Unfortunately our results describing children’s physical activity in Early Education are published only in Finnish. The first small article about our latest results in English has just been published in Nursery World. Even though there are still a lot of things to enhance in Finland, there may also be some things that could be used in other countries too, see Jyrki Reunamo: Physical activity: some lessons from Finland).
In April 20-22 the Chinese Secretary General of CEAIE Wang Ling and her colleagues Wen Shijun, Guo Shixin and Vivi Chen visit Finland to seek possibilities for cooperation with Orientation project and Finnish Early Education developers. We concentrate on the use of progressive feedback, which gives a strong foundation for Chinese Early Education, based on the strengths and needs of dynamic China and its needs.
In Finland, on 21st March, more than 200 teachers and specialists in Early Education were practicing observation with the help of videos describing different everyday situations. Now the observers practice observation in their own groups with another observer and we check the reliability between the obervers. Based on the feedback we have another training session in 8th May with another set of videos. Thank you for the invigorating session!
In the leading Finnish journal for educational sciences Kasvatus (Education), an article about supporting children with immigrant background in early years has been accepted for publication. In the Orientation project data there were 309 children with immigrant background, whose need for support was evaluated. Mostly, children’s skills were equal in relation to the original population, but in context specific situations there were differences. The results highlight the importance of the educator in interaction. In a multicultural environment it is important to consider the shared production of learning content and educational practices. The article info:
Arvola, O., Reunamo, J. & Kyttälä, M. (accepted for publication). Maahanmuuttajataustaiset lapset varhaiskasvatuksessa: kasvattajien näkemykset lasten taidoista ja tuen tarpeesta [Immigrant children in early years: the educators’ views about children’s skills and need for support. Kasvatus.
The Finnish national recommendations for physical activity in early childhood are now availabe in English. The publication Joy, play and doing together; Recommendations for physical activity in early childhood is available at https://julkaisut.valtioneuvosto.fi/handle/10024/78924.
The workshop in Hualien on Saturday 19 November 2016 collected together the project early childhood educators participating in the data collection. The teachers presented examples from tree houses to using stumps in math. We also compared the Finnish and Taiwanese research results. In the workhop the teachers input, examples and sharing were essential. There were researchers from Taiwan, Indonesia, Hong Kong, Turkey and Finland. Participating researchers included professoriHui-Chun Lee (Tzu Chi University), professor Li-Chen Wang (Chang Gung University), professor Doris Cheng (Tung Wah College of Hong Kong), professor Shu-Shuan Shih (Taitung University), professor Hui-Hua Chen (Dong Hwa University), Yeni Rachmavati (Pendidikan University), Mehmet Sahin (Dong Hwa University) and Wei-Chen Zhang (Dong Hwa University). The natural resources, Pacific Ocean, rivers, mountains, plants and animals give the pre-school settings a unique environment, which calls for respect and exploration. Thank you for the participants for a very inspiring day!
The recommendations for physical activity in early childhood have been based largely on scientific justification. The articles for the Scientific justification for the recommendations for physical activity in early childhood (2016, Ministry of Education and Culture 2016:22) have just been published. The Orientation project results and insight have been a major contributor in this process, see:
Laukkanen, A., Määttä, S., Reunamo, J., Roos, E., Soini, A. and Mäki, P. Perheen tärkeä rooli [The important role of the family], p. 22-26.
Reunamo, J. Lapsilähtöinen toimintakulttuuri edellyttää lapsen kuuntelua [Child-initiated action culture requires listening the child], p. 27-31.
Iivonen, S., Laukkanen A., Haapala, A. and Reunamo, J. Motoristen taitojen kehitys [The development of motoric skills], p. 32-37.
Soini, A., Laukkanen, A., Mäki, P. and Reunamo, J. Fyysistä aktiivisuutta ja liikkumista edistävä ympäristö [An environment that enhances physical activity], p. 44-48.
Kyhälä, A-L. and Soini, A. Organisoitu liikunta [Organized excercise], p. 49-53.
Reunamo, J. and Kyhälä, A-L. Liikkuminen varhaiskasvatuspäivän osana [Physical activity as part of everyday activities in early childhood education], p. 54-58.
Hopefully the articles will be translated in English as soon as possible!
The book Contemporary Perspectives on Research on Bullying and Victimization in Early Childhood Education has just been published. The book includes our article Openness and Agency as Strategies for Addressing Bullying. The authors are Jyrki Reunamo, James Ko, Doris Cheng, Hui‐Chun Lee, Li‐Chen Wang, and Essi Salminen. The yearbook is an essential reference in Early Childhood Education research. This is a major recognition for the work and research of our project. Our article presents a rare perspective on children’s strategies to confront bullying. We also see how these strategies are reflected in the everyday activities and interaction. The book can be bought online at the Information Age Publishing’s website. The direct link is: http://www.infoagepub.com/products/Contemporary-Perspectives-on-Bullying-and-Victimization-in-Early-Childhood-Education.
The Finnish National Board of Education has granted our project on Progressive Feedback for 280 000 euro. The grant was clearly the largest sum funded of all applications. This funding is a major support and recognition of our project. The participating municipalities include Espoo, Hyvinkää, Hämeenlinna, Järvenpää, Kerava, Mäntsälä, Nurmijärvi, Sipoo, Turku and Vantaa. The project coordinating municipality is Kouvola. Thank you for the team for a succesful project! The funding will help us to make the best of progressive feedback. We will concentrate on accuracy, depth, topicality and feedback.
In Finland, in municipalities Espoo, Helsinki, Hyvinkää, Hämeenlinna, Järvenpää, Kerava, Mäntsälä, Nurmijärvi, Sipoo, Turku and Vantaa, we make the progressive feedback a permanent practice. The observer training starts in January 2017 and the building and testing of the needed infrastructure and tools starts immediately. From September 2017 onward, every day 180 randomized observations is conducted in different municipalities. When we merge the observation data with skills and learning environment evaluations, we get a real time feedback of the essential processes of early childhood education in Finland. This gives us an opportunity to get hold of these processes and change them in a conscious way. Furthermore, we get instant feedback about the effects of the development work almost in real time, which can be shared and further developed by the community and educators.