Browsing by Subject "maahanmuuttajataustaiset lapset"

Objectives. Increase in immigrant background children shows strongly in Espoo City’s daycare and social welfare and healthcare services. In Espoo, almost one third of the clientele of speech therapy have immigrant background. Given that children spend most of their day in kindergar-ten, actions related to advancing speech therapy services should be integrated in daycare func-tions. In order, kindergarten personnel can correctly support a child who has problems in language development, should the personnel be sufficiently offered guidance and right type of supportive material for speech therapy. Moreover, tight collaboration between parents of immigrant background children and other potential rehabilitation actors is needed. Previous studies show that kindergarten teachers find collaboration with speech therapists extremely meaningful. The objective of this study was to investigate kindergarten teachers’ experiences of the services that Espoo City’s speech therapists offer to immigrant background children in kindergarten. In the focus of study were the quality and sufficiency of guidance and the functioning of collaboration between the immigrant background children’s parents and other rehabilitation actors. Methods. The data of this qualitative research was collected in semistructured theme interviews. In total nine kindergarten teachers from seven different Espoo City’s kindergartens participated in the study. Findings and conclusions. The majority of kindergarten teachers found they received too little guidance from a speech therapist. In addition, distribution of supportive material was inconsistent. It was also found that the collaboration with parents had often been challenging because of cultural and language differences, among other things. Furthermore, collaboration between other rehabilitation actors and kindergarten had also been insufficient. Lack of guidance, as well as dysfunctional and insufficient collaboration between parents and other rehabilitation actors challenge the support that is offered to immigrant background children in kindergarten related to language and other development. Therefore, it is recommended that Espoo City children’s rehabilitation services should re-evaluate their practices related to immigrant background children and improve collaboration with their parents.