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This study examined Finnish preschool teacher’s conceptions, attitudes and beliefs about the science education in early childhood education. In Finland this topic has not been much examined. On the other hand there are several international studies which indicate the benefits of early childhood science education. There are also international studies which indicate that preschool teacher’s conceptions, attitudes and beliefs effect heavily on the substance which is taught to children. There is however no explicit definition of science education in Finnish national core curriculums in early childhood education. This raises a need to examine how Finnish preschool teachers define science education, what science-related substances they choose to teach, how they see child’s ability to learn science and how they see themselves as science educators. The methodology of this study was quantitative. The research material of this study consisted of six theme interviews which where transcribed and analyzed by using deductive and/or abductive content analysis. The definition of science education appeared to be difficult and controversial to the teachers. Most of research informants preferred the concept of guided inquiry. Half of the teachers defined science education as natural science. The results of this study only confirmed the findings of earlier studies; those teachers who found science education as important and meaningful part of early childhood education also integrated more science-related substances to their daily activities. Teachers idea of the child appeared to be very child centered and was linked to the sosioconstructivist paradigm of educational sciences. Generally teachers also experienced themselves competent to teach science in early childhood education.

On a global scale, bullying has been a problem for a long time. This is supported by the fact that bullying has been a popular research topic since the 1970s. Even though solutions and different interventions for bullying have been developed, the subject emerges almost regularly in both local and international media. The meaning of this research is to form an understanding of the agencies that are formed within bullying and find out what factors affect them. My goal is to touch the normative reality behind the phenomenon through interviewing people with experiences related to bullying. I’m also interested in how these people talk about bullying. The sample of this research consists of four women whose bullying experiences I have tried to get a hold of through a themed interview. I have approached the material with discourse analysis, which I‘ve conducted with the help of four central concepts: bullying, agency, norms and experience. On the basis of the analysis, bullying appears to be a multidimensional and subjective phenomenon that is seen as a normal mode of acting in school. In relation to bullying, the agency of an individual is affected by the norms of the school community, the age, personality and “coolness” of the individual, the physical surroundings of the bullying situations and the form and duration of bullying. Traditionally bullying has been seen as originating from the individual pathology of a person, but according to the research in hand bullying is actually a ubiquitous mode of acting in the social reality of the school, something that anyone can “grab” onto. In this framework the bully is seen as person who guards the group’s conventional social order. This notion is supported by the data, according to which social pressure, an understanding of the bullied being somehow different from others and the changeability of the role of the bully are all key factors in bullying. The cultural cliché that emphasizes individual pathology as the starting point of bullying should be forgotten if we really want to get rid of the phenomenon. Instead we should concentrate on the normative discourses at play in school. Opening these discourses to conversation is the first step toward change, and research can help in doing that.

Aims. The purpose of this study was to get a small picture of elderly people who use social media to search information about food and nutrition. Framing of the research question was shaped from the desire to investigate present-day elderly as users of social media. The purpose was to get a picture of how elderly experiences social media as a source of food and nutritional information. The previous studies have shown that social media can have an impact on the food choices that people make. Methods. This is a qualitative study. The sample of this study consisted of five discretionary selected elderly that live in the capital region. Besides the same age range all members of the research group had learned to use social media after they had retired on a pension. Individual interviews were the data collection method of this study. The interviews were recorded and transcribed. In this study data-driven content analysis was used as a method of analysis. Results and conclusions. The research showed that social media can offer peer support and motivation considering food and nutritional information. The elderly takes advantage of social media in their everyday life when they are searching information about food and nutrition.

Tavoitteet. Tutkimuksen tavoitteena oli selvittää millaisia pedagogisia keinoja siirtymätilanteissa käytetään sekä selvittää kuinka kauan siirtymätilanteet kestävät esiopetuksen velvoittavan päivän aikana. Tutkimus pyrkii tekemään näkyväksi siirtymätilanteiden pedagogisen arvon. Aiemmat tutkimukset ovat osoittaneet, että siirtymätilanteiden suunnitteleminen on tärkeää. Ilman aikuisten suunnitelmallista toimintaa läpi päivän eri tilanteiden lasten haastava käyttäytyminen nousee esille. Tutkimuksen tarkoituksena on tuoda esille keinoja, joita voi hyödyntää siirtymätilanteita suunniteltaessa. Menetelmät. Tutkimusaineistona toimii syksyllä 2019 eräässä pääkaupunkiseudulla sijaitsevassa päiväkodissa tuotettu videoaineisto. Aineisto on kuvattu kahtena peräkkäisenä päivänä ja videolle tallennettiin ryhmän kaikki siirtymätilanteet esiopetuksen velvoittavana aikana. Tutkimukseen osallistunut ryhmä oli iältään esiopetusikäisiä. Tutkimus oli luonteeltaan laadullinen eli kvalitatiivinen tutkimus ja kyseessä oli tapaustutkimus. Tutkimus on analysoitu käyttäen teorialähtöistä sisällönanalyysia. Tulokset ja johtopäätökset. Siirtymätilanteiden kestoon esiopetuksen velvoittavana aikana vaikutti olennaisesti päivän ohjelma. Aikuisten suunnitelmallinen sekä tilanteesta muodostuvat pedagogiset menetelmät siirtymissä vaikuttivat myös siirtymätilanteiden kokonaispituuteen päivän aikana. Ei ole kuitenkaan automaattisesti hyvä asia, jos siirtymiin käytetään päivän aikana vähän aikaa, sillä siirtymiä voidaan hyödyntää monipuolisesti esimerkiksi pieninä opetustuokioina, kun ne ovat hyvin suunniteltuja etukäteen. Siirtymätilanteiden pedagogiset menetelmät auttavat varhaiskasvatuksen henkilökuntaa suunnittelemaan päivän kulusta ehjän kokonaisuuden, joka tukee yksilöiden kehitystä.

Tiivistelmä - Referat - Abstract Aims: The purpose of this study is to provide information about home cleaning work from the point of wiev of aims and motivation. The aims and motivations behind home cleaning have hardly been studied. This research forms new information about the causal relationship between these two factors and specify the backgrounds behind aims and motivation. Research questions are, what are the aims of cleaning and what factors influence cleaning motivation? Methods: The research material was collected in April 2019 by interviewing five families. The families were selected through acquaintances of acquaintances. The following criteria have been used to select the target group; families parents are working or students, children are in kindergarten or school, and the families did not have major problems at the research moment in life. The material was transcribed and analyzed. The material was analysed using theory-driven content analysis. Results and Conclusions: The results and conclusions are supported by the studies presented in the theoretical part. The aims of cleaning are based on cleanliness, order and comfort. The aims are influenced by the standards emerging from society, the model of the childhood home, and the individual's experience of their own everyday life and feeling of goodness. Motivation was influenced by material resources such as time and equipment. Motivation was also formed if the work felt easy or pleasant. The results contained both external and internal motivation. External motivation was formed by rewards, and internal motivation came from the individual's own desire. Personal attributes are also associated with motivation, such as the "cleaning urge” that emerged from the study. The results of the research cannot be generalized due to the small sample size

Objectives. This thesis focuses on Home Economics Science trough everyday life at the field of housing. Housing covers a wide range of topic for example keeping your home clean and tidy. The purpose of this Thesis was to find out whether the respondents had developed a cleaning routine and how they felt the cleanliness of their home. The results of the study can be used to understand this everyday issue in the home, how the cleaning day in the home is realized and how the cleanliness of the home is felt. Methods. The material for this thesis is the answers of the Large Home Survey questionnaire by Helsingin Sanomat in 2016. Responding to the questionnaire has been voluntary. The answers which are analyzed are from two different age groups, 20−29-year old and 60−69-year old. The chosen survey method is a quantitative survey and analysis of answers is done by using IBM SPSS Sta-tistics software. Out of all questions two chosen questions were analyzed. The first question was whether the respondents had a cleaning day or not. Results of this question were represented as a dichotomous variable. The second question included Likert scale answers from 1-5 about how re-spondents perceive the mess or dirtiness of their home. Results and Conclusions. The older age group carried out more cleaning days compared to the younger age group. More than half of respondents in the older age group had a routine in the form of cleaning day, while over one-third of the younger age group reported having cleaning day. The younger age group, on average, felt that their homes were messier or dirtier. Some of the older age group were satisfied with the cleanliness of their home even though there was no cleaning day. In the younger age group, there were those who felt their homes were messy or dirty despite the day of cleaning. In conclusion, the cleaning day is implemented in both groups, but the older age group had cleaning day more often. In addition, the older age group more often found their homes tidy.

In this study experiences concerning cooperation between foster care and school was examined. The goal was to search and describe different forms and problems in cooperation from the point of view of the foster care personnel. The cooperation was expected to be difficult and to seldom take place. Having worked in a child welfare facility. My experiences made me think about these problems. The subject is interesting and has apparently not been researched that much. Based on the theory it was possible to bring the Finnish legislatives point of view to the cooperation and also the student’s right to be supported in education. The material constructed of four foster care home representatives’ interviews. I ended up using a semi-structured interview as research method so that the interviewees had the opportunity to answer my questions as freely as possible. In material analysis I used theming. After theming I simplified the material and interpreted it using the original phrases. Certain themes, which were the same as the research question popped up from the material. The main themes were describing the forms of cooperation, who were doing it, the targets and methods of cooperation and the challenges and remedies of cooperation. The challenges in cooperation were described as not seeing the child’s needs, not listening to the counterpart, school being too inquisitive about the child’s current situation at home or disclosing the parents from the child’s life. Another problem was the counterpart trying to give guidelines on how to operate with the child. The goals were the child’s advantage, building trust, solution-centered actions, communication and correctly prioritized goals. The method of successful cooperation was knowing who you are working with since the more they kept in touch, the easier the cooperation was. Cooperation between school and foster care homes is quite similar to cooperation between home and school. The cooperation between foster care home and school may be not be as dense, which I think is because of the child’s special needs concerning school. This cooperation however does not differ from cooperation between school and home if the child has special needs and the parents have the desire to cooperate with school. The goal of cooperation is to build trust. The problem in cooperation is the lack of reality when setting goals to a child. Right situation assessment when determining the child’s ability to go to school was seen as an important factor. Cooperation has also been done by solution-centered thinking, highlighting the right situation assessment.

This thesis is a literature review, the goal of which is to first determine the conceptual difference between a simulation, a game and a simulation game. After this conceptual determination the thesis will explore the theoretical groundwork for using simulation games as a teaching method. Games have risen in popularity as a teaching method these past couple of years, so much so that the use of games as a teaching method has been largely inscribed into the Finnish National Curriculum of 2014. The purpose of this thesis is to first offer a deeper glimpse into the terminology of games and simulations, since many educators can accidentally mix these terms together. In addition, this thesis will offer theoretical rudiments of using simulation games as a teaching method for any teacher who are willing to use these kinds of methods. Previous research on this topic is scarce, especially in Finland. This thesis utilized a descriptive literary review method. The purpose of the review was to first determine the conceptual difference between simulations, games and simulation games, after which the goal was to collect theoretically educational sources to justify the use of simulation games as a teaching method. Sources were mostly Anglo-American in regard to simulations, whilst most Finnish sources covered participational pedagogy. The findings of the thesis were that a simulation is a model that replicates reality, games are controlled conflict situations which are rule-based with quantifiable results and a simulation game is a cross between these two. Simulation games are content-wise no better than traditional teaching methods, but simulation games offer a higher degree of engagement for students, activates them instead of passivating them and is beneficial towards socialization.

The purpose of this thesis was to increase understanding about the concept of grit and how to teach it. Grit is a colloquial concept, which nonetheless has been defined scientifically in the field of psychological research. Thus, the first research problem was to define what grit as a concept means. The concept was examined in relation to research on grit and similar concepts as grit. Especially in the United States teaching non-cognitive skills, including grit, in schools as well as developing these skills in students has become increasingly more popular. Similar demands have also been expressed in Finland. Due to this, the second research problem was what research has been conducted on teaching grit within school context. Research on grit in Finnish is scarce, so the purpose of this thesis was to summarize current research findings on the subject and explore grounds for teaching grit also in relation to Finnish comprehensive school. This thesis was conducted as a descriptive literature review. The data collection was conducted according to strict search criteria and focused on current scientific books and peer-reviewed articles and dissertations regarding the concept of grit and teaching it. Due to lack of research in Finnish, the data selected was mostly in English. The research problems were answered according to the data. Based on this review there is an established definition for the concept of grit according to which grit consists of passion and perseverance for long-term goals. Grit can be regarded as an individual, malleable personality trait or as a trait that overlaps with other psychological constructs. Research on teaching grit was scarce or yet unpublished. Interventions aiming to develop grit in students have had both positive and negative results, which gives reason for additional research. Indirect ways for cultivating grit in the short-term appear to be deliberate practice, strategies developing self-control and interactive teaching methods. Grit is related to qualities that should be targeted in school teaching according to the Finnish national core curriculum. As such grit could have applications also within the Finnish comprehensive school.

Interest towards natural dyes and natural dyed products increases among condumers and industry. In this research is intended to gather recent study of cotton dyed with quercetin from onion skins (Allium cepa), and colourfastness of these natural dyeing processes. In this study I also research what mordant brings the best result in colourfastness prosperities. In this systematic review there was precise criteria to the articles that were picked to this review. Every study reseaches woven cotton fabric dyed with quercetin from onion skins. Three studies out of four uses mordants in their research. One study uses pre-treatment with chitosan solution. These four studies were compared and attempted to discover similarities in which dyeing methods and mordants brings the best dyeing result dyeing cotton with quercetin. Effects of mordanting and pre-treatments were analysed in colourfastness and dyeing process. Colourstrenght of different mordants and ways of mordanting were also compared with each other and with chitosan pre-treatment. Every study showed that mordanting or chitosan pre-treatment affected positively on the dyeing result and the result of colour fastness depending on which treatment was used to fabric in question. Optimization of natural dyeing process with cotton and quercetin was not able to be found and the dyeing processes differed lots of ways. Iron mordanted and dyed fabrics brought good results in general with colour fastness. Copper mordant got same kind of results but using copper mordant in dyeing process is questionable because of it is hazardous to environment. Alum mordanted fabrics got mixed result in colour fastness in different studies. In general, pre-treatment and mordanting improves dyeing results and colour fastness. In this study I try to find subject to research this futher for my Master’s thesis in this same field of study.