Helena Grierson - OECD

1 Helena GriersonEarly Childhood Educationand Care Policy in FinlandBackground report preparedfor the OECD Thematic Reviewof Early Childhood Educationand Care PolicyMay 2000 Finland has granted the OECD permission to include this document on the OECD Internet Home Page. Theviews expressed in the document are those of the authors and not necessarily those of Finland, the OECD or itsMember countries. The copyright conditions governing access to information on the OECD Home Page areprovided .. information on Finland .. policy .. of social and health care services in Finland .. 3 Overview of Finnish family policy .. of educational services in Finland .. 5 Overview of Finnish education policy .. Finnish ECEC system .. 6 SECTION I: DEFINITIONS AND change in in families .. s entry into working life.

2 With children aged 0 7 and the parents employment situation .. system of family policy benefit .. available on the birth of a child .. 14 Maternity grant .. 14 Maternity leave and maternity allowance .. 15 Paternity leave and paternity 15 Parental leave and parental allowance .. for the care of small 16 Child-care leave and child home care allowance .. 16 Partial child-care leave .. 17 Partial home care 17 Private child-care allowance .. 17 Housing allowance, maintenance allowance and home help .. 17 Other forms of support .. kindergarten to day-care centre .. of family day folk school to comprehensive day care today .. day care .. forms of ECEC .. of the different child-care arrangements .. 26 SECTION II: .. of a child .. activities .. management in social and health care.

3 30 Inspection and evaluation of children s day care .. 30 Inspection and evaluation of education .. 31iiiSECTION III: and access .. history of children s day care .. situation .. 34 Number of children in municipal day care .. 34 Access to day care .. education for six-year-olds in day care and at school .. activities provided by other bodies .. in working conditions and the need for shift care .. of children in day care aged under one .. 39 SECTION IV: REGULATIONS .. in steering .. of 40 National level .. 40 Provincial 41 Local level .. 41 Research organisations .. 41 SECTION V: STAFFING .. qualifications and dimensioning at day-care qualifications and dimensioning in family day qualifications and dimensioning in the educational current state of training.

4 Staff training .. equality in the staff structure .. of day-care staff to their work .. , staff turnover, role of the trade unions .. 47 SECTION VI: PROGRAMME CONTENT AND content and of for six-year-olds pre-school education .. s special needs in ECEC .. of language and culture in ECEC .. from home to day care and from day care to 51 SECTION VII: FAMILY ENGAGEMENT AND SUPPORT .. engagement and Overview .. Forms of co-operation .. Co-operation between parents .. 54ivSECTION VIII: FUNDING AND FINANCING .. and fees .. Overview of the financing of Financing of ECEC Financing of the educational 57 SECTION IX: PRE-SCHOOL REFORM .. reform of 2000 2001 .. Background for reform .. Pre-school arrangements .. Concept of pre-school 59 Objectives of pre-school education.

5 59 Implementation of pre-school education .. 59 Pre-school Pre-school reform and financing .. The issue of lowering the compulsory school age in Finland .. 61 CONCLUSIONS .. and research in the fields of early childhood education andcare and pre-school education .. 69 List of with children under 7 years of age in 1998 in terms of employment,unemployment and economic of child benefit in 1999 .. in the number of day-care places in 1985 1997 .. in municipal day care on 31st January 1999 .. participating in municipal pre-school of 6-year-olds in pre-school education in January 1999 .. earnings in children s day care and basic 6 years old children in different language groups in 51 List of of the provinces .. ECEC system for children aged 0 6 in types with children under 7 years of of family benefits in 1997.

6 Of day care for children aged under 3 at the end of care for children aged under 7 at the end of 1998 .. in municipal day-care places in 1970 1999 .. 341. General information on FinlandFINLAND is located in Northern Europe and has borders with Sweden, Norway and Rus-sia. Finland s surface area covers 338 000 km2 and there are million inhabitants. Fin-land is thus a sparsely populated country: there are 17 inhabitants per square is a republic, the authority of which is vested in the democratically elected Parlia-ment. There are 200 members of Parliament. The Government elected in the spring of 1999is known as the Rainbow Government because it has representatives from 5 parties: theSocial Democratic Party, the National Coalition Party, the Swedish People s Party in Fin-land, the Left Wing Alliance and the Finnish Green League.

7 Since the division of the pro-vinces was reformed in 1997, Finland has been divided into 6 provinces (one of which isthe autonomous Province of land), instead of the former 12. There are 452 municipalities,which enjoy extensive autonomy. The size of municipalities varies from 130 inhabitants tohalf a the end of 1998, there were about million families in Finland, 635 000 of which hadchildren. Of those families with children, 18% were single-parent families. The averagenumber of children in one family was , and a total of 57 200 children were born duringthe is a bilingual country, its national languages being Finnish and Swedish. Swedish-speaking people account for about 5% of the population, amounting to 300 000. In addition,the S mi (Lappish) language is spoken in the S mi domicile area in Lapland.

8 There are ap-proximately 6 800 people who speak S mi, 1 700 of them living in Finland. Other minori-ties include the Romany, of whom there are about 10,000. Immigrants represent 150 diffe-rent nationalities in Finnish currency is the mark ormarkka(FIM). 1 = FIM 5, 1998, Finnish wage and salary earners average (gross) earnings for regular workinghours were 1 899 per month (FIM 11 300/month). The disposable income of householdsin 1998 amounted to 11 412 per capita (FIM 67 900).In the beginning of the 1990 s, Finland suffered the deepest economic recession since theSecond World War. The effects of the recession have shown themselves in the form ofmass unemployment, for example. As tax revenues diminished, the State and the localauthorities also reduced their 1. Division of the provinces since 1997 Division of the provinces1.

9 Province of Southern Finland, 92 municipalities,population 2 million2. Province of Western Finland, 205 municipalities,population million3. Province of Eastern Finland, 68 municipalities,population million4. Province of Oulu, 52 municipalities,population million5. Province of Lapland, 22 municipalities,population million6. Province of land, 16 municipalities,population policyTHE FINNISH Government Programme adopted in the spring of 1999 contains several ob-jectives and policy definitions, which are important from the perspective of early childhoodeducation and care and pre-school education. The general objective is for Finland to be anequitable and motivating, socially sound and undivided state. The future of Finland and ofFinns is strongly linked to knowledge and expertise as well as the ability to utilise thisknow-how and expertise and to create new innovations.

10 Raising the level of expertise of thewhole population willsupport Finland s development as a civilised to the Government Programme, Finland will be developed into aninformationsociety, in which knowledge and expertise will be part of the culture and the key factor inproduction. Finland is seeking to play a pioneering role in implementing a humane andsustainable information society. This implies, for example, the development of electronicservices, as well as of cultural and information content that is easy-to-use, safe and avai-lable to everyone because of microcomputers, digital television and mobile phones. Thestrategic development of the Finnish information society will emphasise co-operation be-tween different sectors and administrative branches and also co-operation on an interna-tional to its Programme, in terms of family policy, the Government will, among otherthings, promote such conditions and co-operation between various quartersthat support responsible parenthood, a secure growth environment and progress towardsbalanced adult maturity; develop morning and afternoon care for small schoolchildren; safeguard varied alternatives in the organisation of child care; endeavour to increase the flexibility of day care so that it will better correspond to theneeds of early childhood education and care and the changed labour market.