The links are in chronological order from the first task to the last but in the actual text part the latest writings are on top.
VOC I
Task 1 - How to become a vocational teacher?
Task 2 - What competences do I need as a vocational teacher?
Task 3 - How can I guide learning as a vocational teacher?
Task 4 - Teacher’s responsibilities and rights
Task 5 - How to make my teaching versatile?
Task 6 - How can I, as a vocational teacher, activate my students?
Task 7 - How can I, as a vocational teacher, promote communality and collaboration?
Teaching practice
Task 8 - Assessing learning and competence
Meeting in Oulu - Dec 2014
VOC II
Entrepreneurship
Working-life orientation
Sustainability
Special needs education
Multicultural skills in global world
VOC II
Entrepreneurship
This entity was very nice with various material/media, introductions, videos, self-made audio recordings and survey. In particular, I liked the reflective task of considering intrapreneurship. It gave some new ideas on why I, for example, have never really thought about becoming an entrepreneur, and what could be the differences between myself and those who are entrepreneurs already at primary school.
I was a bit confused about the sources used for the audio recordings. I supposed they were included in the material shared also with us learners but just explained a bit more in the recording. It was a bit unclear how many or which tasks we were supposed to do and which questions were more like topics. Since I wasn't among the first ones who started this task, I was able to proceed without major problems because others had already asked about the unclear things.
Working-life orientation
This learning environment was very well organised. It presented the learners a clear path to follow. The pages of the blog had informative headings, the contents were what the heading referred to. The tasks were clearly divided into their own pages, so very easy for the learner to see what the different tasks are and if s/he had done all the tasks. Also information on the teachers was a nice piece of information.
The tasks themselves were very measured. I think that these tasks guided the learners to critical thinking, because they could not be answered by just picking the answers from the material but some kind of evaluation and application was needed, too. Also commenting each others' views gave some more food for thoughts.
Sustainability
The environment was rather challenging. I was not sure what to do with the submission fields because there were no tasks related to those, so I just wrote there sth like 'Done' or 'Yes, I have now watched the material'.
There was quite a lot of material, and the topic is very interesting, so the main problem was not knowing really what was expected of me as a learner. The videos and prezis were good and gave a lot of ideas what could be done with students in a class and how the subject could be approached.
There was also an individual task to be answered on our own blogs. You can find my views on sustainability as a subject in vocational education on page individual tasks.
Special needs education
With our new group we have created a learning environment where our fellow students are to study and learn about special needs education. I think that the time we had for doing this task was very short, so there was no time to try and test many alternatives but we had to decide about the material quite soon. Of course the time was the same for all groups, but personally I would have liked to have more time to plan beforehand.
We chose a prezi as our presentation format, because it is useful with different kinds of materials (you can link there videos, pictures, text, etc.). Maarit in our group is the artistic one, so she created the presentation in prezi and drew the pictures, we others created material to link to prezi. To do something new, we wanted to used a cartoon character as the main figure in the plot. I'm happy with what we were able to create, but had we had more time... https://prezi.com/uivozpz9wr8j/copy-of-business-canvas/?utm_campaign=share&utm_medium=copy
Multicultural skills in global world
As the first teaching environment this created high expectations for the next ones. I really enjoyed the diverse material the multiculturalism group had made and gathered to their blog format unit, and it was fun to do the tasks. Well, I do not yet know whether I passed or not, but anyhow the whole was finalised and clear, and the lecturers of topics culture and multicultural challenges in particular fantastic.
What did I learn then? Well I learnt a lot on what an interesting online
course may look like. I also think I learnt new things about different cultures and about internationalisation in education. In particular, I found the video about panel on "internationalising higher education - is it an unattainble dream or is it a sustainable reality" surprisingly engrossing. However, I felt that some comments related to the work opportunities were - well, incomprehesible.
I do think institutions of higher education, too, need to be aware of what is happening in the employment area. At least in Finland the goal, I hope, is to educate people so that they can use their education in a way that enables them to earn their living. For example, I would have liked to become some sort of a scholar (I loved doing my pro gradu although it did not always go that smoothly). When I got my pro gradu done I was asked if I would have liked to continue to licenciate work. Unfortunately, my financial support for studying was used, and the faculty did not have any financial help to offer, so I had to humbly do as I was supposed to, that is, go to work.
Internationalisation for the sake of internationalisation cannot be what we are aiming at. There has to be clear views on why do we need and how do we utilise internationalisation. But what internationalisation means exactly is still quite difficult to define. When can some institute or a person(?) be considered international enough?
VOC I
Meeting in Oulu - Dec 2014
After starting with iVET fellow students in June, we now met again. Unfortunately, I was able to participate only on the first day because of work issues. However, I think the first day was very useful because we looked at each others' blogs and were able to receive and give comments on those. I think it is quite interesting to see how we have different ways of presenting information, for example, some of us have many images in their blogs. So far my blog does not have that many illustrations mainly because I'm not sure on what grounds we are allowed to use, for example, pictures from the net. Of course none of us are yet finished with the blogs at this point, so I think most blogs will go through many changes and updates.
TASK 8 - Assessing learning and competence
Group Cognitivism
How can various competencies be documented and developed using a portfolio? What kinds of portfolios are there? How to show one's competencies in a digital portfolio?
Our own presentation had portfolios as topic.This was a very useful topic in this stage of
our studies, because we should be presenting and assessing our blogs/portfolios within a week in our contact days. First we presented a classification of portfolios. There can be documentation portfolios aka working portfolios in which the main point is the student's works. Documentation portfolios may include the student's best and weakest works, from brainstorming to drafts and to completed works.
Process portfolio is what we should be creating in this IVET program. It should present all phases of the learning process and in particular we should reflect our own learning in it by keeping a journal on our progress. The portfolio should show how we have integrated the acquired knowledge or skills in order to achieve the aims of the education.
Showcase portfolio is used in particular in summative assessment of learner's progress. It should include the student's best work that has been selected by the student and teacher. This type of portfolio should also include the student's own analysis of his/her development and reflections.
In our reference material we had an example blog created by a student from earlier IVET group. The portfolio was nice, but I found it a bit difficult to find the summative assessment there. The students are supposed to do some self-assessment as well, and I think the readers shouldn't have to gather that information from bit and pieces here and there, but it should be found without too much searching. On the other hand, this portfolio had also much good in it, so using parts of it as a model for one's own portfolio is not a bad idea.
When it is time to assess a portfolio, it can be required to show the following:
- thoughtfulness, to show that the student has monitored and reflected his/her own comprehension on the topics and new information
- development in relation to the main expectations of the curriculum
- understanding and application of the key processes
- completeness, correctness and appropriateness of products and processes
- diversity of entries (comments, images, mind maps etc)
Characteristics of good portfolio are, for example, that it states the ILOs, demonstrates the student's ability to apply and use what they have learnt, includes a variety of work samples, and has links to relevant reference materials. The contents consist of PSP, reflections on experiences throughout the learning period, the aims, content and assessment of the programme, self-assessment of one's own skills and learning process, as well as professional identity in relation to the developing teacher. To be able to succeed with their portfolios, the students need to have enough information on what is expected to be in it and how it is assessed.
Group Behaviorism
Behaviorists introduced in their presentation the SOLO (Structure of the Observed Learning Outcome) taxonomy by John Biggs, which was a very enlightening way of classifying the different levels of learning outcomes based on their complexity. It defines the competence from prestructural level (nothing relevant in the material created by the student) to the level of extended abstract. On the last and most advanced level the learner has developed beyond analysing and applying information to hypothesizing and theorizing it. http://www.johnbiggs.com.au/academic/solo-taxonomy/
Also information on educational institutions' business-like nature was discussed. The institutions need to be on the market, to compete of students like other businesses compete of their customers. The institutes are also assessed, for example, one criterion could be to measure the employment of graduated students.
There are quite many methods of assessment, and it would be ideal if there could be a mix of different assessment methods used. This could make different learners with different personalities and learning styles have better ways to show their learning. Besides being assessed themselves, the students are often asked to give feedback on the course they have participated in.
Group Constructivism
What is the role of the student's self-evaluation in vocational education?
Self-evaluation can be a useful tool for self-improvement, when reflecting on what has been learnt. Self-evaluation can also help students to learn about their own learning. However, self-assessment is something that may not be self-evident, but learners may need guidance and it needs to be practiced.
To learn self-assessment is important also outside a certain course at school. Since we today are talking about life-long learning, self-assessment can help also in the working life, where formal teaching does not exist like at school.
Constructive alignment presented by behaviorists was a new concept to me. It has been developed by John Biggs and the core idea is to design the assessment criteria and teaching and learning activities according to the ILOs of the curriculum. In other words, once the students have gotten information on what they are expected to learn during the unit in question and what activities it involves, the responsibility of meeting the criteria is not depending on what the teacher does but on what the students do.
Session about teaching practice
We received a lot of very detailed material on what to do before the actual teaching practice, what documents need to be written and approved in advance etc. I quess these things have caused problems with earlier students, otherwise they don't seem too incomprehensible.
It seems that I will not be able to do my teaching practice soon (I do hope my study time will not end before it) because I don't have any extra holiday at work. I plan to ask for unpaid leave, but it depends largely on where I manage to get a teaching practice place and how frequently the teaching hours are. Of course, if I have two teaching hours a week, it is easier to organise than if I have to be away whole weeks outside the holiday season.
The place for the teaching practice will probably be some of the local schools giving vocational education here in Oulu. I was thinking about doing the practice in Stockholm or Saint Petersburg, but to open doors for possible future employment it might be best to do the practice where I live.
TASK 7 - How can I, as a vocational teacher, promote communality and collaboration?
Group Cognitivism
As a teacher, how to guide and organize a team (or study group)? How to make a team work properly?
This topic of organizing a class so that team work would be possible and even successful has been one of the most interesting ones so far in this iVET program. Our method for the teaching session was Flipped Classroom. So we created a mind map to be sent to the students, and the idea was that the students study the contents on the mind map, and then the questions on it are discussed during the lesson.
Unfortunately, our material was sent very late, that shouldn't happen with 'real' students at school. However, since our fellow students in this iVET program had studied the same or at least closely related material on the topic, they were able to discuss the questions even if they hadn't studied the mind map. So I think our session went as planned, although we had quite a lot of material on the map since we answered all the questions given for the task. The discussion was quite lively and we had to go through the material rapidly because of the limited time.
When thinking about the guidelines and details a teacher needs to consider when planning team work for the students, there are plenty of material and tools that can be used to help. As in planning other course contents or teaching sessions or, for example, Flipped Classroom material and process, the key is to do as much as possibe in advance and to engage the students also already from the very start.
The students can in their groups decide on many things that guide their co-operation, one important thing is a group contract in which is defined how the team works together: their meetings, who writes the minutes, how to ensure everyone is included in the process, is there a leader and what is his/her role etc. It is also important to think about possible problems, if the team or some member of it fail to fulfill their task.
Group Behaviorism
Group dynamics
In a traditional manner, Behaviorists presented their material mainly using power point. They began by defining a group: often, in a learning setting, a group means a limited amount of participants who have been given a certain task which they fulfill by themselves (as a group) and then present the results to the whole class.
Group dynamics refers to the relationships that are formed within a group, that is, the roles the participants have. It is rather usual that the more extrovert (loud) personalities take a bigger role in a group. The loud ones may easily be the leaders, whereas the more quiet participants can be given some "background work", for example, to look for theoretical information on the topic in question. To create a group that is able to work independently, the teacher needs to know something about the students' personalities so that there would be a suitable mixture of learners in a group.
Due to technical issues, Behaviorists had to improvise during their presentation. I think they managed that very well, they were able to change their plan on the spot. While one Behaviorist was studying the problem, another started to ask comments from the audience and also used the time to show a video on the topic.
Group Constructivism
Collaborative methods and practices in teaching
The presentation was held with the help of a power point slide set. The term collaborative learning was opened, it means that there is a larger task for which each learner does some individual work. Once each member has done their part, the parts are put together to finalise the task.
Constructivists also asked us learners to discuss on the ideal group size. It was pointed out that when there are four or five members in a group, a fruitful mixture of diverse thinking can emerge.
Briefly, collaborative method requires preparations, that is, forming the groups and introducing the task. For collaborative work to succeed, the team also needs to learn to work together which may be done by giving the group members certain roles, or at least by defining the rules according to which the group can work. Also monitoring and feedback are important factors in collaborative work.
TASK 6 - How can I, as a vocational teacher, activate my students?
Group Cognitivism
What is engaged pedagogy? (”Osallistava pedagogiikka” in Finnish)
In our group, we decided to use debate as a teaching method this time. We divided our group to those against and those for engaged pedagogy, and even though it would have been easier to be pro the idea of engaged pedagogy, grounds for being against it were also discovered and backed up to some extent.
I quess that when planning the lecture, our most thorough discussion involved the concept of engaged pedagogy. What is meant by it? Most of us agreed that it means that the students discuss the topic together and show their activity and knowledge by interacting and discussing with others, and that was the basis for our debate.
We tried to create a topic, that would be easy to interpret and of 'either or' -type. In the end, our topic was 'Engaged pedagogy - is a revolutionary method which sould be used in every VET school'. The goal was to raise discussion in particular on what is left between if not using engaged pedagogy at all and if it must be used in every school.
Personally, I think engaged pedagogy is widely useful, but I can also see some problems. For example, I don't consider myself a very extrovert person, so I can understand the problems some quiet students may have if they are forced (or heavily encouraged) to speak in front of the whole class. I remember being told already in the commercial college (back in the 80's, that is) by one of our teachers that most of the students in our class would not survive in an American classroom because we didn't talk and take part enough. I don't know if the meaning was that everything and everyone should be like somewhere in America, but I must say that I didn't quite agree. Of course I kept my thoughts to myself :o)
When using engaged pedagogy, the teacher should know the students well to be able to assess their performance in the class. In addition, I think that nearly always the teacher also has some other data such as written tests for evaluating the students. When both performances, interaction and discussion in the class and written tests are taken into account, extrovert and introvert students have had a chance to show their skills.
Group Constructivism
Activating a lecture and learning through discussion
Several methods involving discussion where presented during the constructivists' teaching session. As in the preceding presentations on versatility of teaching, constructivists emphasized the factors that need to be taken into consideration when defining whether to apply methods such as debate, individual work, group discussions for teaching with a group of learners. The teacher needs to weigh the student material and their maturity as well as the subject and ILOs when thinking about how to proceed.
The teachers of our session were trying to activate us learners by asking us to comment on the topic and to share our thoughts. I think they managed it quite nicely and were able to rise a lively discussion on the topic. Some of those learners, who already had experience on teaching, pointed out the importance of feedback for the teacher. If the learners are active, it gives the teacher more or less clear signs on how s/he is doing and is s/he getting the message through.
Furthermore, it was discussed that it is also important that the teacher asks questions. When the students answer the questions and share their thoughts and views, the teacher gets better understanding on the students' current knowledge and is able to adapt the content of the lesson, if needed.
A downsize in an active lecture can be that some students may be very eager to comment on everything while others remain silent all the time. It may be considered rude by the students, if they are asked when they are not signalling anything to the teacher.
Group Behaviorism
What is self-regulated learning?
The topic self-regulated learning was presented with help of good video material and the theme was enlightened by applying it to VOCII topics. Briefly, self-regulated learning means that the learner him- or herself is in control of learning. That is, the learner defines what s/he is going to study, how to study (what environment/tools to use), what is the schedule and the ILOs.
The presentation generated lively discussion among participants. One issue that was considered a bit of a worry was how to define or decide if one's own self-regulated learning is going the right way and when to finish it. It was concluded that self-regulated learning is useful for learners who are able and mature enough to evaluate and reflect on their own learning and progress, and by those means to know when they have reached what they had set out to do.
TASK 5 - How to make my teaching versatile?
Group Cognitivism
What are the core skills of teaching?
Since we were encouraged to use a new method for teaching for this task, we had quite a long list of possible options. We decided to use brainstorming, and also its negative version. First the "students" of the session were asked to brainstorm about the characters of a dream student and then it was time for negative brainstorming and the topic was a bad teacher.
The goal of brainstorming on these topics was to collect views on the preferred learning style of the or the learner and of the preferred teaching style of the teacher. Of course the bad teacher functions as an example of what not to do.
We also wanted to try a new tool 'bubbl.us' in collecting the material on a task, and with this tool, at the same time present the outcome of the brainstorm to the students. The idea was to add the group's answers and thoughts on the topic to the bubbl.us -tool view created beforehand.
Unfortunately, I had technical issues with the tool and couldn't log in during the session (I had tested and managed to log in earlier). But my fellow-student-presenter saved the situation and led the discussion further. The topic was for each student to think of the subject they are teaching or likely to teach and what methods would be the best for teaching that subject. Our idea was to show that the best teaching methods depend on the subject and that it is important to try to find various ways for gaining the ILOs.
We also used the tool thinglink, which is one of my favorites so far, to present the more lesson-like material: https://www.thinglink.com/scene/574893508599480321 Mainly the thinglink material is links to videos (there were plenty of videos available when using search words like 'good teaching', 'bad teaching' etc.) and to some other relevant pages on the net, but not to any heavy theoretical tomes.
Group Behaviorism
How to make my teaching versatile?
Behaviorists presented their material in a traditional power point show format. They introduced various working methods for versatile teaching, such as independent learning, contact teaching (the method in which the teacher speaks and students listen often rather passively, a method most of us have experience of), group teaching, workplace studying and personal guidance.
Behaviorists pointed out that doing something new in teaching may wake up the tired (often younger) students. This new can be a teaching walk, for example. One of the members in the Behaviorists group had even tried the teaching walk with her students. Factors that need to be considered in advance are, for example, group size, age of the students and how much the students know on the topic already.
In addition, Behaviorists introduced classification by Huba and Freed, which compares teacher-centered and student-centered methods. As the terms suggest, teacher-centered means that the teacher has the knowledge and students are learners. Student-centered teaching focuses on the students' progress, the teacher learns as well and the way of doing is co-operative and supportive rather than competitive and individualistic.
Group Constructivism
What methods advance/improve the versatility of learning?
Constructivists also used the traditional power point slides in their presentation. In addition, they played the methods the presented in their session: Fishbowl, teaching walk, reading circle, snowball and inquiry teaching. Although the play part was done by a minimalistic arrangements, merely just by discussions and some pictures, we learners got quite a good picture on what were the main points, the advantages and disadvantages, in these methods.
TASK 4 - Teacher's responsibilities and rights
The legislature that directs and guides teaching and education in Finland
Core question: What are the teacher’s rights and responsibilities?
I was not able to join the actual virtual session, so I watched the recording and have collected here some of the main things presented and discussed during the lecture. Although I didn't participate the session, I attended the meetings our group (Cognitivism) had about the topic. My individual tasks can be found here.
“Good Administration, Safety and Privacy Protection”
In our group meetings, we had quite lively discussions in general on how easy or difficult it is to try to make things better in a work place. It can be rather difficult to improve in particular issues of mental safety because there are often, if not always, people and their roles, responsibilities and ways of handling things involved. In the worst case, it may happen that experienced problems do not come to light because people are afraid that there will be other, worse problems due to the fact that often these things are taken personally.
Group Cognitivism presented their task first. The task for the session was 'How do I ensure the safety of the educational work environment?' (Work place safety, mental health, bullying, physical dangers…)' and the reference material Polytechnics Act 351/2003), Occupational Safety and Health Act 738/2002), Tort Liability Act 412/1974) found in www.finlex.fi/en.
Our group presented a list of the jobs that have the highest safety risks, and among the nine most risky jobs in this sense were child care and education, in which fields teachers work. In improving the safety at work, both employers and employees need to do their share, both parties need to build the instructions and rules together. In school environment, the safety includes the safety of the teachers and safety of the students. One of the most important ways of preventing safety risks is to try in advance to see the situations where problems could arise. The risks can be physical as well as mental, and as we have seen in school shootings, for example, in Finland, mental problems may lead to physical in situations where innocent parties get hurt or even killed when a mentally disturbed person behaves unpredictably.
Maarit, our legal expert in IVET commented the topic by asking: Safety is everybody's thing. What does that mean?
In short, we all should remember common sense in everything we do or instruct our students to do. Silvia, who teaches in Italy, pointed out that there teachers have to watch and look after their students even during breaks, so preventing the safety risks is very much on the teacher's responsibility.
Maarit added that the teacher needs to consider the risks in advance and arrange environment so that doing practical things is safe. Even with adult students these things need to be considered because they may use machines they are not used to etc.
There was also dicussion about the school shootings and how schools have reacted to those. Although schools now have improved their plans for dealing with risky situations, it may still be a traumatic experience for a teacher to confront an aggressive and violent student in a class, let alone to face a student who has come to school with a gun and intends to shoot people. There is no foolproof process for handling all unexpected situations, but teachers can be prepared somehow if these things have been openly discussed and trained.
In general, employers need to see that the workers have breaks, and too heavy work load should be avoided to prevent mental health problems. In schools, teachers should have tools to recognise how their students are doing. Engagement, communication, relationships between students and teachers should be given enough time and they should be part of everyday life at school. One common problem in schools and working life is bullying which can also be a factor causing mental health issues.
Group Behaviorism presented their material next. Their topic was 'How do I take into account privacy and data security in education?' The given reference material was
Polytechnics Act 351/2003, Act on the Openness of Government Activities 621/1999, Child Welfare Act 417/2007, Personal Data Act 523/1999, found in www.finlex.fi/en
SORA-statutes mean solutions in situations where students are found not to be suitable for the education in question. SORA guidance is given by the national board of education. SORA focuses on mental things, for example, can a student continue studies if s/he is having mental issues that may risk his/her performance and the health of their future clients (in healthcare in particular).
In fields such as healthcare, when students are applying for an education, an experienced teacher interviews them in connection of the entrance examination to see if the student might have some mental issues that are relevant for the education in question. Of course the interview is not a psychological one, but the objective is to try to see obvious health issues that could be problematic and risky in the education and possibly later on in the working life.
As Maarit clarified, the drug test mentioned in polytechnics act can be used only under very limited conditions. For example, in the act it is stated that the drug use must be suspected and that the use of drugs must cause high risk at work. The school in question must also have written documents on how to deal with students' drug problems. So a teacher cannot start any process on drug testing without very heavy grounds.
Another interesting question in the Behaviorists' presentation was that what documents need to be kept secret in the school world. Teachers usually gain a lot of information about their students, for example medical details, and a lot of that information is such that cannot be shown openly. So the teachers should not keep any private, written or other type of documentation about anything that is not required by the general school procedures.
All in all, the laws and regulations are changed and updated all the time, so the teachers need to be careful when looking for the latest material. It is also important to check, when some change in law is inforce, when it starts, to be able to fulfill the requirements. In general, there are every year three changes to the laws related directly to teaching profession. A teacher is not a private person, but must follow a set of laws.
Group Constructivism's task was 'How are the principles of good administration seen/felt in the everyday work of a teacher? (What are the principles of good administration?)', given reference material was Administrative Procedure Act 434/2003, Chapter 2 Fundamental principles of good administration, The Constitution of Finland, Chapter 2, Basic rights and liberties, found in www.finlex.fi/en
The most obvious and maybe also the most difficult principle is that everyone should be treated on equal basis, fairly. The constructivists gave an example, in which a teacher had a badly behaving student. The teacher took notes on the student's behaviour, and despite of discussion with the student, the situation continued. Finally, the teacher tells the student to leave and that s/he is expelled.
Although the student caused the situation by his/her own behaviour, the teacher still needs to follow the law and the school policy. For example, the teacher cannot expel a student just like that, and if the student is a minor, the guardian(s) need to be heard. Furthermore, if the teacher wrote down some documents on the student's behaviour, those documents are not for the teacher only, and if the student asks, s/he has a right to read the documents.
The constructivists also asked for comments on how the authorities react or should react if a teacher reports violence, and that s/he has faced dangerous situations. Ideas from the audience were that first the principal could try to clarify the situation, and the teacher should also make a work safety report. If the principal does not act properly, the teacher should report to the principal's boss. Some thought that if there occurs threatening behaviour, these incidents in school should always be reported to the police. It was also experienced, that depending on the situation, it can sometimes also help that the teacher in private discusses with the student and learns about what is wrong, and may even be able to help somehow.
Unfortunately, it may happen that co-operation between different parties in these situations fail. Reasons for this kind of failure can be several, but the most common presented by the participants of the session were lack of communication and wrong attitudes. It was also pointed out that in order to get one's own understanding known, one has to have the right kind of network, to know the right people who can make decisions or forward the message to those who have the power to decide. Also it was mentioned that a foreigner may not have the same starting point as a native Finn, because of being a foreigner who may not be able to communicate as well as Finns.
One problem in the daily work of a teacher today can also be the fact that students are considered customers. Earlier it was quite clear to all parties that at school and in particular in the classroom teacher is the boss, but today teachers use a lot of their energy when explaining to parents why they require this or that from the children, the students. The students may start complaining if they do not like a particular way of teaching, drama for example. So according to the law, all should be treated equal but unfortunately the law does not define in detai what is good and fair.
Maarit admits that these issues can be expressed vaquely in the law, but vaqueness is there for a reason. For example, the idea of fairness concerns so many fields that in each case ethical things need to be considered in one's heart first.
The most important things learnt when studying these legal issues were that the legal text is usually on quite a high level, but there often exists more concrete articles from real life as well. It can also be very demanding to try to see the whole picture of the legislation on some particular area, the acts and decrees usually include references to many other places. It can seem quite a jumble to follow the existing material in a logical order. However, we should remember that especially in difficult circumstances, the law is for lawyers, and they have been trained to read and interpret the relevant acts and decrees.
TASK 3 - How can I guide learning as a vocational teacher?
Group Cognitivism
What is learning? What kinds of views (or theories) of learning are there? (Such as Kolb's learning styles.) What is your view of the various styles?
Since our groups are named after the main learning theories (behaviorism, cognitivism and constructivism), those theories are now easy to remember by name :o) I have only a rather superficial understanding of these theories, but based on my understanding, my favorite is the latest, constructivism. Constructivism, as the name suggests, can be seen as a process in which old, existing knowledge of a learner is combined with new received information and a new ensemble of knowledge is built.
A popular way of describing or defining the constructivist idea of learning is the learning cycle. Or rather, constructivism is the core principle behind different learning cycles. As an example our group presented Kolb's learning cycle, which consists of four main phases: concrete experience, reflective observation, abstract conceptualisation, and active experimentation. Different learners may start the cycle from different phases, but to fully learn, the cycle should be completed. Kolb has combined to the learning cycle also different learning styles, so this cycle works on two levels in a way.
However, Kolb's theory on different learners or learning styles in the cycle model is not so easy to perceive. Our group used a bit easier approach and we presented the learning styles according to a more commonplace division: there are visual, auditory and kinesthetic learners or learning styles. A visual learner learns best by having visual experiences, auditory learner by hearing, and kinesthetic learner by doing. There are several tests in the internet to test one's own learning style, and if I remember correctly, most of our group members appeared to be visual learners. However, it would be ideal if the input was received in more than one way.
Group Behaviorism
What role do learning styles and strategies have in study guidance/tutoring/teaching?
The behaviorists had a power point slide set with quite lof of text in it. However, I think the amount ot text was valid. It included thorough descriptions on different learners and how they could be taught (auditory, visual, kinesthetic).
When thinking about teaching students who have disabilities in some area, for example, vision, it is important to offer these students other ways of learning. They can experience and learn by touching and feeling the objects as much as possible (kinesthetic) or by hearing about the new things in songs, sound books or discussing on the topics in class (auditory).
For auditory learners hearing and speaking about the topics in question is important. They need words, either written or spoken to reach their best understanding. A new and surprising piece of information was that to be able to concentrate when reading, auditory learners need some bacground noice. Auditory learners solve problems by talking them through, which sounds familiar to me although I'm more of a visual learner according to some test.
Kinesthetic learners learn best by moving, doing and practicing. In classroom, it helps their learning if tools such as computers, calculators or typewriters are used. The teacher should try to find other ways of meeting and experiencing new things and information besides lecturing or having the students reading about them.
According to the behaviorist learning theory, learning is the result of reinforcing the learners behaviour, reinforcement can be negative or positive. However, in today's education the behavioristic view that a person learns somehow blindly based on the feedback given by the teacher (or someone or something else) is considered outdated.
Group behaviorism also briefly presented the basic idea of contructivism, a later and now more popular theory of learning than behaviorism. The constructivist theory means basically that learners are not empty buckets to be filled in with information but that they try to process the new information (if they want to learn) in a way that makes the new things match with what they already knew.
Group Constructivism
What is Progressive Inquiry? How does it differ from other cyclical theories such as Kolb´s Experiental Learning? How is it similar?
The safe and familiar power point slide set presentation had been chosen for this teaching session as well. For me it still works well. The main issues of the presentation were that progressive inquiry is a process where students are researchers trying to find answers to the questions they create themselves, and try and test according to their working theories, hypotheses. The teacher's role is to set up a context, to show why it makes sense to study the topic in question. Also the teacher needs to guide the students so that the focus of the project is not missed.
Progressive inquiry develops students' skills in critical evaluation and sharing and receiving information. When thinking about working life, the students are also learning team work, because they work together towards a common target. What happens often in group works in class is that each student learns about what s/he is working on but not what the other members of the group are doing. In progressive inquiry, the learners need to plan also the questions together and proceed by presenting different questions in different phases of the process, so just sharing tasks and doing them separately is not so easy.
Differences between PI and other theories on cyclical learning are that PI tries to follow the process of a scientific research community. Learning is considered as a process of creating and conveying knowledge. Other approaches to cyclical learning mostly deal with how an individual learns.
However, there are many similarities to between PI and other cyclical learning theories as well. For example, all of them see learner as an active doer and that the learner tests and adjusts and re-tests to achieve the desired result, and may repeat the same phases several times.
TASK 2 - What competences do I need as a vocational teacher?
Group Cognitivism
How does a teacher maintain and develop his/her vocational competence (skills).
In this task our group, Cognitivism, first discussed about what is meant by vocational competence. The competence in teaching includes many areas besides the more obvious pedagogical and substantive ones. However, the pedagogical field alone is already quite vast, so it is not an easy task to stay updated on what is happening on the field education.
In addition, there are the rarely mentioned organizational as well as developmental and research skills. Well, I quess today the developmental skills have become more stressed and self-reflection is surely known by all teachers. For example, modern technology requires teachers to develop themselves because in order to understand their students' ways of communicating and searching information about almost anything, the teachers must also be aware of social media and technology.
Since I don't have any real experience about teaching, this task gave a better idea about what all is included in a skillful teacher's 'repertoire'. Our lecture format for the session was Prezi video: http://prezi.com/ykxw3rdgpsdl/?utm_campaign=share&utm_medium=copy
Group Behaviorism
What challenges/demands does working life set for vocational education?
The presentation was a power point show. The main message was that the challenges in vocational education can be achieved by having qualified personnel, people who are professionals on the subject and also have pedagogical skills. For vocational education to be of use there should be a realistic correlation between education and working life, that is, there is no point in educating professionals for fields that have poor employment situation. Co-operation between educational institutes and regional business, employers should be encouraged and supported. The quality of education should be monitored and measured based on the framework of Common quality assurance framework (CQAF). More information on CQAF can be found at http://www.oph.fi/downloa/46734_ammatillisen_koulutuksen_laadunhallintasuositus.pdf.
Group Constructivism
What is expected of a vocational teacher from the student’s or school’s point of view? What ethical values does a teacher need?
Constructivists had also a set of slides, a very nice set. In addition, they used discussion as a method on their lesson. There can be quite lot of expectations for vocational teachers owing to the fact that vocational education concerns many students, many different fields of professionalism and the working life is changing all the time. Also all the different stakeholders, parents, students, employers, political preconditions etc. have their expectations and requirements. The teacher must also know the school customs and invisible curriculum to be in line with them.
The students' main expectations are that the teacher should know the subject and be able to advance the students' learning. Also students expect their teachers to develop as teachers, to have skills in guiding their students and be interested in students' learning and their opinions, and last but not least, to treat them equally when teaching and assessing.
TASK 1 - How to become a vocational teacher?
Group Cognitivism
How should I use my Personal Study Plan to advance my studies? How and where to use RPL?
In our first group task, we used the more or less traditional method and presented the keypoints of our material on power point slides. We had also included in the material some videos, but I think in general, the videos should be used sparsely during lessons. They are good if sent well in advance or included as reference material, but the time of having the group present shouldn't be used for sitting and watching videos.
In my opinion, the main point of PSP is that it is a tool for helping us in fulfilling the requirements of our studies. Even though we may in our heads have a clear idea on what we are going to do, it becomes more concrete when put on "paper" and scheduled. In particular, scheduling is important when most if not all of us are working fulltime as well. I also think that PSP can be used almost anywhere and in different formats. It can be for the author's eyes and use only, because it is personal and created according to one's own goals, but it may also be important to get some feedback on it, for example, if it is realistic or not.
RPL (Recognition and Acknowledgement of Prior Learning) means the knowledge and skills you already have gained in some other connection and of which you want to get credit(s). I quess in most cases, the RPL is based on studies completed in some other institution, but it is also possible to verify one's skills as a teacher by having 5 years experience of fulltime teaching. Of course it is then the school's decision whether they recognise the prior learning or not.
Group Constructivism
Learning as a Product vs. Learning as a Process How shall I (as a future teacher) view my pedagogical studies?
The presentation was held in the format of discussion and the constructivists asked for the audience's views on product and process. This group had some technical issues in their presentation.
The division product vs process was not very clear to me. In theory, product in this context means the measure of learning, for example, a change in behaviour could be considered a learning product. Learning as a process means what happens when learning takes place. It may be different to different learners even if they are receiving the same new information, because the new information is added to what an individual learner already knows.
Constructivism approaches learning from the point of view that it is a process. The focus in teaching is on the progress a student makes. Luckily, the constructivists gave a nice and more concrete chocolate cake example on the topic: Product is a chocolate cake that is measured, process is to learn to make a cake and measure how the cake is made.
In relation to our teaching studies, the product is the qualification and it is a requirement when applying to most teaching jobs. As a process we learn, we are reflecting on what we have learnt and where we could improve.
Group Behaviorism
What does word 'vocational' mean?
Behaviorists presented their material in the power point format, and they also invited students to discuss on the subject. They experienced some technical issues in the beginning but managed to continue.
In short, according to Helakorpi, teacher's main values in vocational education are substance, pedagogical and social skills, and development and reserach skills. In vocational education, it is important to connect the theory to practice and to the working life. The students also learn by working in the field and following professionals, and are also showing their skills at work.
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