ABSTRACT

What is childhood like in Finland? What kind of practical solutions have been created and evaluated that aim at both providing good childhood experiences and supporting children’s positive development? What practices aim to prevent child exclusion from regular education and social experiences and to foster children’s healthy development in emotional, social, and behavioural terms?

This book considers the reality of childhood in Finland. It discusses the realisation and evaluation of early childhood education and addresses aspects of research and practice concerning children under the age of 10. It examines the growth and development of young children, how learning and teaching are organised, practices of rearing children and the state of child care in Finland.

Contributors represent a variety of universities and sub disciplines in the science of education and focus on perspectives of children’s well-being, special viewpoints of early childhood education, care, and research in Finland.

This book was originally published as a special issue of Early Child Development and Care.

chapter 1|8 pages

Introduction

How do the Finnish family policy and early education system support the well-being, happiness, and success of families and children?

chapter 3|14 pages

Individual plans for children in transition to pre-school

A case study in one Finnish day-care centre

chapter 5|18 pages

Having, loving, and being

Children's narrated well-being in Finnish day care centres

chapter 9|18 pages

Care for the other's selfhood

A view on child care and education through Heidegger's analytic of Dasein