Development work in early childhood education and care
The early childhood education and care providers in Vantaa also develop their operations through various projects. The ongoing development programmes reinforce, create and establish pedagogic methods. The early childhood education and care development programmes are carried out in cooperation with other bodies such as basic education, sports services, and culture services.
This development work is also implemented through various studies and thesis works. A research permit needs to be applied for studies and thesis work. This permit should determine the purpose and objective of the study, the methods and the research subject and schedule.
Pedagogical development
The basis for pedagogic development work is built on the valid pre-primary education curriculum, the early childhood education and care plan and the Act on Early Childhood Education and Care. The ongoing development programmes reinforce, create and establish pedagogic methods. The objective of developing services is to make service production more efficient while also diversifying the service structure so that the services can meet the needs of local residents even better than before. The methods used include service design and various surveys.
Better services through service design
The objective of service design is to make service production more efficient while also diversifying the service structure so that the services can meet the needs of local residents even better than before. Service design allows for the various perspectives and experiences of the service’s users, partners and producers to be utilised in the service development.
The goal of this joint design process can be, for example, improving an existing service or finding completely new services and channels for producing them. Joint design allows for the staff and local residents to meet and work together. The early childhood education and care sector holds various service design events and workshops in different areas and in individual locations.
The Vantaa early child hood education and care sector is known as an active developer of pedagogics. The development programmes are carried out in cooperation with other bodies such as basic education and sports services, among other operators. The projects are funded by the operators themselves as well as with state funding and grants received from other bodies.
Research permits of early childhood education and care
If you wish to conduct a study or carry out research in one of the early childhood education and care locations, please contact the location directly in advance. Any research must be agreed with the day care centre’s director or management. After you have received their approval, fill in the research permit application and send it to the Registry (Kirjaamo) by email
The application has questions about the purpose and objective of the research, its methods, the research subject and the schedule. The names of the day care centres and their directors involved in the study should also be mentioned. A research plan is needed as an attachment to the application and the survey form, if there is one, should also be enclosed. The plan needs to outline how ethical perspectives have been taken into consideration and what permits are needed from the guardians.
When reviewing the research plan, we pay attention to the research methods and the ethical perspectives. We are also interested about the roles and duties of the early childhood education and care personnel in implementing the research. Thesis works often have a quite narrow scope. The student’s educational institute is responsible for guiding the content of the research work.
Lähetä hakemus liitteineen (allekirjoitussivu skannattuna) osoitteeseen: kirjaamo@vantaa.fi
Kasvatuksen ja oppimisen tutkimuslupahakemus(pdf, 784.8 KB)Limited tasks related to practical training period
Students involved in practical training for the working life often perform various small-scale observation tasks. Doing this is mutually agreed on at the place of practical training. A separate permission to conduct research is not usually required for this, but families and guardians will be informed. The student drafts a notice regarding their project for guardians.
The early childhood education personnel supervise students and their work. Any details are agreed on at the practical training site.
Customer surveys
Guardians have a chance to give feedback regarding the starting of early childhood education and the smoothness of the process via an online survey.
Click here to open the early childhood education Webropol feedback form >
Every other year, we carry out a customer survey directed at guardians with children in early childhood education in the metropolitan area. Helsinki, Espoo, and Kauniainen are included in this survey in addition to Vantaa. The survey aims to map the experiences of children and their guardians regarding early childhood and pre-primary education, and to find out about their wishes for possible areas for development in early childhood education.
The next survey will be conducted in October-November 2022. The previous survey was carried out between October 19 – November 8, 2020 for all guardians with children in municipal or private early childhood or pre-primary education. The customer survey was sent to nearly 60,000 guardians who had one or several children in municipal or private early childhood education. We received a total of 15,269 replies.
The customer survey for clubs, open daycare centres, and residential parks carried out every two years helps evaluate and develop the services of open early childhood education and care. The latest survey was conducted in spring of 2018.
You can hear about local and city-level events at daycare centres, on our website, and the Lasten Vantaa Facebook page (in Finnish)
The Vantastinen (“Vantastic”) blog for early childhood education
The Vantastinen blog by the early childhood and pre-primary education of Vantaa provides a window to their everyday operations and activities. The blog is published together with the early childhood education personnel and partners.
The themes and topics of Vantastinen! Stem from the children, everyday life of early childhood education, research, development, cooperation, early childhood education and care curriculum, and pre-primary education and care curriculum.