AIBU to think the Finnish school system can't be this good....

[2boyz1girl]

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And it's just the media jumping on the bandwagon.....

Bruffin- short daylight hours? Not a lot to do on those long winter nights but pour a drink...

The high suicide rate is apparently linked to day light hours and again apparently the Finnish (well Scandis in general) are not known for their social lives.

It has also has a high murder rate, twice that of sweden and the highest in western europe.

There might be a couple of explanations for that that have nothing to do with their school system. One is the relatively easy access to weapons in a country where so many people hunt for food and use heavy tools like axes for woodwork etc. They don't have the American attitude about rights to own weapons to defend yourself- but weapons are still around because so many people have a perfectly legitimate reason for owning them.

The second, which I suspect is the most important, is their adherence to Eastern European drinking habits. Aquavit is socially riskier than red wine: you get drunk quicker, you get hooked on drinking quicker, many people get more aggressive on it. And there is a lot of home-brewing.

Swedes sit with one foot in each camp: they are partly Eastern Europeans, partly wooed by a more continental way of life, plus they have historically had a very strong temperance movement (dying out in my generation).

But its the result of education that really matters, às i have pointed out previously having worked for and with Finns , i am really not impressed with the results.

You worked with a few Finns, that's not indicative of the nation as a whole bruffin

The high murder rate is directly linked to the high alcohol consumption - most murders occur when the murderer has been drinking (and usually the victim too), the other big cause (which is dying down now thanks to better mental health care and education about mental health and depression and whatnot) is murder-suicides, happened a lot in the 90s during the big economic crash (when the Soviet Union collapsed, which was Finland's biggest trading partner so caused a massive recession) and many men lost everything and then killed their entire families and then themselves.
On the plus side, alcohol habits are changing now, many are switching to a more Continental approach with wine gaining in popularity as well as craft beers and less with the spirits, it's particularly changing amongst young people who are increasingly choosing not to drink at all, or then very little (unlike the typical Finnish youth who start binge drinking at 14/15 and never stop)

Rafals If I were in charge of changing the UK education system I'd look at aspects of the Finnish system that were in place already in the early 90s and earlier instead of the newer 'fluff' stuff. Things like the free school meals for all, the short days with frequent breaks, each school having a psychologist and a social worker so issues can be tackled quickly before they get big, teacher qualifications and respect, and, not part of the education system but related to this, libraries everywhere (Finns read a lot - reading a lot is always going to help with educational success) including library buses to rural areas. With these things it's easy to see how they can actually help (less hunger equals better learning, frequent breaks means the brain works better, early intervention into any issue, academic or otherwise, helps children get back on track before they get too far behind, teacher qualifications is obvious of course and should be combined with allowing teachers much more autonomy.

I have also visited and as the biggest employer in Finland i think it is very indicative

The City of Helsinki? That's the biggest employer in Finland. Or do you mean Nokia? (Not biggest employer in Finland but biggest company) my uncle works for Nokia and he is certainly intelligent and able to think outside of the box - he was a big influence on my brother and his computer learning and he is a literal genius.

Neither, was insurance company,

It's interesting how this thread has gone from "is the Finnish school system as good as they say" to "Finns are alcoholic murderers".

What insurance company? Sampo group? Not biggest employer and insurance doesn't exactly attract the best educated people, not in Finland at least.

At least they're well educated alcoholic murderers WonderTweek

Think there has been some takeovers since, so not called Sampo and the people i worked with had degrees. At the time it was the biggest employer in Finland as they included agents in the figures.
Thw point is I keep seeing posts on how wonderful the finnish education system is and in 6 years of working for the largezt employer in Finland at the time, i never saw any evidence of it

You need to forgive my typing.
If people are going to throwing satistics about how wonderful tbe Finns are then they need to look at the negative stats as well.

There is plenty of negative aspects to Finland and the Finns, the alcohol culture and domestic violence for starters along with many other things that would be too depressing to go into. But you can't judge an education system based on a few people you worked with (doesn't matter how big the employer was, you obviously didn't have contact with all of them), you have to look at the results as a whole to see if the system works and the results show that adults have high levels of literacy and numeracy compared to other countries, that the majority of the population has decent critical thinking skills (shown by less people falling for fake news so that it's not really considered an issue here, unlike certain other countries...), low drop out rate in schools even post-compulsory (education isn't compulsory after 9th grade but something like 99% continue)

bruffin If this were a thread discussing, say, chocolate and the virtues of Belgian chocolate in particular - and it discussed elements of Belgian chocolate production that might be significant, that might be drawn into mainstream UK chocolate production or which are already a feature of UK chocolate production - can you imagine how weird it would be to interject a conversation about Belgian Olympic performance? On the grounds that you might perhaps have gone running with some Belgians, a while back? And that, if we are going to talk about Belgian chocolate, we have to talk about the other - less great - aspects of Belgian culture. And add into that a sprinkle of "And, as I said, I went running with these Belgians, and let me tell you, they didn't know their arse from their elbow. They're less pragmatic than us Brits. We ended up practically carrying them."

I'm very fond of you, bruffin , but you sound as though you're carrying over some unresolved stuff from your stint in the Finnish business.

I've a friend who's a Finn. It's making me a little uncomfortable.

Some...unFinnished issues perhaps?

I'm sorry, that was a terrible pun.

WonderTweek

"you have to look at the results as a whole to see if the system works and the results show that adults have high levels of literacy and numeracy compared to other countries,"

Sure. And another poster also made the same point about Swedish adults of her generation.

The thing is, though, nobody is questioning the fact that the Finnish and Swedish education systems were doing a bang-up job in the past; we're pointing out that they aren't doing such a good job now. In the case of Sweden, frankly the Swedish education system stinks, from what I have seen and heard. In the case of Finland, Finland's schools are still "good" by international standards but they also appear to be headed in the wrong direction, and the innovations brought in over the past 20 years have gradually resulted in less and less well-educated cohorts.

If we copy these trends, we risk copying the same results into our own education systems and making things even worse.

There are many things about Finland's schools that I think are genuinely very good, but the problem is that a lot of educationalists and politicians seem to be hell-bent on copying the weakest or least-applicable bits and ignoring things that might be genuinely helpful.

Getting and keeping good human resources in teaching, reducing class-contact hours for teachers and lesson planning requirements so that teachers have more time for working with struggling students (one on one or in small groups)--these are terrific things that we should be copying.

Most commentators, however, seem to be intent on cherry-picking the "cuddly" sounding bits--like fewer school/homework hours and a late school starting age. As I discussed previously, Finland's gender gap and weaknesses in "proper" maths/science are probably related to the fact that its kids aren't really putting the hours in, and its late school starting age is the sort of thing that is easier to get away with when you have an incredibly easy writing system.

If we want a package of ideas to copy, one country that it would be really helpful to look at is the current situation in Germany. That might sound odd--Germany doesn't top any international tables in education. But around 15 years ago, Germany was shocked by its very poor performances in PISA and TIMSS, and then adopted a series of common-sense and practical measures to improve things (more rigorous curriculum, getting rid of its divisive selectivity at age 10, improving teaching methods, increasing the number of school hours for primary school age children), and they have improved their results dramatically over the past 15 years. We should be looking to Germany and other "rapidly improving" countries like Germany if we want some sensible ideas that will actually work.

I have read the article and most of the points could apply to my kids School in wales.
*EVerything is free
Finnish education is free. And all the other stuff is free too, including lunches, excursions, and school supplies. If pupils live more than 2 km away from school, a special school bus will transport them to and from school. *
We get (and do all of the uk) Free transport of over a certain distance.
England get free school meals in infants, in wales we get free breakfast club, free milk, free school supplies.

Individual approach to every pupil.
Our school learning through play and have large sections of the day where they can choose what activities they do. For example my son loves to play with the Lego and will mostly choose that, the teacher has then devised some Lego activities that incorporate literacy and maths so that they are learning while they are ‘playing’

Marks are announced only to the pupil.
Pretty sure this is standard most places??

They can come to lessons in pajamas.
Ok I’ll give them this one

During a lesson, a child can be sitting on the sofa or lying on the carpet.
children don’t have to be sitting at their desk. During a lesson, they can make themselves comfortable in armchairs or on the floor. If the weather is warm, lessons might be held on the grass near the school or on special benches situated in the shape of an amphitheatre.
Our school
Also has an amphitheater, several log circles and in infants there aren’t enough tables and chairs for the whole class but there are lots of reading corners with bean bags carpet areas, etc maths lessons are often outside, each classroom has an undercover patio area to play:learn in. Each class has several TAs so kids are often in smaller groups around the school

There is very little homework.
Teachers in Finland think that children should rest and spend their time with their family instead of doing homework. Homework takes very little time and can be very interesting. For example, for a history lesson, a pupil might be asked to interview her granny to find out what life was like in the ’50s and to find the differences between that life and the modern world.

We do get quite a bit of homework but they also do the ‘interesting bit’ as above, each half term has a different topic and they can choose to so anything related to that topic - so currently Romans so cook a roman recipe, make a map of the Roman Empire, make a model etc

There are no exams at all.
We do have national tests in wales by there doesn’t seem to be the stress and focus on them like the SATs in England. We also don’t have grammar schools somthe 11+ isn’t an issue either

In some schools in Finland, all subjects have been canceled

Our school does this to a certain degrees they still have dedicated maths and literacy but each half term its a different topic so they do all activities and work around this topic, eg Egyptians, the tudors, Antarctica, fairytales, fashion etc So everything they do at school during that time will be related to that topic

Moreover, they have the longest breaks in the world.
Not quite every 45 minutes but lessons aren’t any longer that about 45 minutes to an hour and kids (especially in nfants) aren’t day at a desk anyway and are always moving about and changing scenery. They don’t spend the whole time in the same classroom. There are lots of different areas eg a small side room off the classroom, a creative area for art etc, outside spaces, library

. Teachers in Finland are really cool.
I suspect they have good and bad teachers just like here!

*Students are only taught the things which they will need in life.

© Ylistaron yläkoulu, Seinäjoki/Facebook

In swimming lessons, they are taught to recognize the signs that a person is drowning. In housekeeping lessons, they are taught how to cook, knit, and sew. A lot of attention is paid to caring about nature. In addition, Finnish schoolchildren can easily create a website or a portfolio.*
Mmm aren’t most kids taught this at school? I know my primary ages kids have done the above

All schools are equally good.
English system is definitely flawed but I can’t believe that every school is Finland is equal, younaremgoing to get School in well iffmareas and poorer areas and there will be some variation in outcomes surely?

Pupils choose for themselves what they will have for lunch.
Our county has 2 options for lunch as well as a veggie option and always a jacket potato and salad bar
Kids choose in the morning what they want. Menu is 3 week rolling one.

. Overnight parties are held in schools
This is standard for every school?

There are many things about Finland's schools that I think are genuinely very good, but the problem is that a lot of educationalists and politicians seem to be hell-bent on copying the weakest or least-applicable bits and ignoring things that might be genuinely helpful.

Yeah that's an issue, too much focus on the fluff and not enough on the solid things that have been in place for decades, but those things include the short hours and not insane amounts of homework (the 30 mins max is bullshit though, the homework varies from teacher to teacher and grade to grade) and the late starting age (it's always been that way even when Finland was doing very well in the maths portion of pisa). I must admit though the difference in the maths DD is doing at school compared to what children her age are doing in the UK is vast - I have UK curriculum based activity books that we do at home and the 5-7 age range covers quite a lot of maths but in school she's doing shapes and measuring... And 9th grade maths I'd say is a bit below the equivalent age level in the UK but high school level maths covers the rest - pisa and timss are measured before high school.

English system is definitely flawed but I can’t believe that every school is Finland is equal, younaremgoing to get School in well iffmareas and poorer areas and there will be some variation in outcomes surely?

In the capital area they do vary as some schools have much higher proportions of immigrant children and then the middle class parents put their children in other schools so it does create a bit of a hierarchy in the schools there but outside of the capital area there's very little difference. Applying for schools is a completely difference process than in the UK, parents don't worry about moving to the right catchment area to get into the 'better' school or need to put down several options and hope to get into a decent one, you literally just go to the nearest school and that's that (rarely there won't be room and you'll have to go to the next nearest school) and you don't worry about it. There's no visiting multiple schools trying to figure out which is best for your child or any of that stress. It's not until upper comprehensive or high school that differences come into play but that's different specialities in the schools not some being better than others.

www.oecd.org/pisa/pisaproducts/pisa2012-2006-rel-items-maths-ENG.pdf

it's always been that way even when Finland was doing very well in the maths portion of pisa

I think it's important to understand what the maths portion of PISA is, and what it isn't.

The above link gives a sample of the kind of questions asked.

As can be seen, the "maths" in PISA would be better described as "reading comprehension that has some maths mixed in"--it's very much about things like interpreting graphs or reading a text about a service and working out what fees you would pay, and so on. There are a few somewhat more abstract questions, but overwhelmingly, the PISA maths test is tilted towards reading comprehension.

TIMSS, meanwhile, tests harder-core maths and involves a lot of equations and geometry and so on. Finland has never done better than about average on TIMSS--its scores are similar to the UK and US, which are also mediocre performers.

Both of these tests are "good" tests, but it's important to understand what they do and don't test.

PISA maths is more a test of "Is this country turning out mathematically literate citizens who can understand how services work and statistics in a newspaper and so on?"

TIMSS is more a test of "Is this country able to produce sufficient numbers of 18yos who will be able to succeed in STEM at university and beyond?"

Finland is a bit odd because it manages to be good at PISA but not very good at TIMSS---what this suggests is that their very good reading scores are pushing up their scores in the PISA maths section.

So, sorry, but I would stand by my assertion that Finnish kids are probably not putting in the hours necessary to get really good at maths and the hard sciences.