Lasten sitoutuneisuus toimintaan : kvantitatiivinen havainnointitutkimus

Children s involvement is a key quality factor in Early Years Education. As a process variable it concentrates on children s actions and experiences. The involved children are operating in their zone of proximal development. The aim of this study was to find out how the children involved themselves in the Finnish day care centres. The problems of the study were: (1) how the children are involved in different situations between the hours 8.00 and 12.00, (2) how do the skills of children whose involvement level is high differ from the skills of children whose involvement level is low and (3) how do the learning environments of the children whose involvement level is high differ from the learning environments of the children whose involvement level is low? The research method was observation and children s involvement levels were assessed using LIS-YC Scale. In addition, the kindergarten teachers evaluated the children s skills and the team workers did the evaluations of the educational settings. The data used in this study was a part of the Orientaation lähteillä research. The 802 children, who took part in the study, were from 48 different groups of eight different municipalities in Central Uusimaa. There were 18358 observations of children s involvement and the quantitative data was analyzed using correlation, cross tabulation and t-test. Children s involvement was an average at a moderate level. The involvement levels were the highest during playing time and adult guided tasks and lowest during eating and basic care situations. The level of involvement was higher if the children were adaptable, proactive, self-motivated and good players. The involvement lever was lower if the children needed some special care. The children s involvement is supported if the educators had at least once a week a meeting and if children s confidence and identity construction was frequently considered in educational discussions. Furthermore, the appreciation of the ethical issues and positive atmosphere appeared to confirm the involvement. The children s involvement is decreased if the educators had been perpetually short of time or resources or there has been lack of joy and humour in the group.