Introduction
The chapters collected in this book contribute to three interconnected fields of activity and scholarship. First of all, within curriculum studies is the theory and practice of multiliteracies ā sometimes found within language arts or literacy (depending on how different countries name their mother tongue instruction as a subject in the curriculum) and sometimes defined as a cross-curricular future-oriented theme. Second is the development of multiliteracies by children within early years education ā sometimes conceptualized developmentally in terms of the growing child's entry into their culture (so learning not just print literacy but also digital, media, and visual literacies) and sometimes understood as the application of a particular theory of literacy instruction in structured early years provision. And finally, although the contributors to this volume come from Australia, the United States, the United Kingdom, and Norway, it is also a book rooted in curriculum innovation in Finland and scholarship surrounding the implementation of an imaginative project in that context ā thus the volume as a whole contributes to comparative educational study.
The rest of this Introduction is structured around each of these areas, but before moving on to each theme in detail, we want to show how bringing these three contexts together constitutes an original way of investigating curriculum reform. The book came about as a result of a seminar held as part of Monilukutaitoa Opitaan Ilolla (MOI; The Joy of Learning Multiliteracies), a research and development project funded by the Finnish Ministry of Education and Culture. MOI itself was initiated in response to the ways that the concept of āmultiliteraciesā was named and placed in national curriculum development in 2016.
While Finland has an extraordinary international reputation for the quality of its education and care, especially when it comes to early years (see below), it does not have a particular history of work in multiliteracies ā that term and concept deriving more from an Anglo tradition in Canada, the United States, the United Kingdom, and Australia. The 2016 curriculum mandate, and indeed MOI, thus raised a number of questions:
1How might new curriculum content and different pedagogies trouble established practice? Even though early years education in Finland is highly developed, highly institutionalized, and well financed, it may, nevertheless, be impervious to change or reform.
2How can innovations be introduced at scale? A new national curriculum mandate plays out differently in a country like Finland, with its tradition of local accountability and significant local and regional variation. How do innovations in theory and practice, like multiliteracies, work through a system like this?
3How can teacher expertise in the area of multiliteracies be supported and developed? This is not a field where conventionally teachers have much expertise, even though the national education system in Finland is renowned for highly trained educators and respect for teacher autonomy and independence.
4How can standards be benchmarked and meaningful learning progressions be described in a more open and emerging conceptual field (referring to multiliteracies and early years)? What might constitute evidence of changes in learning, understanding, and knowledge?
5How can multiliteracies be conceptualized, both as a new school subject and/or a way of accounting for children's learning in contemporary society? The field of multiliteracies challenges the relationship between home and school knowledge and indeed the ways that contemporary digital practices might be out of step with how schools define literacy learning in practice.
These are both practical and theoretical challenges. By drawing on comparative international experience, MOI attempted to look beyond its program remit to see how it might offer the introduction of multiliteracies into early years in Finland as a case study in curriculum reform. It thus asked a range of practical, conceptual, and theoretical questions needing evidence from teachers, learners, and the development of curriculum materials to begin to answer what difference a program like this might make. The contributions in this volume contribute to that debate. Even though some of the cases described may be of more interest to specialized early years educators, we hope that by framing the project as an exercise in more widespread curriculum reform, and thus asking questions to teachers and what might be at stake in transforming classroom practice, we challenge all progressive education initiatives to take on board the whole system, classroom, teacher expertise, and learner experience dimensions of change.
Even though only half the chapters in this book describe learning, classrooms, and curriculum innovation from Finland in the context of the 2016 curriculum reforms, assumptions about the arrangement of early years education and its associated practices do provide a kind of norm for all of the chapters in the book. Questions about teacher expertise, the assessment of learning and development, as well as the legal framework around curriculum reform and what it might mean to mandate āmultiliteraciesā are either set against or derived from the Finnish experience. Thus, a very brief introduction to the education system in Finland, curriculum, and teacher education comprise the next section, including a subsection on early years, given that introducing multiliteracies into early years was an unusual and imaginative development. The second section deals with questions about the meaning and nature of multiliteracies themselves: as a school subject, as pedagogy, as a theory of cultural development, and as an educational project. As a number of chapters in the book draw on MOI, the third section outlines the project in more detail, and will be of interest as background to readers of chapters dealing with the reform in action. Finally, this Introduction offers an overview of the chapters in this volume, showing how and in what ways they address both the history and challenges raised in the preceding discussion.
Education of young children in Finland
Finland performs well on many indicators of development, with high efficiency in education (OECD, 2016c) and high levels of literacy (Miller & McCenna, 2016). A deeply shared commitment to democracy and equality has enabled Finland to develop a world-class welfare and education system (Castells & Himanen, 2002; Miettinen, 2013). Driven in part by a small population size, Finland's policy-makers have shown a dedication to investment in human capital and development, and hence in mainstream education, health, and welfare services, which has been critical to ensuring the success of the information economy and Finland's overall survival and prosperity. The nation's commitment to early childhood ā now shown by researchers to promote human capital, educational equity, social cohesion, and socioeconomic prosperity (Heckman, 2011; Heckman & Masterov, 2007; Heckman, Pinto, & Savelyev, 2013) ā has been a core element of the Finnish society for decades.
The Finnish Early Childhood Education and Care (ECEC) system is characterized by comprehensive and adaptive ECEC services available to all children and families, backed by a professional ECEC workforce. A quality ECEC program, guided by the National Core Curriculum, promotes local adaptation so as to be responsive to each child's learning and development. The unique features of the Finnish education system, including the intrinsic value it places on childhood and play, its āwhole childā-centered approach to ECEC, and the trust it places in teachers' and institutions' self-accountability, instead of externally controlled, high-stakes testing and inspections, continue to attract international interest.
Nonetheless, Finland's ECEC policies and services are in a state of flux and face challenges emanating from major societal, demographic, cultural, and economic changes. In parallel, global educational reform movements are introducing new trends and principles to the Finnish ECEC system, emphasizing increased accountability, standardization, and privatization (Paananen, Kumpulainen, & Lipponen, 2015). It is unclear how these trends ā which largely contradict the fundamental beliefs that undergird the Finnish ECEC system ā will unfold in the future. Consequently, the present ECEC system of Finland must be read against the backdrop of a dynamic, continually evolving society.
In Finland, the state plays an important role in developing and managing welfare policies and services. The government's responsibility to provide education, health, welfare, and security is written into the Finnish Constitution, so that citizens are guaranteed the right to an income and care. Universal and integrated ECEC services ensure that children and their families, wherever they live and whatever their social, economic, ethnic, or cultural backgrounds, have access to an array of nationally defined, universally offered, ECEC services.
The ideological orientation of the Finnish system sets ECEC deeply within a social welfare context. Finnish society and public policies largely rest on a Nordic welfare model, with a national social contract serving as the basis for universally available public services that aim to provide high-quality education and care for children and their families on fair and equal grounds. Broadly, Finnish society and policies are based on three core principles associated with the Nordic welfare model: universalism (social welfare programs for all citizens), social rights (citizenship as a basis of entitlement), and equality (equal access to services) (Miettinen, 2013).
Early Childhood Education and Care services
All children between the ages of 0 and 6 have a universal right to ECEC services, which may take the form of center-based, family-based, or open services. Importantly, only the final year (pre-primary) is compulsory, followed by primary education beginning the year children turn 7. Although both are compulsory, pre-primary education is considered part of ECEC, whereas primary education is part of basic education, which extends through secondary education. As pre-primary education is only for half a day, most 6-year-old children in Finland also use other ECEC services in their pre-primary year. A key principle framing Finnish ECEC services is parental choice, and this has led to a wide variety of ECEC options.
The most common form of ECEC provision in Finland is center-based, where children are generally organized into age groups of 0ā3 and 3ā5. Six-year-olds form a separate group, as they attend a pre-primary education program. Center-based ECEC is offered by municipalities, municipality-outsourced ECEC providers, and private ECEC service providers, which can be either for-profit or not-for-profit, and may specialize in particular activities (such as languages, arts, or sports) or advance a specific pedagogical approach (e.g., Montessori or Reggio Emilia). Regardless of these differences, all ECEC service providers must meet Finnish legal requirements for the provision of ECEC, that is, they must adhere to quality measures, such as the National Core Curriculum, adultāchild ratios, professional qualifications, and staffing patterns and structures. The municipality and Regional State Administrative Agencies (AVIs, aluehallintovirasto) are jointly responsible for overseeing the provision of all ECEC programs in their area (Kumpulainen, 2018).
Pre-primary education, which typically begins in the autumn of the year a child turns 6, is designed to support children's learning, development, well-being, and smooth transition to school. Although pre-primary education was made compulsory in 2015, attendance rates prior to this change were already high, hovering at above 98 percent (Kumpulainen, 2015). Today, compulsory pre-primary education is organized for 700 hours per academic year, or about 4 hours per day. With costs fully covered by the state, it is provided free of charge to children, including all materials and meals. In addition, children who live over 5 km from their pre-primary education provider, or who live where the route is deemed dangerous, are entitled to free transport (EDUFI, 2017).
All Finnish pre-primary education follows both the National Core Curriculum and a local curriculum; Individual Education Plans (IEPs) are also created for each child. Approximately 80 percent of pre-primary students are enrolled in services organized by ECEC centers, with the remaining 20 percent participating in pre-primary education on the premises of primary schools (Kumpulainen, 2015). About 6ā8 percent of children attend pre-primary education offered by private, for-profit ECEC providers, situated either in schools or ECEC centers.
Curriculum framework
Finland's national curriculum framework for ECEC covers children between the ages of 0 and 5. Although separate curricula exist for pre-primary and primary education, all three are designed to ensure quality, equity, and effectiveness, and are thematically linked to support children's continuous learning. The curricula are the responsibility of the Finnish National Agency for Education (EDUFI) and are developed in partnership with a range of stakeholders, experts, and citizens, including educational policy-makers, teachers, and other ECEC professionals, families, trade unions, professional organizations, and research communities.
The Finnish ECEC and pre-primary curricula are pedagogically underpinned by recognition of the intrinsic value of childhood and an emphasis on the importance of play for development and learning. Drawing on socio-constructivist and sociocultural theories of learning and development, they incorporate children's own cultures, previous experience, knowledge, skills, and personal interests as important building blocks (EDUFI, 2016a, b). Learning is considered a holistic process in which actions, emotions, sensory perceptions, and bodily experiences interact. As a result, the ECEC curriculum does not set specified learning or performance targets for children under the age of 6; instead, it promotes child-centered pedagogy and humanistic values inspired by the Froebelian approach (Froebel, 1887), which stresses children's agency and autonomy.
Finland is also noted for its adherence to child-centered pedagogy and practice. Enhancing children's trust in their own abilities and strengths as learners ā through positive emotional experiences and opportunities for child-directed play, inquiry, and imagination ā is regarded as an essential aspect of ECEC (Kumpulainen, 2018). Simultaneously, there is an emphasis on encouraging social interactions and relationships, and creating a sense of community among children, ECEC staff, families, and the local community (EDUFI, 2016a, b).
The content of the Finnish National Core Curriculum for ECEC, including pre-primary education, is organized into five core entities (EDUFI, 2016a). These cover (1) Diverse forms of expression: including music, visual arts, crafts, and physical and verbal expression; (2) Rich world of language: including linguistic skills and competencies, and language as a tool for thinking, expression, and interaction; (3) Me and our community: aiming to help children understand themselves and others while appreciating diversity in society; (4) Explori...
