercise is a happy thing for children. Only a few children experience fear when they exercise. The majority of preschool children like physical activity and feel that they are good at it. There are differences in the results between genders; boys experience physical activity more positively than girls do. All children can describe physical activity in some way and most of the children have a sports hobby.

Objectives. The aim of this study was to find out how the day-care centre managers define inclusive early childhood education and what kind of thoughts inclusion evokes in them. The study also examines how the day-care centre managers (both managers and deputy managers) guide and support their employees towards an inclusive way of working. The starting point for the study was the interest in how the renewed National core curriculum for early childhood education and care (drawn up by the Finnish National Agency for Education, OPH, 2022) emphasize the implementation of inclusive early childhood education as part of the value base. Methods. The research was carried out as a mixed methods research in which the material was handled both qualitatively and quantitatively. The research material was collected using an electronic questionnaire (N=23). Quantitative research data was analyzed using statistical methods, whereas qualitative research data was analyzed using data-driven content analysis. The survey was carried out using an e-form for managers and deputy managers of Finnish-speaking day-care centres in the city of Helsinki. Results. The results showed that the views described by the managers and deputy managers of day-care centres towards inclusive early childhood education are versatile. The respondents were mainly unanimous about the value of inclusive early childhood education in furthering the development of participation, equality and equitable treatment. However, inclusive early childhood education was seen from various perspectives among the respondents considering the amount of support measures and resources available for the operation. According to the results, managers see themselves playing a key role in the implementation of inclusive early childhood education as a part of the everyday life of the day-care centres. Nevertheless, the means to promote the realization of inclusion were seen very differently depending on the respondent, and there are no official policies set on the matter on behalf of the city.

Aim of this study was to investigate the connection between children’s self-regulation and temperament. Additionally, the aim of the study was to determine whether a child’s age, gender or mother’s level of education modified the associations between temperament and self-regulation skills. The research material was collected in 2017 in kindergartens in Salo (N=29) and Riihimäki (N=3) as part of the DAGIS project. Data consisted of questionnaire material collected during the baseline measurement of the project. The subjects (N=802) were 3–6 years old children and their families. Children’s self-regulation skills were measured using PikkuKesky survey (challenges in self-regulatory skills) completed by early childhood education teachers or other professional (N=757). Also, parents filled a form that measured child’s cognitive and emotional self-regulation skills separately. Children’s temperament was assessed using Children’s Behavior Questionnaire (very short form). This questionnaire was filled by parents. The relationship between child’s temperament and self-regulation was analysed using linear regression analysis. In addition to that, regression analysis was used to examine whether a child’s age and gender or maternal education level had an interaction effect with temperament on self-regulation. The results of the research showed that there was a connection between children’s temperament and self-regulation. Children with high levels of surgency had more challenges in their self-regulatory skills, while better effortful control meant that the child had fewer challenges in self-regulation. This study did not find connection between challenges of self-regulation and negative affectivity. Children with high levels of effortful control as well as those with more surgency was associated to better cognitional self-regulation. In contrast, children with high levels of negative affectivity had weaker cognitive self-regulatory skills. Children with high levels of surgency or negative affectivity had weaker emotional self-regulation skills, while children with high levels of effortful control was associated to better emotional self-regulation. In this study, age, gender and maternal educational background, had no interaction between temperament and self-regulation. Children’s personal temperament needs to be taken into account when developing child’s self-regulatory skills and pay attention to supporting the self-regulatory skills of children with different temperaments - especially surgency ones - at an early stage.

The purpose of this study was to find out how diversity is presented in contemporary chil-dren’s picturebooks. The theoretical background of the study was based on feminist peda-gogy, gender studies and cultural studies. The aim of the study was to describe, analyze and interpret the discourses of diversity in children's picturebooks written in 2012–2021. The main interest was in the means of making diversity a part of everyday life’s representa-tion. The phenomena were examined intersectionally. Previous studies (see e.g., Pesonen 2015a, 2015b, 2017; Heikkilä-Halttunen 2013; Rastas 2013, Beezmohun 2013; Kokkola & Österlund 2014; Österlund 2008) have found that diversity is often presented in an exotic and ethnocentric way – through differences – but discourse is changing to describe diversity as a normal part of society. Representations of socially constructed categories such as citi-zenship, “race,” and gender are changing. The research material was produced by selecting picturebooks that presented diversity in some way as a principle. The purpose in studying discourses was to increase understand-ing of how hegemonic and dominant discourses were challenged in the selected picture-books. Poststructuralist feminist discourse analysis was used to analyze the material. Es-pecially power positions and agencies were examined. The study showed that in the ten children's picturebooks examined, diversity is mostly pre-sented as a normal, everyday and pervasive phenomenon. Three main discourses could be distinguished from the material, which were 1) children challenging the hegemonic norma-tive, 2) diversity as a normal part of society, and 3) requirement of equality: everyone has the right to be their own self. Modern children’s literature actively challenged dominant con-cepts of gender, “race,” ethnicity, language, age, and health status, but at the same time might have produced binary gender dichotomy. Nevertheless, all the books studied also created a new kind of diversity discourse and, in other words, actively reproduced concept of diversity.

In the Finnish society, the trial of two-year pre-primary education implemented by the Ministry of Education and Culture began in 2021. The trial, which will run until 2024, will involve children from four to seven years old from selected municipalities. The basis of the trial is the law and the experimental curriculum developed for it. The purpose of this study is to describe the experiences of children's parents from the trial of two-year pre-primary education and their participation. The aim is to analyze what kind of meanings parents give to the implementation of the two-year pre-primary education trial. In addition, the study will examine how the parents perceive their own participation in the cooperation with daycare centre. The research is a continuation of my earlier research related to two-year pre-primary education. The study was conducted as qualitative research, the material of which was collected interviewing parents with a semi-structured thematic interview. A total of 16 parents from the trial daycare centers in the city of Helsinki participated in the individual and group interviews. When focusing on people's experiences, the research is phenomenological-hermeneutic in nature. The parents' conversation was analyzed using content analysis. The results showed that the parents mostly had a positive attitude towards the pre-primary trial. The trial was seen as an opportunity for the child and as a reinforcement of the learning path. On the other hand, the communication concerning of the trial was perceived as unclear, the resources insufficient, and the expectations and obligations directed at families were perceived as concerns. Some of the parents did not see the activity during the trial as different from their previous experiences related to early childhood. The parents were quite committed to the trial, even though they felt their involvement was minimal what they have wished. Parental experiences of the participation was also associated with uncertainty and feelings of trust. The results of the study can be used in making further plans for developing two-year pre-primary education. In addition, research results can contribute in creating new practices for informing parents. The article “The realization of two-year pre-primary education trial and participation from the parents' point of view” is to be published in the Journal of Early Childhood Education Research.

Tiivistelmä - Referat - Abstract The concept of multiculturalism is often used in the world of education. In connection with this concept, we also often talk about immigrants. However, every child, group of children, or work community, for example, can be thought of as multicultural. For this reason, when using the term multiculturalism, one should be particularly sensitive and define what kind of phenomenon the concept describes. Each pre-school group has children from different cultural and linguistic backgrounds, and children are influenced by a wide range of cultures outside the pre-school. Pre-primary education should therefore be culturally and linguistically aware, it should take into account the linguistic and cultural background of each child and family, so that each child receives support in building and developing their cultural identity. Diversity should therefore be a prerequisite for learning, allowing each child to build and grow his or her own cultural identity on an equal footing, and through which children can also perceive and experience different cultures and languages in a safe environment. The purpose of this master's thesis was to find out what kind of things children bring up from their own cultural background and what kind of things they notice in their peers. The dissertation focuses especially on the interaction between children in the daily life of pre-school education in a group where 16 children spoke a language other than Finnish as their native language. The dissertation was carried out as an ethnographic observational study. Participatory observation as well as covert observation have been used as observation means, various interaction situations between children have also been videotaped. The material has been analyzed in the way of a discussion analysis, and the observations have been divided into four different categories according to the principles of thematic design. The material consists of observations collected during the spring of 2021 in a pre-school group in Helsinki. With the written permission of the guardians, 19 pre-school children participated in the study. Based on the observational data, it can be concluded that the children of the preschool group were interested in each other’s cultural backgrounds and were proud of their own backgrounds, especially their knowledge of different languages. The children asked each other about their mother tongue, were interested in learning them and, for example, wanted to teach each other their own mother tongue. Children discussed ways of different countries as well as different religions, especially in eating situations, comparing, for example, what kind of food was offered in pre-school education and what was eaten at home or wondering why some children ate pork and some did not. Religions also appear in the observational material in discussions about gods of different religions or searching for children from the same religion in a group. The importance of a sense of belonging is emphasized in the material strongly. The children care about belonging to their own group, but also take care of the other children in the group. This can be seen, for example, in noticing a lack of common language skills, for example during play time. From the observational data, it can be concluded that the feeling of belonging to a group is important for children and children may distort their language skills or say that they belong to a religious group to which they did not really belong in order to feel part of the group.