Jenny & Antti Wihuri foundation has granted Jouni Veijalainen 24 000 euro to finish his doctoral thesis about children’s self-regulation in early education. The same foundation also granted Outi Arvola 7 000 euro to complete her doctoral thesis on multicultural children in early education. Both are using project data on their thesis. Congratulations!
At the 2015 Quality Childhood Conference International (QCCI) at 19th June in Hong Kong, an Orientation project symposium was organized. Presenters from Hong Kong, Finland and Taiwan described the project results. In the picture conference chair Doris Cheng presents the differences in children’s orientations at play-based and academic preschools in Hong Kong. The presentations were:
The conference was also a great place for networking and synchronization of the project. Special thanks for Doris Cheng for the opportunity.
Orientation project team will present some of the empirical results of the project at the 2015 Quality Childhood Conference International (QCCI) symposium. The conference takes place at the Hong Kong Institute of Education. The research results will be from Finland, Hong Kong, Singapore and Taiwan.
The conference theme is Enhancing Quality Childhood Education. Check out the conference website at http://www.ied.edu.hk/qcci/. See you at the conference!
Professor Hui-Chun Lee from Tzu-Chi University and professor Li-Chen Wang from Chung Gung University in Taiwan have produced a presentation of the project plans from 2014 to 2018. The presentation is in Chinese. Feel free to use it with colleagues or with observers, evaluators, adminstrators or parents. The presentation can be retrieved here.
Xinhuanet is a leading news media in China. Xinhuanet published an interview about Orientation project that considers the connections between learning, well-being and physical activity. In the interview the importance of wholesome development is emphasized. Hopefully the interview instigates a discussion! You can read the interview here.
The research permits for parents have been translated. Still under construction are Albanian, French, Somalia and Turkey. If the research permit has not been translated to the language parents understand, an interpreter needs to be used. The research permit forms can be downloaded from here.
The Singapore observation training lasted for two days. More than 40 observers were trained. The training produced a wealth of interesting discussions and insight. The data will be collected from kindergartens in 5-year-old groups between February and May 2015. After the data collection the kindergartens and observers will get detailed feedback on the activities observed. Thank you for the organization and support for Christine Soo Mee Ling and to the other helpful people at PAP Community Foundation. Now the observers will practice the use of the observation instrument and collect questions about its use. In January, just before the data collection, we will discuss the raised questions to ensure a valid and reliable observation across all four countries and kindergartens. The observation details were also presented in the PAP conference for ECEC teachers: Serving with pride, nurturing with passion.
The amended observation tools and observation training materials are now ready. The finishing touches of the training were completed during Taiwanese colleagues visit 16-28.8.2014. In the observation training we will use the same video material and same example coding in every country to make the observations as reliable across countries as possible. In Hong Kong the training will start on 4th September, in Singapore on 10th September and in Finland on 16th September. The purpose of the observation is to find out what really happens in early childhood education and which paths increase children’s balanced learning and well-being.
Our precious colleagues from Taiwan arrived in Helsinki today. Their input is essential in agreeing on the final versions of the 2015 data collection. We need to go through the observation definitions, interview questions, child evaluations and the learning environment evaluations. Furthermore, we also need to agree on the definitions of the observation training videos. A laborious but exciting work ahead! We will use the results in the Finnish, Hong Kong, Singaporean and Taiwanese training.
The second phase of Or.project is starting. Here are some dates for 2014: