Week 9 28/02/11-6/03/11

On Monday there was a plethora of Finnish flags in the city.  Usually there are very few Finland flags but Monday was Kalevala Day.  It was a day which celebrates the completion of Kalevala, a Finnish poem from ancient oral tradition.  The material, comprises old Finnish ballads and lyrical songs depicting "the sons of Kalevala", and was first published in two editions in 1835 and in 1849.  It was good to see Finland flying their flag as last weekend I was in Stockholm with a few students and we commented on how Sweden flies their flag with pride.

This week I observed a class at Turku International School where I do my school placement.  The class was a games lesson.  For sport the Finnish schools provide the possibilities to as many sports as possible, so one term the pupils will do cross-country skiing and the next boys will learn ice hockey skills and girls will be taught some figure skating techniques.  It was fascinating when my assigned teacher told me that the schools provide all the equipment and winter sports have a lot of equipment and most of it is expensive.  Helmets, skies, ice skates, etc are all paid for by the school system.  The lesson took place on an ice rink under the school in an old nuclear bunker.  The teachers have a good relationship with the pupils and because of the status teachers have it means that the pupils respect the teacher, although there is still the odd occasion where pupils act out of turn, but it instantly stopped when the teacher said something to the pupil.  There is also a break of fifteen minutes between each lesson in which the pupils have a break or recess and it allows for the teacher to prepare for the next class.  The class I observed was grade 6 which is the equivalent to years 8/9 although they are still in the primary education stream due to their later starting age.

With one of my classes, Finnish schools in the light of international comparison, we created a presentation on our home countries school system compared to Finland’s.  The Nigerian system was rather striking at how religion, politics and the former British colonial powers had, and still does, influence the school system.  To attend a university in Nigeria you can take British A-levels to gain entry.  Other countries which were compared to the Finnish system was; Spain, USA, South Korea, China, Nigeria, Armenia, Russia and the UK.  I learnt that South Korea had the highest PISA result and how vastly different their school system is as there is very few holidays with a lot of independent study and a long school day 2 or 3 hours longer than our system.   

Picture: Stockholm, the Swedish seem more proud about their flag and nation than the Finns.