Abstract
This chapter will focus on the youngest children and the everyday contexts and practices of their lives in Finland. The chapter explores the concept of ‘becoming’ within childhood, particularly within early childhood education and care (ECEC) in our country. For the youngest children, their homes and nuclear families have been historically and culturally constructed as the first and most important social and emotional growth environments. For families, the discourses concerning the ‘best or right place’ for their young children to be cared for and learn in are fuelled by the extensive system of financial incentives for home care (e.g. maternity, paternity and home allowances). Only about 40% of children aged between 1 and 3 attend ECEC in day-care centres or ‘family day care’ outside of the home. However, linked to the recent and strong culture of home care, many politicians and stakeholders have expressed concerns about the low attendance rates of the youngest children in ECEC. Diverse financial incentives have been proposed to increase these attendance rates. Thus, the discourses on what is ‘best for the child’ are becoming more complex, as they now include institutional ECEC options outside of domestic environments. To explore becoming in this cultural, historical and political context, the chapter will first describe the means and institutions that participate in supporting children’s becoming in Finland. Then, the chapter will provide a short description of the historical background of ECEC in a Finnish context, namely, the influence of Germany and Friedrich Fröbel. Following on from this historical review, the chapter will then discuss the current status of ECEC. In recent years, early childhood education institutions and practices have undergone various structural and political changes, such as changes in legislation. Thus, the chapter will also discuss how becoming is interpreted, seen and supported in the new National Core Curriculum for Early Childhood Education and Care (2018) and in educational practices today in Finland.
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Notes
- 1.
In the time of writing this chapter, the new legislation concerning ECEC gained force (2018) and the National Core Curriculum for Early Childhood Education and Care (2018) was updated to follow changes in the legislation. Most of the updates were technical in nature and involved updating the terminology to correspond to the legislation’s terminology. This chapter was also updated in January 2019 to follow those changes. As there was no official English translation of the 2018 core curriculum available at that time, we used the English translation of the 2016 version for the quotations in this chapter following a confirmation that the content had remained the same in the quotations in 2016 and in 2018 Finnish versions (Varhaiskasvatussuunnitelman perusteet, 2016, 2018).
- 2.
For more information on the maternity package, please see https://www.kela.fi/web/en/maternitypackage
- 3.
Sometimes Fröbel uses the words ‘the mother and nurses’, probably referring to child’s nurse at home.
- 4.
von Wright’s thinking revolved around the term sivistys in Finnish, often translated as “civilisation” and sometimes as ‘formation’. It also refers to individual growth, learning and culture as well as a form of scholarship, sophistication, erudition and education that includes certain values.
- 5.
In the core curriculum, the concept of ‘the guardian’ (huoltaja) is used to refer to the child’s parent or legal guardian.
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Acknowledgements
We are grateful to Kati Laaksonen for her transcription of the interviews quoted in this chapter. The finalisation of this chapter was supported by Academy of Finland, project no. 321374, Tracing children’s socio-spatial relations and lived experiences in early childhood education transitions (2019–2023).
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Rutanen, N., Hännikäinen, M. (2019). Finland: Becoming and the Youngest Children at Home and in ECEC. In: The First 1000 Days of Early Childhood. Policy and Pedagogy with Under-three Year Olds: Cross-disciplinary Insights and Innovations, vol 2. Springer, Singapore. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-981-32-9656-5_6
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