Pre-primary education
In Hämeenlinna, pre-primary education is provided in conjunction with daycare centres and comprehensive schools.
In pre-primary education, children learn through play, movement, exploration, and artistic activities.
The primary task of pre-primary education is to promote a child’s growth, development, and learning. Pre-primary education activities consider the child’s individual strengths and needs, as well as their ways of acting, doing, and learning. Pre-primary education offers opportunities for diverse interaction with other children of the same age. In pre-primary education, children have the chance to get excited, experiment, and learn new things.
It is the guardian’s responsibility to ensure that their child participates in pre-primary education or other activities that achieve the objectives of pre-primary education in the year preceding the start of compulsory education. Pre-primary education lasts 4 hours daily and is free of charge.
In Hämeenlinna, pre-primary education is provided in conjunction with both daycare centres and comprehensive schools, and a pre-primary education place is allocated to the child according to the city’s principles for admitting pre-primary pupils.
The curriculum for pre-primary education in the City of Hämeenlinna aims to guarantee high-quality and equal pre-primary education. The curriculum for pre-primary education in the City of Hämeenlinna is based on the Basic Education Act and the national core curriculum for pre-primary education.
Enrolling in pre-primary education
Guardians will be informed about enrolment for pre-primary education via a Suomi.fi message before the enrolment period begins. Enrolment for pre-primary education takes place at the beginning of the year when the child turns six years old.
Hämeenlinna also has forest or nature-based pre-primary education groups. If a forest or nature-based pre-primary education group operates in conjunction with your child’s municipal pre-primary education place and you wish for your child to be placed there, please mention your preference in the ‘Additional information’ section of the application form.
If you wish for your child to have a pre-primary education place in a private daycare centre, select ‘service voucher’ as the operating model on the application and indicate your preferred service voucher unit.
Pre-primary education lasts 4 hours daily and is free of charge. If your child requires supplementary early childhood education in addition to pre-primary education, please submit a separate application for it. Pre-primary education ends annually on 31 May, after which early childhood education must be applied for the summer period as needed.
Pre-primary education absences
Pre-primary education is regulated by the Basic Education Act and is compulsory. Compulsory means that a child must participate in one year of pre-primary education or other activities that achieve the objectives of pre-primary education in the year preceding the start of compulsory education.
If a child needs to be absent from pre-primary education, an application for absence must be submitted. Absences lasting less than a week should be applied for from the pre-primary education teacher, while absences exceeding one week require an email application to the daycare centre director.
School transport for pre-primary pupils
If your child requires transport for pre-primary education, you can find information on applying for school transport and the school transport criteria here: