Jari Lavonen Department of Teacher Education University of Helsinki, Finland Teachers - a major factor for successful educational systems: Reflections based on Finnish Teacher Education

Republic Finland 2 In northern Europe, area of km 2 (10 times bigger than Catalonia) 5,4 million people (70% of Catalonia) Success in - welfare - education

1. Finnish education context 2. Teacher professionalism 3. Teacher education 4. Discussion 3 Content of the presentation

4 4 Finnish education context

5 Characteristics of Finnish Education Laukkanen (2008), Niemi et al. (2012), Sahlberg (2011) 1. Educational equality - minimize the influence of socio/economic background - education is free (books, meals, health care, …) - well-organised special education (inclusion) and counselling According to PISA % of FI, 35% of CAN, 33% of U.S, 32% of SGB and 5% of UK teachers use pedagogy for supporting pupils with heterogeneous abilities to learn in all classes they have. 2. Devolution of decision power to the local level - leadership and management at school level the role of school principal is important - teachers are responsible for local curriculum and assessment

Outcome based –modelFinnish –model Aims asLearning outcomesBroad aims for teaching/ learning Important levelNational/district level planning and assessment Assessment and planning at the level of a school and classrooms +a learner knows what he/she should learn - competitive school culture: ranking of students and schools - “teaching to the test” +co-planning +a teacher conducts assessment for enhancing learning processes - problematic to compare the quality of learning outcomes and select students to next level

Values and Aims of a Finnish School Values: human rights (rights for high quality education), equality, democracy, natural diversity, preservation of environmental viability, endorsement of multiculturalism, individualism (responsibility, a sense of community), respect for the rights … Finnish society Partners Global Stakeholders Parents Learning of 21 st century competences Professional teachers Versatile knowledge base Collaboration skills Competence for life-long learning Local curriculum and environments Broad aims Versatile learning environments and use of technology Teaching and assessment methods Networks & partnerships Grade and subject teans School level teams School-family partnership City level teams Leadership and quality culture Distributed leadership & management Goal orientation and interaction Quality assurance Teams and teamwork Finnish school Diverse learners

Networks and partnerships Networks are for sharing (communicating) ideas, opinions and experiences Networks support adoption of educational innovations: The information flows through the networks (Rogers, 2003). In a partnership parties collaborate and share common aims, information and services: School-family-partnership facilitates the sharing of educational aims and responsibilities in order to support the development and learning of a pupil (Epstein, 2009). 8

Helsinki, February 2011, 12:00 Finnish educational context Teacher professionalism

Teacher professionalism refers to status of teachers and depends on (Müller et al, 2010; TALIS 2008 survey) individual characteristics (teacher knowledge, teaching philosophy, interaction skills, …) school level factors (shared leadership, collaboration, school-society-family partnership …) cultural and education policy factors at state level or context (accountability policy  trust culture, …) 10 All important

An “effective teacher” An effective teacher is able to support pupils’ learning and effectiveness is seen in pupils’ learning outcomes A link to accountability, where testing recognises effective and non-effective schools and teachers (Williamson & Walberg, 2004). Standards and accreditations are needed for teaching, teachers, schools and teacher education. (Bullough Jr., Clark & Patterson, 2003). According to PISA % of FI, 30% of CAN, 49% of AUS, 57% of U.S, 86% of SHA and 87% of SGB teachers feel that pupils’ assessments are used to make judgements about teachers’ effectiveness Finnish teachers focus on educating pupils towards the 21 st century aims than maximizing their test performance 11

Diverse definitions to professionalism (Hargreaves & Goodson, 1996; Evans, 2008; Freidson, 2001; Urban & Dalli, 2011; Evetts, 2012) Individual characteristics The professional (conceptual) knowledge base Self-regulation of and -control over the work (self- assessment). Specific professional ideology, incl. shared understanding of professional values and ethics code. Include social and individual elements Strong institutionalization of an occupational group. Autonomous role in planning and implementation. Work (activities) is complex and not easy to standardize. 12 high quality knowledge base networks & partnerships life-long- learning

Teacher leadership Broad meaning of teacher leadership fits with the Finnish teachers A teacher leader (Lieberman, 1992, Katzenmeyer & Moller, 2001; Harris, 2003) has a clear vision and is goal oriented can plan, implement and assess his/her own practice and pupils’ learning has deep understanding on teaching and learning is able to work collaboratively with other teachers is a facilitator, coach, mentor or a trainer of other teachers is able to consume research based knowledge Is a curriculum specialist and innovator for new approaches is able to use assessment outcomes for school development. … 13 high quality knowledge base networks & partnerships life-long- learning

4. Finnish Teacher Education Helsinki university main building Teachers are academic experts who are able to - autonomous decision making, - plan and implement learning activities - evaluate their own teaching and student s’ performance - lifelong learning (professional development) 3. Finnish Teacher Education

15 McKinsey &Company Auguste, B., Kihn, P., & Miller, M. (2010) Closing the talent gap: Attracting and retaining top third graduates to a career in teaching: An International and market research-based perspective. McKinsley & Company

“… most important part of any successful educational system — the teacher” SCIENCE, 13 th January 2012, Vol 335 Recruit the best and the brightest to be teachers, and train them well. Give them the independence from centralized authority, and time to prepare lessons and Finland acknowledges the central role of teachers in society, as demonstrated by the respect 16 Editor John E. Burris

17 Finnish Teacher Education Development Programme (2002): The teacher education programmes should help students to acquire: high-level subject knowledge and pedagogical content knowledge, and knowledge about nature of knowledge, social skills, like communication skills; skill to cooperate with other teachers, moral knowledge and skills, like social and moral code of the teaching profession, knowledge about school as an institute and its connections to the society (school community and partners, local contexts and stakeholders), skills needed in developing one’s own teaching and the teaching profession. academic skills, like research skills; skills to use ICT, skills needed in processes of developing a curricula, …. high quality knowledge base networks & partnerships life-long- learning

18 A secondary (subject) teacher typically teaches at grades 7 to 12 (ages 13 to 19) teaches typically one major and one minor subjects (e.g. math and physics) An elementary (primary) school teacher (a class teacher) teaches at grades 1 to 6 (ages 7 to 13) teaches typically all 13 subjects

19 Teacher education at the University of Helsinki University of Helsinki (11 faculties, students, staff members) Faculty of Behavioural Sciences Faculty of Arts Faculty of Science Faculty of Biosciences Faculty of Theology Faculty of Social Sciences Dept. of Teacher Education Teacher Training Schools Secondary teacher education: pedagogical studies + subject studies Primary teacher education

20 Structure of the Master’s degree of a secondary teacher: years, 300 cr Major Subject Minor Subject Pedagogical studies Communication and language studies Bachelor’s level (180 cr)Master’s level (120 cr) Master- thesis cr = 27 hours of work Study credits Ped. thesis Teachers benefit of the research orientation while they make the school curriculum, plan, implement and evaluate teaching and learning BSc thesis Teaching practice Subject knowledge, knowledge about teaching and learning, and school practise are integrated into the students’ own personal pedagogical theory/ view

21 The structure of the pedagogical studies in secondary teacher education programme in Finland In Finland huge amount of PCK is taught also at the departments of Physics, Chemistry,… Pedagogical studies in Finland (60 cp.) General courses on education, teaching and learning 13 cp Subject pedagogy (PCK) 17 cp Educational research 10 cp Teaching practice 20 cp - Psychology of development and learning 4 cp - Special needs education 4 cp - Social, historical, and philosophical basis of education 5 cp - Psychological basis of teaching and learning of a subject 5 cp - Curriculum development and planning of teaching 5 cp - Evaluation of teaching and learning, evaluation of a curriculum 7 cp - Research methodology in education 3 cp - Teacher as a researcher-seminar 3 cp - Minor thesis in pedagogy 4 cp - Supervisedbasic teaching practice 7 cp - Supervised applied teaching practice5 cp - Supervised advanced teaching practice 8 cp - Reflection supported by portfolio assessment work

Psychology of development and learning, 4 cp 22 Objectives: A student becomes familiar with development of an individual and group and identifies the special characteristics of the different groups. The student develops readiness to understand different views on the growth, development and learning of the human being and from the significance of the interaction between an individual and a group and takes the psychologic principles of the learning into consideration in the teaching.

23 Special Courses at the Department of Physics for Physics student teachers Master level courses Concepts and structures of physics I: Classical physics Concepts and structures of physics II: Modern physics Structures and processes of school physics Experimentation in school laboratory History and philosophy of physics Physics teachers‘ master thesis seminar

24 Structure of the master degree of a primary teacher: years Major Education or Ed. Psych. Multi- disciplinary studies Minor Subject Communication and language studies Bachelor’s level (180Bachelor’s level (180 cr)Master’s level (120 cr) Master- thesis Master- thesis cr = 27 hours of work Study credits BSc thesis Finnish language, PCK Mathematics, PCK Physics, PCK Chemistry, PCK Biology, PCK Geography, PCK History, PCK Religion/ethics PCK Sports Arts Music Crafts Pedagogical studies Teaching practice

The pedagogical studies helps the students … to integrate subject knowledge, knowledge about teaching and learning and school practice into their own personal pedagogical theory/view, to become aware of the different dimensions of the teacher profession: social, philosophical, psychological, sociological, and historical basis of education, to be able to reflect on their own personal pedagogical “theory/view” (reflection for, in and on action), to develop potentials for lifelong professional development. 25 Education Psy. = Psychology of development and learning; Spe. = Special needs education; Phil. = Social, historical, and philosophical basis of education; Sem.= Research methodology in education and teacher as a researcher-seminar; Pedagogy Cur. = Curriculum development and planning of subject teaching; Eval.= Evaluation of subject teaching and learning; Practice B_prac. = Basic Supervised teaching practice; Ap._prac.= Applied Supervised teaching practice; Ad._prac.= Advanced Supervised teaching practice

4. Quality Assurance of Finnish Teacher education programmes Department of Teacher Education

A new era in Quality Assurance (QA) for higher education Wolff (2004): The focus in QA is turning more and more to mastering changes, allowing ownership for developers Ehlers (2009) writes: … “In teacher education we need methods and practices that get deeper into organizations and closer to the teacher educators and learners.” 27

Levels of Quality Assurance in Finland Quality Assurance (QA) has three main levels: National audits and other national level external evaluations based on self-assessment at an institutional level Institutional, university level QA (University level QA office, committees feedback) Department and programme level QA processes (students’ evaluations and staff members’ self evaluations, feedback from local stakeholders). The interaction between levels through official (meetings of deans) and unofficial meetings (meetings inside the university) 28 Quality Culture instead of QA

Assessment of teachers Finnish trends Opposite trends (an example) Qualification Master degreeTeachers in US apply to the National Board for Professional Teaching Standards (use of portfolio, videotaped lesson, …) Standards for teachers No standardsAustralian professional standards for teachers Assessment (appraisal) Self-assessment and development discussions with the headmaster External appraisal and writing of evaluation sheets (S. Korea) Inspectors No-inspectorsHeavy inspection in England Testing No-national testing Teachers are valued based on their students’ success in national tests

30 Feedback Students learning outcomes and evaluations (feedback + self- evaluations) of the programme Municipality feedback Outcomes, Collection of students’ evaluations EU and National strategies Curriculum - framework - local Assessment Research on - subject matter - teaching and learning - needs of learners - policy, history,... → Content Research on teacher education - Structure of teacher knowledge - Forms of knowledge: professional …practical - Teacher identity - Agency University pedagogy Own research on teacher education Framework for designing a teacher education programme at the University of Helsinki Subject teacher education programme Co-operative planning of the programme: Teachers from the subject departments, Department of teacher education, school teachers, principals and student teachers

Discussion

Finnish teachers, in general, are effective in the traditional meaning of teacher effectiveness: Finnish students perform well: (they have achieved the highest scores in reading–, mathematics–, and scientific-literacy assessments in PISA). The low variation of performance in results indicates that all teachers and schools are in general very similar. In Finland, the teacher effectiveness /professionalism could be discussed in the context of ‘input’ - instead of the widely accepted ‘output approach’ 32

1. A versatile knowledge base Subject matter knowledge: the broad meanings of concepts; epistemological, ontological and methodological issues related to the subject. PCK and GPK, which are needed for (broad) planning (including the local curriculum), implementation and assessment of teaching and learning. Moral and ethical knowledge in order to work ethically correctly with students and parents. Skills needed in producing and consuming research based knowledge. 33 The planning and assessment of teaching and learning are based on 1) the local curriculum and 2) the different needs of the students.

2. Life-long-learning competencies Skills needed in evaluating and developing the teaching profession: learning of new subject matter and pedagogical knowledge, for example, from a book, journal or an in- service training course… Skills and the willingness to engage in collaborative and creative processes. 34 A creative teacher recognises problems around him/her, is able to generate alternatives for solving the problems and able to select the most appropriate solution among the alternatives.

3. Readiness for collaboration and partnership Readiness for collaboration inside the school : Multiprofessional teams Readiness for collaboration with parents. Readiness for school society/industry/… partnership. Schools are not isolated institutes in a society. 35

36 more...less... professionalism – bureaucracy long term policy and a vision – ad hoc ideas coming from the politicians decentralization, decision making, assessment and quality culture at local level – standardization, inspection, national testing and heavy quality control trust based responsibility (self-evaluations, listening of students and municipality people/ parents voice) – test and inspection based accountability collaboration, networking and partnerships – competition and rankings In education we need …

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