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From Bob Kansky. Our thanks to him for providing this. He
reduced the 167 pages of the book Finnish Lessons: What can the
world learn from educational change in Finland? by Pasi
Sahlberg, Director General of the Centre for International Mobility
and Cooperation at the Finnish Ministry of Education (2011), to 9
pages that make the attachment. This follows the posting Tuesday,
November 27, 2012 on "Why Finland's Unorthodox Education System
Is The Best In The World" to which there was an enthusiastic
response - as Bob writes, this puts flesh on the 27 interesting slides
found at the Business Insider given in the earlier posting:
http://www.businessinsider.com/finlands-education-system-best-in-world-2012-11?op=1
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Introduction to Finnish Lessons: What can the world
learn from educational change in Finland?
In the course of about three decades (1980-2010), the national
education system of Finland progressed from one which was
"nothing special" to one that produces students whose
academic achievement is so consistently outstanding that Finland's
system is often referred to as the best in the world. This book
describes how Finland achieved that transformation.
In Finnish Lessons, Pasi Sahlberg Director General of the
Centre for International Mobility and Cooperation at the Finnish
Ministry of Education, details the policy decisions that guided that
transformation. He documents the choice of policies that
chose not to embrace "tougher competition, more
data, abolishing teacher unions, opening more charter schools, or
employing corporate-world management models in education
systems." To the contrary, Finnish policies focused on
"improving the teaching force, limiting student testing to a
necessary minimum, placing responsibility and trust before
accountability, and handing over school- and district-level leadership
to education professionals." The result is an educational
system that "lacks school inspection, standardized curriculum,
high-stakes student assessments, test-based accountability, and a
race-to-the-top mentality with regard to educational
change."
Sahlberg characterizes the policies of the current system as (a)
having a vision of education committed to building a publicly financed
and locally governed basic school for every child, (b) building on
educational ideas from other nations to produce the unique
"Finnish Way" that "preserves the best of traditions
and present good practices," and (c) systematically developing
respectful and interesting working conditions for teachers and leaders
in Finnish schools. The Finnish experience in building an
education system in which all students learn well is one that has
focused on equity and cooperation rather than choice and competition
and that rejects the paying of teachers based on students' test scores
or converting public schools to private schools.
The text of Finnish Lessons details ten underlying
notions.
1. The current Finnish system of education is one in which
students learn well and performance differences among schools are
small.
2. The above has not always been so.
3. Teaching is widely viewed as a prestigious
profession.
4. Finland has one of the world's most competitive
teacher-preparation systems.
5. Finnish teachers have a great deal of professional
autonomy and lifelong access to purposeful professional
development.
6. Those who become teachers typically are "teachers
for life."
7. Almost half of the students completing the Finnish
nine-year comprehensive school (the peruskoulu) have
experienced some sort of special education.
8. Finnish teachers invest less time in
teaching and Finnish students spend less time in
studying than do their peers in other countries.
9. Finnish schools do not engage in standardized testing,
test preparation, or private tutoring.
10. The policies and practices of Finnish education are
contrary to those of those of most other countries of the world --
specifically, those of the United States.
The current, and highly effective Finnish system of education is
the result of decades of determined and continuous refinement of
policies and practices. Finland did not attempt to simply
transplant the ideas of education into the Finnish system; rather it
modified promising ideas to fit the Finnish context. Neither did
the process for improving education Finland jump from one "big
idea" to another; rather, it committed to informed, long-term
refinement of policies and practices based upon educators' evaluation
of the effects of those policies and practices on student
learning.
Go to the attachment for Bob Kansky's
pages.
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--
Jerry P. Becker
Dept. of Curriculum & Instruction
Southern Illinois University
625 Wham Drive
Mail Code 4610
Carbondale, IL 62901-4610
Phone: (618) 453-4241 [O]
(618) 457-8903 [H]
Fax: (618) 453-4244
E-mail: jbecker@siu.edu