How to get there depends on your starting point and the state of guidelines for early childhood education in your country. Often this is referred to as the “curriculum”, but the term itself has different meanings in different countries or even between professionals themselves.

DIFFERENT VIEW OF “CURRICULUM” AS STARTING POINT

In Finland the national / city / kindergarten specific curriculum means a guideline of how to work and sets the pedagogical objectives. It doesn't specify milestones for children's learning or lesson plans that should be run.

Some other countries consider the word curriculum as a syllabus consisting of preplanned lesson plans for a term. While other countries see curriculum as a set of milestones / learning objectives that children should get to practice and reach.

None of these alone gives a complete answer for how to go ahead to provide quality education!

SOLUTION TO GO FORWARD

No matter what curriculum means to you or in which country you live in:

For quality education, teaching activities must be goal-oriented and organized in a purposeful manner.

Building on your starting point and expanding it, you should take the whole learning process into consideration:

1. Set the pedagogical objectives for children’s learning.
2. Plan the lessons to match the objectives, taking children's interests into consideration.
3. Observe and document the learning moments and engage families.
4. Assess and reflect on the learning and plan future learning.

KINDIEDAYS PEDAGOGCAL MANAGEMENT SOLUTION

Kindiedays supports the whole learning process in a flexible way so you can build on what you already have in place.

First, Kindiedays can offer the Finnish curriculum’s pedagogical objectives that in addition to children’s own interests guide the activity planning. But you can also use your own pedagogical objectives as starting point.

High quality pedagogy helps for example when children get restless or when situations need more focus for learning. But what is pedagogy in practice?

You might understand quickly that you need to promote pedagogy for exaple when children are queuing to wash hands or while they wait for story time to begin.

Simply, pedagogy is - or at least it should be - present in all moments of the day that a teacher spends with children. Pedagogy does not play a part only during circle times, pedagogy is there all the time, all the way from morning to afternoon.

Pedagogy can be seen in guided activities, when supporting children's play, in transition moments, when eating or resting and in all other moments that teacher encounters children.

Test and wear 'pedagogical glasses' for a day

It is worth while to stop and think through your day with 'pedagogical glasses' on. You can assess and notice the weak points of the day and start to develop them. Think for example:

• What moments are stressful?
• When are the children restless?
• Are there moments when sensitive interaction with the children does not come true?

Discuss with your team and search for solutions together. You might understand quickly that you need to promote pedagogy for exaple when children are queuing to wash hands or while they wait for story time to begin.

How to enhance restless moments and add high quality pedagogy to the day?

1. Use poems and songs when children are in the queue - time goes faster when you sing and children get to practice new songs and participate.
2. Add pictures and visual sings to the walls where children can see them, for example on how to wash hands properly, so that children can practice handwashing moves while they wait.
3. Add more adults' presence to the hectic and stressful moments.

The core idea is to understand the child's point of view. How does the child see this situation? What means versatile and safe early childhood education to the child? How can we support the child's wellbeing, growth, development and learning throughout the day? Teacher can see the child's side by observing closely, interacting in a sensitive manner and helping the child to name and show his feelings.

What is then the worst thing that prevents pedagogical early childhood education from happening?

The absolute NO's in early childhood education are:

• Educator's closed mind that only follows everyday routines as changing diapers like a robot.
• Treating all the children similarly without noticing their personalities and unique needs and different ways to communicate.
• Doing the job similarly as it was done 20 years ago.

→ This kind of thinking does not support high quality pedagogy nor children's learning.

High quality pedagogy is based on warm and sensitive interaction with the children. <3 The core idea is to understand the child's point of view.

Happy encounters!

References: Liisa Ahonen & Piia Roos. 2021. Untuvikot - alle 3-vuotiaiden pedagogiikka. (Untuvikot - pedagogy with children under 3y.)

Simply, pedagogy is - or at least it should be - present in all moments of the day that a teacher spends with children. Pedagogy does not play a part only during circle times, pedagogy is there all the time, all the way from morning to afternoon. Pedagogy can be seen in guided activities, when supporting children's play, in transition moments, when eating or resting and in all other moments that teacher encounters children.

It is worth while to stop and think through your day with 'pedagogical glasses' on. You can assess and notice the weak points of the day and start to develop them. What moments are stressful? When are the children restless? Discuss with your team and search for solutions together. You might see quickly that you should promote pedagogy for exaple when children are queuing to wash hands or while they wait for story time to begin.

How to develop restless moments and add high quality pedagogy to the day?

One way is to use poems and songs when children are in the queue - time goes faster when you sing and children get to practice new songs and participate. Second idea is to add pictures and visual sings to the walls where children can see them, for example on how to wash hands properly, so that children can practice handwashing moves while they wait. Thirdly, and above all, add more adults' presence to the hectic and stressful moments.

The core idea is to understand the child's point of view. How does the child see this situation? What means versatile and safe early childhood education to the child? How can we support the child's wellbeing, growth, development and learning throughout the day? Teacher can see the child's side by observing closely, interacting in a sensitive manner and helping the child to name and show his feelings.

What is then the worst thing that prevents pedagogical early childhood education from happening? Closed mind that only follows everyday routines. Changing diapers like a robot. Treating all the children similarly without noticing their personalities and unique needs. Doing the job similarly as it was done 20 years ago. This kind of thinking does not support high quality pedagogy nor children's learning. High quality pedagogy is based on warm and sensitive interaction with the children.

References: Liisa Ahonen & Piia Roos. 2021. Untuvikot - alle 3-vuotiaiden pedagogiikka. (Untuvikot - pedagogy with children under 3y.)

Happy encounters!

Even though the world is changing and sad news from different countries run around in our heads - children must have the possibility to remain children and think of topics that interest, amaze and wow them.

It is magical how children live in a bubble that is filled with imaginary friends, sweet fairytales and beloved stuffed animals. Children are naturally curious and they long for new information! Children are excited to learn new words, test new skills and hear unheard stories. Let's protect this childhood bubble as long as we can and offer children activities and information of topics that interest and inspire them to the fullest!

A good way to teach children and keep them interested is to use themes. One theme can last for example for one week and you can plan all sorts of activities based on that specific theme. If a topic loses interest, or on the contrary - all children get super into it - be flexible and sensitive with the schedule.

How to find out what themes interest children?

1. DISCUSS. Sometimes children tell this to you if you just ask  "George, what do you like to play with the most?" -Dinosaur!

2. OBSERVE. Sometimes, you need to observe the child for a while and you'll find out! As George just always plays with his dinosaur, sleeps in a dinosaur pyjama and so on... - The answer is quite obvious. At times - when a child is not obsessed with one certain topic - you might have to observe the child a bit longer in a different situations and make notes of toys he plays with, books he chooses and topics he talks about.

3. INTRODUCE. In case the child does not have a certain interest or he doesn't know what he would like to play with, it is ok to introduce something new to him! Ask if he would like to play with rockets, dolls or animals? Offer 2-3 options for the child to choose from.

And of course children want to hear and learn about new themes every once in a while. As you go through every child's favorite topic in a kindergarten or preschool group over the year, children surely get new experiences too.

Below is a little list of different themes that might be a hit with your children - and if not, look around for inspiring activities and lesson plans from other themes. Behind the following links you can find some craft, STEM, letter, math and art activities from different sites.

• ANIMALS (for example DIY dinosaur eggs)
• CARS
• BABY DOLLS (Birth certificate for a doll)
• BARBIE (for example Fashion sketch paper doll)
• DANCE
• FROZEN (for example Stone trolls craft)
• I AM SPECIAL
• KNIGHTS & PRINCESSES

Play is the most important way of learning for children. Children practice and learn multiple skills during play, but how do children actually learn to play?

Stages of Play

Psychologist Jean Piaget (1896-1980) studied play and found out that even babies play - but in a different way than 5-year-olds. According to Piaget, children engage in types of play that reflect the level of their cognitive development. The stages of play are: Functional play, Constructive play, Fantasy play, and Games with rules (Johnson, Christie & Wardle 2005).

• ­Functional play
  • using bodily movements
  • playing with or without objects
  • running, jumping, sliding, gathering, dumping
  • manipulating or stacking objects
  • playing informal games without rules

• ­Constructive play
  • using objects like blocks, Legos or other materials (sand, clay, paint, blocks, snow ) in an organized, goal-oriented manner to make something

• ­Fantasy play
  • role playing or make-believe playing
  • pretending to be eg. a mother, superhero, dinosaur or Peppa Pig
  • make believe actions, such as driving a car by moving a pretend steering wheel or imagining a cardboard box as a castle

• ­Games with rules
  • games with peers
  • games are controlled by pre-established rules
  • games such as tag or hide&seek

How can children learn by playing in Finland?

Which type of play is the most valuable one?

As children grow older, the way they play evolves. Piaget viewed the forms of play as progressive, beginning with functional play (a baby playing with a rattle) and later progressing to more complex games with rules.

Nevertheless, one of the stages of play remains important, even the child's cognitive skills would allow him/her to move to the next stage.

According to Francis Wardle (2015), PhD in child development and early education, early childhood educators continually have to justify the use of play in the curriculum. Often this justification is that play prepares children for later academic, social, and emotional successes (Leong & Bodrova 2015).

But, while constructive play teaches children to be flexible thinkers (Bruner 1972), and develops a sense of control and self-esteem by encouraging children to control their environment (Chaille 2008), Wardle believes the main value of constructive play is that it enables children to be children: to do what children need to do and want to do!

I believe the main value of constructive play is that it enables children to be children: to do what children need to do and want to do!

- Francis Wardle

Children love constructive play

Even research shows that when given a choice of free play activities, preschool children choose constructive play more than 50% of the time (Rubin, Fein, & Vandenberg 1983). Constructive play was also preschool children's favorite outdoor activity (Ihn 1998).

Assess children's learning with Kindiedays