Friendship and caring across borders

The international education developers’ team at Tampere region organized a poster and logo competition for pupils across different schools in the region. The themes for the work were internationalism, education for peace, refugees and global responsibility. The learning activity was well suited for developing pupils’ global citizenship competences and skills at using multi-media and implementing multi-literacy.

The learning process started with a classroom discussion about authentic international and global education related themes. Students expressed their opinions and worries, and solutions to different real life problems were sought together. After that the students chose the special themes or problems that inspired (or worried) them most and which they wished to influence.

It is important that the message contained in the work comes across clearly and boldly. When creating a logo message the design is simple and clear. It is based on a picture and 1 - 5 words. A poster may contain a bit more text, pictures and details, but in it, too, the message has to come through lucidly. In the competition the technique was free: the pupils could draw, write or paint by hand or by computer, they could use their own or freely accessible online photos, which they could edit, add text to or make into a collage.

The activity integrated ethical education and learning by doing. The results were awesome. They represented the pupils' strong commitment to friendship and peace, and their wish to help. In addition, issues related to immigration and refugees were strongly expressed.

Best designs and art works are printed and they are made into stickers and posters. That’s how they can be spread around the community to help make global responsibility and internationalization at home visible in school classrooms, corridors and websites. The good-will video below is a compilation of various pupils’ work and spreads the message of friendship and caring. A warm thank you to all participants!



P.S. This could be a wonderful eTwinning learning task! I sincerely recommend a similar activity to be carried out in all schools around the world as part of global citizenship education.

UN's Sustainable Development Goals and Transformative Education

The United Nations’ new Sustainable Development Goals were approved at the UN 2030 World Summit of Sustainable Development at the end of September. These objectives include ending poverty and hunger, as well as promoting health and welfare.

The fourth goal deals with education.The most important thing is to ensure that all girls and boys get completely free, equitable and quality primary and secondary education leading to relevant and effective learning outcomes (4.1). Goal 4.7 is aiming to change the curricula and learning goals and contents both in developed and developing countries: 

By 2030, ensure that all learners acquire the knowledge and skills needed to promote sustainable development, including, among others, through education for sustainable development and sustainable lifestyles, human rights, gender equality, promotion of a culture of peace and non-violence, global citizenship and appreciation of cultural diversity and of culture’s contribution to sustainable development.

According to the general theme of sustainability seven out of the total 17 goals deal directly with sustainable development and global responsibility from the environmental point of view. These goals are regarded as major challenges in respect with the quality of life and the future of our planet. Failure to reach these development goals would hinder achieving the other goals as well.

In the new Finnish Core Curriculum of Basic Education it’s stated that

The global education within basic education creates, for its part, the foundation for equitable and sustainable development in line with the United Nations development goals. p. 16

The UN 2030 Sustainable Development Goals are perfectly suited to be used as authentic learning material. For example, in learning English as foreign language they offer current vocabulary and lots of support material for discussions and for presenting one’s own opinions. In cross curricular learning projects the goals can be divided to be studied in different grades and school subjects. Learning outcomes and created guidelines to promote sustainable development are shared and brought into use. Everybody at school work together to achieve the goals and implement the guidelines in the spirit of active citizenship and transformative learning.

In Finland UNESCO ASPnet schools work in the vanguard in implementing the UN goals in local curricula. The aims of the ASPnet school network focus on two themes: Global Citizenship Education and Education for Sustainable Development. GCE deals with human rights, education for peace and global responsibility. It’s transformative and empowering and its goal is to give learners the opportunity and competencies to realize their rights and obligations to promote a better world and future. ESD aims at reorienting education worldwide, so that it provides everyone with the opportunity to acquire the values, attitudes, skills and knowledge that are needed to contribute to sustainable development.

The aims of ASPnet schools are to integrate GCE and ESD in the school curricula and learning processes as well as to experiment innovative approaches and learning methods in global education. This implies strong commitment to implementing the new curriculum in the spirit of the UN 2030 Development Goals.

As the UN's Climate Change Conference starts today, I think we all share the same concerns and fears and hope that decisions will be made for a better future for all.

New Finnish Core Curriculum, international cooperation and eTwinning

The new Core Curriculum for Basic Education (approved on December 22, 2014) strongly supports the idea that school is closely connected to the community,  society and world around it. Finland is becoming culturally more diverse and global and local continuously mingle and overlap in our everyday life. This should be visible at school and inherent in teaching.

At school we work, if possible, together with schools and developers of teaching and learning from other countries. Basic education is a positive and constructive force for change in society, nationally and internationally. CCBE p. 16

eTwinning offers an excellent and easy way to co-operate with the developers of teaching. For registered teachers, the eTwinning portal offers a wide variety of ways to network and develop professionally. In different thematic groups (eg. Creative Classroom or Language Teachers groups) teachers can share their knowledge and get tips for teaching. If you want to exchange ideas and experiences on a specific topic, you can look for a Teachers Room. If you cannot find one, you can set up a room yourself. 

eTwinning also provides continuous professional development opportunities. Learning events and webinars are offered on many different topics, particularly the ones relating to student-centered pedagogy, ICT in education and 21st century competences. These are also included in new Finnish core curriculum and there referred as transversal (cross-curricular) competences (L1-L7).

The Core Curriculum for Basic Education brings up international co-operation combined with ICT.

During the basic education, students will have experiences of using ICT in international interaction. CCBE p. 21
Contacts with schools in different countries increase students’ skills to operate in a globalized world. CCBE p. 26

Twinspace (eTwinning’s virtual learning environment) has been designed and made just for this purpose. It offers students an opportunity to interact and learn together with their European peers and partner classes. Students can chat, write messages on forums, share photos, videos and a variety of files created by themselves or together with their peers in a safe and protected learning environment. This way they can enhance their intercultural and cooperation skills as well as communication and ICT skills.

An international project is well suited for multidisciplinaty, cross-curricular and phenomenon-based learning. In eTwinning projects foreign language and ICT learning are integrated in different subject- and content areas. At the moment, projects dealing with STEM subject areas (science, technology, engineering, mathematics) are especially popular. Global education, cultural heritage and cultural diversity related themes are also quite common. They encourage students to reflect on the state of the world and the future, engage them in making the world a better place and, thus, develop creativity and problem-solving skills. They also enhance "cultural knowledge based on respect for human rights, respectful interaction and diverse ways to express oneself and one's views." CCBE p. 19

International cooperation and eTwinning partnerships have, of course, a very special role in language teaching and learning.

Opportunities are created for students and groups of students to network and communicate with people all around  the world. Information and communication technology offers a way and an environment to implement language learning in authentic situations following students' communication needs. CCBE p. 243

I started my first eTwinning projects 10 years ago just because I wanted to create possibilities for my students to use English language in authentic communication situations. It was quite another thing to tell about oneself, one’s own school and hometown

to a young European partner, who is genuinely interested in exchanging ideas and experiences, than to tell these same things to a classmate you know since kindergarten. The active use of language on discussion boards and collaboration when carrying out project tasks increased students’ motivation and significantly improved their language skills.

It is clear that in basic education all students won’t be able to participate in student exchange or mobilities and, environmentally, it wouldn’t be very sustainable. However, eTwinning offers everyone an opportunity for encounters and friendships across borders free of charge and without carbon footprints. It is Internationalization At Home (IaH) at its best.

Global is a perspective to every topic

A three-day International Symposium dealing with Education of Global Citizens took place in Hanasaari (Finland) from 5th to 7th May. The general aim of the symposium was to explore, share and promote concepts, pedagogy and practice concerning the education of global citizens, particularly in general education. Two Finnish initiatives were in special focus, namely the proposal for the new core curriculum mainstreaming global education and the KOMPPI school development partnerships creating global responsibility.

In his opening keynote Liam Wegimont identified a number of conceptual challenges: “Global education has emerged as a field that is largely consensual, anti-theoretical and makes assumptions that are ungrounded. “ Karen Pashby responded to the challenge by applying ethical approach to global education. She juxtaposed soft and critical Global Citizenship Education, the first representing universalism with one shared view of good life and the second reflexivity and dialogue interrogating our good intentions and putting action into context. Regarding global competences, she argued that they cannot have static definitions as in the rapidly changing world challenges are growing and multiplying.

Werner Wintersteiner brought up three interconnected western burdens, namely Auschwitz, Hiroshima and colonialism that underlie our relationship to Global Citizenship. In his résumé he concluded that Global Education is a challenge to Eurocentric views of the world, is a project rather than a ready made concept and needs a global educational dialogue (to pick three from a list of many).

Ethical, civic, ecological and intercultural competences of global citizens were discussed deeply in the four different workshops. On the basis of the workshop reports and the keynotes the Symposium agreed upon shared conclusions that will be published later (here, too, I hope).

On Wednesday afternoon, we had a stately visitor, as Minister Pekka Haavisto talked about development cooperation. “Ownership and reciprocity are at the heart of international development and peace keeping projects,” he said. He also referred to the Millennium Development Goals and said that there’s a small gap in quantity but a big gap in quality in reaching the MGs of education. Education of teachers is the key development area in developing countries.

In his closing words Helmuth Hartmeyer emphasized the need to put justice at the core of Global Education and to recognize the distinction and relations between individual ethics and the underlying power structure. He also reminded us about the pedagogical challenge: education cannot be transferred, only acquired by dialogue, engagement and fun.

The symposium was organized by the Finnish National Board of Education, Ministry of Foreign Affairs, Ministry of Education and Culture and Global Education Network Europe (GENE).