Multi-professional teamwork in Finnish early childhood education and care

Abstract

This article analyses the theoretical, practical, and political interpretations of multi-professional teamwork in Finnish early childhood education and care during the last two decades. A semi-systematic approach was used to provide an overview of teams, teamwork, team composition, and multi-professionalism. The data were drawn from two main sources: key Finnish policy documents that regulate or guide multi-professional teamwork and a systematic literature review of multi-professional teamwork in Finnish research studies over the past 20 years. The data were examined through the lens of thematic analysis. In the final phase of the analysis, we constructed a narrative timeline. The timeline indicates two main themes: one is an emphasis on multi-professional teamwork as a resource combined with the challenges in implementing it, the other is an emphasis on pedagogy and the clarification of professional profiles. The timeline illustrates changes in the ways multi-professional teamwork has been interpreted, guided, and studied.