I loved the Finland article we read for today. I like Finland's approach to education much more than some of the powerhouse Asian countries. I liked a few different methods they used.
1) They do as little measuring and testing as possible.
2) The "outside math" method. I feel like my math skills would have been so much better had teachers tried this approach!
3) A child has to do something really bad (like hit someone) to be punished.
4) Some teachers will stay with the same students for an extended period of time. For example, one teacher stays with the same kids from first to sixth grade. Imagine how much he/she must know about her pupils! That is one aspect of being a reading specialist I am really looking forward to, that I will get to be with the same children for multiple years and see how they grow.
5) In Finland teaching is a very respected career and very difficult to get into. Finalnd filters its teachers very selectively and they must have a masters degree by completing a five year program.
6) Finland is a society based on equity. They don't care about one person outperforming their neighbor. They care that everyone is performing at average, but that the average is high.
I especially loved this quote: "In the U.S. they treat teachers like pizza delivery boys and then do efficiency studies on how well they deliver pizza." Fantastic.
No comments:
Post a Comment