Rothersthorpe

Projects

Finland Day Five

{gallery}Finland day five part 1{/gallery}

On Friday teachers went back to the training room where they reflected on the practice and teaching/learning seen in Finnish schools.

Teachers looked at Finnish data showing the following key policy points that lead to higher performance:

  • school funding
  • early childhood development
  • child health and wellbeing
  • special needs education

(Equity = Excellence)

Some wellbeing facts about the Finnish education system:

  • Finland spends 3 times more in the early years, (pre-school to age 7 years), than many other countries
  • There is a  good level of funding across all years
  • A systematic way of helping pupils
  • Standards are compared against the capabilities of the child, not against others
  • There is a high focus on continuing professional development for all teachers 
  • A personalised system - the children get there when they are ready
  • Pupils are responsible for their success
  • Finland rely on TRUST and not test based accountability. 'Accountability is left when responsibility is taken away'  Pasi Sahlberg

The 2016 World's Happiness Report by the Sustainable Development Solutions Network and the Earth Institute at Columbia University produced the following results.

1st Denmark, 5th Finland, 13th USA, 20th Ireland. For unknown reasons the U.K was not included in this study!

The study used the following factors:  GDP per capita, social support, healthy life expectancy, freedom to make life choices, generosity, everything else.

Action Planning

Teachers worked on an action plan for their school.  We will be presenting our action plan to Rothersthorpe pupils and community shortly.