Education

Adolphe Ferrière: .. Ja niin luotiin koulu Paholaisen ohjeiden mukaisesti. Lapset rakastavat luontoa, heidät suljettiin luokkahuoneisiin. Lapsista oli leikkiminen hauskaa, heidät pantiin tekemään työtä. He tahtoivat nähdä tuloksia työstään; huolehdittiin siitä, ettei heidän työstään ole näkyviä tuloksia. Lapset haluavat liikkua, heidät pakotettiin istumaan hiljaa. He tahtovat olla tekemisissä esineiden kanssa, heidät asetettiin kosketuksiin aatteiden kanssa. He tahtoivat käyttää käsiään, heidän annettiin työskennellä ainoastaan aivoillaan. He rakastavat puhumista, heidän käskettiin olla hiljaa. Heillä on halu keskustella, heidät pakotettiin ulkolukuun. He tahtoivat itse etsiä tietoa, heille tarjoiltiin tiedot valmiiksipurtuina. He haluavat seurata mielikuvituksensa lentoa, heidät pakotettiin aikuisten ikeen alle. He tahtovat tehdä palveluksensa vapaasti, omasta aloitteestaan, heidät opetettiin tottelemaan passiivisesti. Simul ac caveder (kuten kuollut ruumis). Ja Paholainen nauroi partaansa. (Bruhn 1968, ss. 7-8)

The presentation is a showcase of a Finnish teacher studies and Finnish Teacher Training School of Savonlinna.

During the video presentation we  will explore the ways of practice in Finnish schools, as well as how do we use modern ubiquitous technology, such as tablets, to promote learner oriented methods and inquiry based learning in a socio-constructive context.
We will also familiarize ourselves with links between teacher training and actual practice in schools in Finland.

We-are-Europe-project from six EU countries aimed to develop and implement a concept for innovative learning modules for 10-to 14-year-old students. It adopted the theoretical perspective of purposive history and interdisciplinary approaches in order to elicit children's perspectives (Prout 211; Karlsson 2013), studies of the child's perspective (Karlsson 2013; Hohti & Karlsson 2014; Mayall 2008). The idea was for awaken or deepen their interest in Europe. Methodologically, the project promoted the localized involvements of teachers and students according to what makes more sense for them to develop in their particular contexts of learning: thus, they were able to choose the activities and resources that are most interesting for them. The aim of this research project is to elicit children's knowledge. In Finland the students (N=170) have had (spring 2016) a possibility to carry out studies and then produce material and activities related to their own countries as well as the children's and adolescents' cultures. The students also produced stories with Storycrafting method (Karlsson 2000; 2013). The main idea is to give children the floor and the opportunity to learn from each other. Our study focuses on three dimensions. First we take a look at the presentations and video presentations, developed by Finnish children. What is shown to children from other countries, what is not? Which values and attitudes are presented? Secondly, we dive deep inside the change which happened during the project, whether it is in a child's view of his own country and nationality, being a member of European Union or how she/he sees another nationalities in EU. Third part is a teacher's view: how did a teacher and teacher trainer experienced a child centered method in practice. As our methods we used a qualitative content analyzes. Projected results seem to be well within the focus areas. Students enjoy working with child centered way where they have a complete ownership of project: what, how, when and finally why, they are working with the project. And from a teacher's point of view, giving a lead to students is challenging yet rewarding: there is an implication that learning could be deeper with methods of children's perspectives.

Mikä on oppikirja ?-kolme perspektiiviä käsitteeseen "Oletetaan jokin mielivaltainen väite, esimerkiksi 'ulkona sataa'. Voin sitten kieltää väitteen sanomalla ' ulkona ei sada'. Voin seuraavaksi kieltää jälkimmäisen lauseen 'ei ole niin, että ulkona ei sada', mutta silloin ulkona sataa. " Airaksinen, Minuuden rakentajat, 1999, 24.

One of the goals of education is to create responsible citizens who can adequately understand the problems faced by their societies and who can then act to help solve them. Such behaviour can be fostered through proper education that facilitates expert knowledge about social issues, nurtures the ability to think critically and learns the skills needed to pro-actively search for possible solutions. Through this study we aimed to develop an Information and Communication Technologies (ICT) supported pedagogical framework, Children as Agents of Social Change (CASC), as a possible vehicle to facilitate appropriate education about social issues. This article analyses the first implementation of the CASC framework carried out at schools in Tanzania. Forest fires in Tanzania are often caused by human activity and education about this pressing problem needs to be provisioned on a large scale. However, due to a lack of teachers and teacher expertise, this is not the reality. With help of the local community, we created a locally contextualised video supported by a Problem Based Learning (PBL) solution to connect local forest experts with school students. These students then creatively conducted PBL activities in order to help solve local environmental and conservation problems. Data was collected through pre-and post-tests of control-experimental groups and teacher interviews. Results suggest that the participants were enlightened as to a variety of active problem solving possibilities and that they ranked the CASC methodology as an effective approach to sustainability.