Finnish teacher education

After the first rounds of PISA surveys the Finns have analyzed the reasons of the successful results. It is agreed that the quality and functionality of the Finnish educational system are based on the highly qualified teacher education. The pedagogical studies along with the school subject studies provide the teacher to teach in all the educational institutions in Finland. In pedagogical studies theory and practice go hand in hand, which directs the students to form their own educational practise and establish their professional identity.

Teacher education development

Ministry of Education compiled the Teacher Education Development Plan in 2001 and the recommendations and operations of the plan were also to be followed-up. The development plan concerned both the initial studies of teacher education and the teachers’ in-service training. The recommendations for the initial studies were directed to student selections, pedagogical studies, teaching practise, status of the teacher education and co-operation needed.

The Study of Initial Teacher Education

The research on initial education was carried out in spring 2005 as a part of the research project “The follow-up and evaluation of the developing program of Finnish teacher education”.  All the Finnish teacher educators and the teacher students in the universities and in the teacher education colleges had the possibility to fill in the inquiry in the web. Altogether 2006 responses were collected. The collected data was to be compared with the previous follow-up data gathered in 2002 (869 respondents, see Figure 1). This presentation concentrates on the university results.

Figure 1. The respondents (N=2875) in groups 2002 – 2005. (Appendix 1.)

Factoring of the statements of Pedagogical Studies

The section of the inquiry focusing on pedagogical studies consisted of 19 Likert scale statements (the scale: 1 = not at all, 2 = unsatisfactory, 3 = moderate, 4 = rather well, 5 = extremely well). This data was factored through the whole data that consisted of 2875 respondents. The analysis generated four categories which were named as follows according to the strongest computational values: Schoolwork (mean 2,63; SD 0,78), Divergence (mean 2,64, SD 0,81); Methods (mean 3,40, SD 0,62) and Communication and co-operation (mean 3,26, SD 0,68)

Results

There were statistically significant differences (***) in all the analysed categories when compared between the University teacher educators and University teacher students (Table 1).

Table 1. The pedagogical studies categories in the university data 2005. (Appendix 2.)

The sum category ‘Methods’ was the most equally considered section between the teachers and the students. The including issues are characteristic to the teacher’s teaching habits and methods in contemporary teaching. This area, the basic skills of teaching, is organised moderately well.