Rethinking BETT show 2015

This year´s BETT hype was computing, robotics and different kinds of little gadgets you can program to do different things. So far I’ve been thinking very positively about coding and even attended a couple of courses to understand a bit more about what it’s all about – especially as coding is now included in the Finnish school core curriculum. At BETT I started to get increasingly concerned about engineers taking over education.

It’s clear that the big businesses are mainly interested in selling (actual) things: tablets, laptops, mobile devices, robots, 3D printers, screens (the bigger  the better), smart boards etc. A few years back everybody was talking about serious games and gamification of learning. Well, it proved to be something teachers found exciting and full of possibilities, but the schools had/have no money, so the interest in developing serious games slowly expired. No big bucks in that line of business. Now, we've come to the point where teachers and students are encouraged to create learning games themselves. It develops creativity and problem solving skills. Yippee! And your hard work will be recognized by a cute digital badge, if you share your game with the rest of the world.

In the light of sustainable development and solutions for the future, I’d like to see more open learning solutions, less to do with different devices and more to do with thinking and problem solving. More BYOD-based and 1:2-4 learning, prioritizing collaboration and team work skills, communication and creative inquiry.  For me the idea of the internet of things in which I have to update my washing machine (and all other home electronics) once in six months and change it for a newer model every two years is a horrible nightmare. Perhaps, it’s not a surprise that WALL-E is one of my all-time film favorites.

However, contrary to the show of things, I did enjoy the show of thoughts at BETT. Dr. Ashley Tan questioned the conventional way of flipping. It shouldn’t just be teachers working overtime making videos and students doing their homework in a bit different way than usual. Flipping entails rethinking of teaching and curriculum. In true flipping the conventional classroom roles are flipped, students are learning content creators and teach each other. For me that’s an inspiring idea and supports students engagement and them taking ownership of their learning. It shows way towards more personalized learning and design learning.

After spending three days looking at devices, gadgets, things and stuff, it was very refreshing and absolutely fascinating to listen to Sir Ken Robinson talking. He hardly mentioned technologies, but talked very critically about education. “I’m criticizing school culture and standardization, not teachers.” he said. Human mind is inherently creative. Creativity, imagination and innovation should form the corner stones of education. Education should support diversity instead of conformity. I totally agree. But how do I convince the decision makers, as creativity and diversity are difficult to measure and convert into Big Data. Blimey!

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).

OPPI: celebrating learning

Finally, an international learning festival dealing with the most fascinating and mind-blowing issues in learning and discussing global challenges and mega trends without stiff self-important lectures and academic jargon. Even if some of the topics were serious and heartfelt, the atmosphere in general was relaxed and joyful.

As hierarchies are inevitably crumbling down and flexible global networks and learning communities are gradually replacing them, as students become more and more engaged in their own learning, more and more self-organized and they participate in the process as designers, it’s only proper that also in “conferences” participants are actively taking part, learning by doing, creating new contacts and joining new networks. The 21st century way of learning in which the learner is at the centre should be applied throughout in professional development, teacher training, seminars, workshops and conferences.

New ideas and fresh points of view were presented in many of the discussions, lectures and workshops. Students’ voices were heard and a little bit of music and circus and lot of play were included.

For me, PISA statistics and comparisons were very thought-provoking. Why do boys and students with immigrant background do so badly compared with girls? How much of that is due to teachers and teaching? Majority of Finnish teachers are white female high-achievers. Do they even speak the same language with boys and immigrant pupils? How is it possible that the Finnish students with very low self-belief, motivation and engagement still have the best learning results in Europe? Is it, at least partly, due to the “good girl” syndrome? And, seriously, what does this kind of lack of motivation and engagement do to creativity and collaboration?

On the other hand, Saku Tuominen’s workshop in which he presented his mindset for dreaming and doing was quite inspirational. I’ve always been an advocate of learning by boing, but now I think I’ll include dreaming in the equation as well. I’m sure a dreamstorming session now and then in a Finnish classroom would make a difference. Dreaming as such is fun, but including doing (realizing your dreams) in the process is what makes it life-changing. It goes very well together with “thinking globally, acting locally” principle.

I also took part in OPPI TeachMeet livestream, my first ever. I really enjoy these semi-spontaneous meetings in which the participants are at centre. The feeling was very warm and encouraging thanks to Oliver Quinlan and Tim Walker. I also shared a little OPPIstory from my classroom a few years back. Yey!

I love Sugata Mitra. I’ve once heard him lecture about the hole-in-the-wall experience/experiment a few years ago and I’ve been an absolute fan since. His school in the cloud is a dream almost come true. It was fantastic to hear him again. He never fails to challenge us. He’s all for minimally invasive teaching and self-organized learning. So, he suggested, teachers shouldn’t be guides but friends. Wow! What do you say to that? A lot of re-thinking to do!