Tuesday 18 September 2012
Thursday 13 September 2012
What Are You Going to Be When You Grow Up?
"Mummy, what are you going to be when you grow up?", asked my daughter.
"I'll be a teacher, I guess".
"Oh, I'll be a clown", she told me.
"That's lovely, hon."
"And daddy is going to be the King. He'll be the King to all of my friends", she continued.
Why do I feel my career choice sounds a bit boring.. ;)
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Finding time to do all my studies is really challenging. I'm mainly studying at nights or when my daughter is at play school and the baby is asleep. Well, this will not last forever! I keep reminding myself that I am doing this for myself but also for my family's future.
"I'll be a teacher, I guess".
"Oh, I'll be a clown", she told me.
"That's lovely, hon."
"And daddy is going to be the King. He'll be the King to all of my friends", she continued.
Why do I feel my career choice sounds a bit boring.. ;)
----
Finding time to do all my studies is really challenging. I'm mainly studying at nights or when my daughter is at play school and the baby is asleep. Well, this will not last forever! I keep reminding myself that I am doing this for myself but also for my family's future.
Wednesday 12 September 2012
Some Interesting Articles: Where is Finnish Education Going?
I find this quite sad..
http://yle.fi/uutiset/parents_shopping_for_good_schools/6288231
And it is quite the opposite where we should be going to..
http://www.oecd.org/newsroom/educationspendingrisingbutaccesstohighereducationremainsunequalinmostcountriessaysoecd.htm
This is only in Finnish (sorry) but the message is shortly that the level of higher education in Finland is increasing lower than average among the OECD countries. Another important notice is that only 87% of 15-19 years old Finns are studying.
http://www.minedu.fi/OPM/Tiedotteet/2012/09/education_at_a_glance.html?lang=fi
http://yle.fi/uutiset/parents_shopping_for_good_schools/6288231
And it is quite the opposite where we should be going to..
http://www.oecd.org/newsroom/educationspendingrisingbutaccesstohighereducationremainsunequalinmostcountriessaysoecd.htm
This is only in Finnish (sorry) but the message is shortly that the level of higher education in Finland is increasing lower than average among the OECD countries. Another important notice is that only 87% of 15-19 years old Finns are studying.
http://www.minedu.fi/OPM/Tiedotteet/2012/09/education_at_a_glance.html?lang=fi
How the Curriculum Directs the Development of Studies?
The official curriculum has got many roles in developing education:
1. The curriculum is a tool for controlling education nationwide
The curriculum ensures equal education all over the country. It also continues the educational tradition.
The curricula build up a continuous educational system - they show what is taught at what level, and how students can move from one level to another.
On the other hand, the curriculum reflects the values of a society. It tells, what subjects should be taught (such as Finnish, Mathematics and Entrepreneurship). It also contains values that may be harder to recognize. The curriculum orders how many hours each subject and topic is taught; in other words, it values each subject and topic differently.
On the other hand, the curriculum reflects the values of a society. It tells, what subjects should be taught (such as Finnish, Mathematics and Entrepreneurship). It also contains values that may be harder to recognize. The curriculum orders how many hours each subject and topic is taught; in other words, it values each subject and topic differently.
2. The curriculum is a tool for schools and teachers to plan their teaching
The curriculum explains the content of a degree / diploma. It also shows the aims and pedagogical principals of a particular course. The curriculum directs the evaluation (what are the expected learning outcomes and how they should be evaluated).
The curriculum includes:
- the aims
- the content
- the activities / actions
- the evaluation
My experience
I have taught only couple of courses, but I found the curriculum helpful when planning the courses. It was important to know the contents as well as the assessment criteria. Reading the curriculum was not easy in the first place. It took a while to understand what were the aims of the course. Luckily I got great help from my colleagues.
I think curriculum is a great tool for planning teaching that meets the national requirements. But a teacher should also be creative and brave to step outside the curriculum if the students show interest in something else that is not written in the curriculum.
I think curriculum is a great tool for planning teaching that meets the national requirements. But a teacher should also be creative and brave to step outside the curriculum if the students show interest in something else that is not written in the curriculum.
Good News: Going International!
Today I got good news about the scholarship. =) Fingers crossed that the partner in the UK will welcome me.
The First Virtual Session
We had our first online sessions on Monday. What a day! We had our teaching material nice, ready and practiced. And what happens! ACP started playing up! Some of us had the PP presentation running smoothly and some of us had big problems. Our slides changed automatically after every 5 sec! A bit challenging :) Well, we learned to cope with unexpected problems. It would have been nice to be able to show our presentation and other material as planned, but in the end the presentation went pretty well anyway.
It was nice to learn new subjects from other teams as well. I also learned new presentation skills: Thank to one of our group member who read all the chat comment aloud... it gave the chat a new meaning when all the comments were recognized. I will use that in the future, too.
It was nice to learn new subjects from other teams as well. I also learned new presentation skills: Thank to one of our group member who read all the chat comment aloud... it gave the chat a new meaning when all the comments were recognized. I will use that in the future, too.
My View of Learning
Learning is a complex process in my opinion. I think all the learning theories (behaviorist, cognitivist, humanist and social&situational) have brought some important factors to the knowledge of learning. I think it would be too narrow minded to box learning under only one of those theories!
We learn new things all the time, both in our private and professional lives. Sometimes learning is unconscious and sometimes learning itself is the task.
Everyone prefers to learn in his / her individual way. I myself like to search for information and reflect the outcomes in written or spoken form. I find the social context of learning really important. I also like to learn by doing. Visual material is not my cup of tea, but still sometimes needed (and therefore I should improve my visual learning skills). I strongly feel that my understanding becomes deeper when I use many different kind of methods to process the new information. Sometimes it might be the last figure or video that makes me to say "Now I got it!". This happened recently when I was learning how to tie a sling for my baby. I finally got it when I was watching some tutorial videos.
The most important factor behind "educational" learning is motivation. A learner has to know why he / she needs to learn something new, and he / she has to want it! The level of motivation is totally different if you feel that you really need the new information than if you are learning only to get some credits. One of the teacher's greatest challenges is to help the students to motivate themselves.
Further reading: http://www.infed.org/biblio/b-learn.htm
We learn new things all the time, both in our private and professional lives. Sometimes learning is unconscious and sometimes learning itself is the task.
Everyone prefers to learn in his / her individual way. I myself like to search for information and reflect the outcomes in written or spoken form. I find the social context of learning really important. I also like to learn by doing. Visual material is not my cup of tea, but still sometimes needed (and therefore I should improve my visual learning skills). I strongly feel that my understanding becomes deeper when I use many different kind of methods to process the new information. Sometimes it might be the last figure or video that makes me to say "Now I got it!". This happened recently when I was learning how to tie a sling for my baby. I finally got it when I was watching some tutorial videos.
The most important factor behind "educational" learning is motivation. A learner has to know why he / she needs to learn something new, and he / she has to want it! The level of motivation is totally different if you feel that you really need the new information than if you are learning only to get some credits. One of the teacher's greatest challenges is to help the students to motivate themselves.
Further reading: http://www.infed.org/biblio/b-learn.htm
Tuesday 11 September 2012
A Beautiful View
Today I drove to the local harbor to do some studying. My older child was at play school and my baby was having a nap on the back seat. What a great place to write a report! I could do this again before it gets too cold. Next time I will bring some coffee and chocolate, too!
Small things can make learning so much more fun!
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