Browsing by Author "Erkko, Janika"

The main purpose of this study is to describe and analyze teachers views of holistic craft and its realization in primary school. There were two research questions at this study: 1) How teachers understand the concept of holistic craft? 2) How does holistic craft come true according to the teachers. The research material was collected on social media (Facebook) by group interview. The group interview lasted six weeks (23.1-9.3.2015). There were six class teachers and subject teachers who took part in the interview. They had working experience from three to 21 years. Qualitative content analysis was used to analyze the data. The analysis was based on five themes rising from the theory and structuring the interview (conceptual perspective, perspective of value, perspective of process, perspective of pupils, perspective of teaching). The conceptual perspective showed that the concept of holistic craft was understood well. The teachers categorized concept to ideation, designing, making and evaluation. On the other hand holistic craft were mixed up mistakenly with the combination of textile craft and technical craft. The holistic craft were seen of a great value and it should be systematically realized already from the first grade. However, some of the teachers thought that it is also important to teach ordinary craft. Perspective of process showed that the holistic craft process needs frames, facilitation and time, so that implementation is possible. When the teachers spoke about the holistic craft, they spoke mostly about designing. The designing needs to be trained as much as making process because difficulties of designing in particular was felt resulting from a lack of experience. From the pupils' perspective pupils' experience of holistic craft seemed to affect pupils' attitudes towards holistic craft. When the pupils' get accustomed to working according to holistic craft since the first class, they would prefer holistic craft as normal approach. As a novel issue for teachers, holistic craft was experienced slightly challenging. Also, the teachers' own attitude had an impact on pupils' attitude. From the perspective of teaching, teachers' thought that craft science education and their working experience were important factors to the teaching of holistic craft.