English teaching at Moision

English (grade 8) Esko Saarinen (a very bright class I was told)
Esko has done a lot to put the language into context I thought - you will see a lot of photos of different aspects relating to English culture or English speaking countries. They were stuck up all over the classroom.

An interesting thing was he played the radio in the background when students checked their work – he did not like silence. This also helped to immerse students in an English environment.




Esko's teaching approach is to teach the essential and leave the extension for the gifted to explore themselves more deeply. Students started with translation of Finnish into English, and teacher reads out the answers to the questions.

some quotes from him: ‘I don’t know if they like doing it, but that makes my life easier.’ ( I think he was being quite straightforward. This is referring to checking answers in class. It might intuitively sound boring, but if answers are checked together efficiently face to face, that can also be a quick learning process. It also saves the teacher a lot of time, which means they can spend more time on preparing lessons well. This of course works well only in environments where students are cooperative.

‘hurry up.’ (that gives me a strong impression of efficiency in finnish way of life, in eating, in checking their work, they seem to get so much done in an hour)

‘no problem.’

Esko reads aloud a passage in English, and the students read after him. then they started reading together with Esko. Esko reinforced their learning of the text by asking them to translate the finnish version of the text in short sentences into English, and playing with the text by substituting some words with others.

They also had a listening exercise of guessing the accent of the English speakers – this gives them more awareness about the world, eg Jamaica, India, new Zealand, Australian, American etc. I was amazed most of them could distinguish these different accents.

Leaving no one behind: special education and core education

The success of the Finnish system is its focus on basic education and its attention to students with learning difficulties, according to many. I talked to a science and maths teacher, who believes that the key is to teach the core, essential curriculum well, and ensure that all students attain a minimum standard. For the more interested and capable students, they can explore the materials themselves on the basis of a strong foundation.


Another aspect is the special classes for helping students with learning difficulties. They are put in a smaller group, and on average, the ratio of teacher to students is about one to five.



But special help does not mean answers are fed to students. In fact, a substantially similar teaching method was applied in regard to the weaker students in the sense that they are still required to try their best to deal with the questions and materials on their own. They try, and they get to check the answers. The difference is the teacher devotes more time and individual attention to each student, but that does not mean spoonfeeding or explaining everything to the student. For certain students, if necessary, they use special materials designed to lower the level of difficulty and impart the absolute minimum of knowledge.

Art class at Moision - professional painter teacher

Art class (Jarmo Lepistö)

The art students of the school are a lucky group to have a professional painter teach them! Jarmo works away in France and Germany from time to time and hold exhibitions abroad. He must be a great role model for students to look up to - a teacher with his own hobbies and interests to pursue in life. It's a pity I haven't been able to see more of the way he teaches other than the basic instruction of theories and methods about graphics.

I could see that he first taught the theories, and then told them several possible methods, and showed them model products that previous students have made. He also demonstrated the technique on the blackboard very roughly by sketching the drawing.

It reminded me of ex-libris, which is what I once did for my secondary school art classes.

Jarmo has his own website where you can admire his paintings.

Music lesson at Moision Koulu: steel band shows

Music class (Annika Viitanen, Grade 8)

Students were making posters about their own computer music products. They had worksheets for computer music which were guidelines for them for an entire year. Basically they all sat down to do their own work, and asked the teacher when necessary. (A bit quiet for a music class I thought, but this confirms the emphasis on independent learning.)

In grade 7, music is compulsory, and students learn about rock and roll history, guitar, bass, drum, singing, and a bit of music theory. From Grade 8 onwards, music is optional.

This school has a special music oriented scheme which continues the music training for students who mostly have begun their special music scheme since grade 3, and this scheme itself will be followed up on by high schools. Students learn about music history, singing, classical music, jazz, etc.

This is only possible because the municipal government and local community give a lot of resources. The equipment for computer music production (the keyboard and computer equipment) is very costly.

The school has quite a lot of music-related activities: choir training, 10 gigs and concerts every year. Music projects are common for other subjects too eg theatre.




They have also started a steel band, and I had a chance to see their steel band show. (they had only had 4 hours of group practice together, and started learning it two weeks ago – very impressive). It is not a difficult kind of instrument apparently, and Annikka has marked the notes on the drums so students can get the hang of it more quickly.

(unfortunately the video is not working at the moment because of technical problems...)

I asked the teacher whether she valued the inspiration of interest more than the honing of skills in musical instruments. She said this was a personal choice for the teachers, and she personally tries to strike a balance between the two. There is not much individual music instruction in the school because teachers don’t have much time, but when teaching in group, the teacher cares a lot about the holistic cooperation between the group and learning together on the same level.

Their philosophy is to give students enough time to develop their interests and skills in their instruments – rather than churning out young prodigies in music.

(Reflection: This is good for the kids who can’t stand a competitive training, and reveals their policy of equality rather than elitism. For the more able and interested students, they can generally thrive if there are opportunities to go a bit further. Finland has a significant number of music institutes for additional training for such students.)

Annikka herself is a substitute teacher for a year because the school music teacher is on maternal leave for a whole year. Annikka is a cellist and she has an interest beyond music in law and politics. I asked her how she ended up with music. She said the decision was straightforward for her when she first started playing the cello – she told her mother after the first lesson that she wanted to be a cellist. Things got slightly more complicated after she has started Turku Academy training, and she is considering some other options as well. Maybe further studies in law and politics. Money is one consideration.

Biology class

Biology class (Anne Martin, Grade 9)

Anne taught them the function and operation of the heart in pumping blood, with the help of coloured slides of heart diagrams and an overhead projector. Students got to try using the stethoscope, mechanical blood pressure monitor, and observe microscopic slides of heart tissues. That much is pretty standard science theory teaching plus experimentation.

The interesting bit was to see students' active participation in class. They asked interesting questions such as international trade of organs, and I saw the teacher showing the world map in explaining the related geography. Another question was why a person’s vision sometimes blacks out temporarily when one stands up quickly after squatting.

Anne emphasised relating the subject to their daily life to help students remember and understand.

Moision Koulu

Moision Koulu is located in Salo, about 1 hour and 10 minutes away from Helsinki by train. Salo is the town of the first mobile phone factory of Nokia, and hence a fairly well off area.

It is a upper comprehensive (offering Grades 7 to 9) with approximately 443 students.

Compared to the other two schools I visited, this school has a relatively homogeneous Finnish student population, with only 25 international students mainly from Russia.

There are a few special features about the school:
1. It has a special music programme for students with more talent in music.
2. It has a special computer science programme for students more keen on computer technology. Both programmes admit students by selection.
3. It has initiated a Comenius Project with Poland and Scotland for teachers to share their teaching experience. It has just started so it's still too early to assess its effectiveness.



A further note about the school - it is fairly resourceful because of the funds provided by the municipality as they can afford expensive teaching equipment (for music, art etc) and apparently they give teachers extra subsidies (which is fairly unusual in Finland). I was told usually one vacant position from this school would attract 50 or more applications.



And a big thank you to Anneli for agreeing to and organising my visit, as well as looking after me!