Why Finland is top worldwide in Education rankings

Anonymous
DD started school in Europe in a game-based environment. (I wouldn't call it play-based, it is quite carefully planned.). When we moved back to US she went into 1st grade. She was placed in the lowest reading group (she was never explicitly taught reading there).

The school basically treated her as if she were behind. Until that is, she took her first standardized test, in I think it was second grade, or maybe third. She got 99s all the way across. I went in to have a chat with her teacher about her placement. Fortunately, I had the test results, which put the teacher on the defensive. She switched her to the highest reading and math groups. (She had little choice) DD has never looked back. The academic awards started pouring in.
She now has a realistic shot at the top colleges and we attribute it to her early ed.

Our other child, a few years older, missed the early ed in Europe, and had a middling high school career.

Needless to say, we are big believers in the game/play-based early ed model!
Anonymous
Anonymous wrote:DD started school in Europe in a game-based environment. (I wouldn't call it play-based, it is quite carefully planned.). When we moved back to US she went into 1st grade. She was placed in the lowest reading group (she was never explicitly taught reading there).

The school basically treated her as if she were behind. Until that is, she took her first standardized test, in I think it was second grade, or maybe third. She got 99s all the way across. I went in to have a chat with her teacher about her placement. Fortunately, I had the test results, which put the teacher on the defensive. She switched her to the highest reading and math groups. (She had little choice) DD has never looked back. The academic awards started pouring in.
She now has a realistic shot at the top colleges and we attribute it to her early ed.

Our other child, a few years older, missed the early ed in Europe, and had a middling high school career.

Needless to say, we are big believers in the game/play-based early ed model!


This wasn't Finland, but a Northern European country with the same basic approach. I should add that the early ed is also very community oriented both inside the school and tied to the community at large and the some of kinds of things the kids do would never be allowed here. Like taking a 2-hour walk, lighting candles, using kitchen knives, etc. The play, games, and puzzles, though are where the magic happens.
Anonymous
Anonymous wrote:
Anonymous wrote:DD started school in Europe in a game-based environment. (I wouldn't call it play-based, it is quite carefully planned.). When we moved back to US she went into 1st grade. She was placed in the lowest reading group (she was never explicitly taught reading there).

The school basically treated her as if she were behind. Until that is, she took her first standardized test, in I think it was second grade, or maybe third. She got 99s all the way across. I went in to have a chat with her teacher about her placement. Fortunately, I had the test results, which put the teacher on the defensive. She switched her to the highest reading and math groups. (She had little choice) DD has never looked back. The academic awards started pouring in.
She now has a realistic shot at the top colleges and we attribute it to her early ed.

Our other child, a few years older, missed the early ed in Europe, and had a middling high school career.

Needless to say, we are big believers in the game/play-based early ed model!


This wasn't Finland, but a Northern European country with the same basic approach. I should add that the early ed is also very community oriented both inside the school and tied to the community at large and the some of kinds of things the kids do would never be allowed here. Like taking a 2-hour walk, lighting candles, using kitchen knives, etc. The play, games, and puzzles, though are where the magic happens.


This sounds very much like my kids N Arl preschool which has a mega long wait list. It is a game approach as well. I am certain it is the best for my child, but I have often worried about the exact scenario you describe, e.g., judged against the Kumon kids from the get go. I have no doubt it will pay off later. Kids with this play approach have been shown to routinely outpace peers by third grade.
Anonymous
Anonymous wrote:
Anonymous wrote:Go rent 'waiting for superman' and tell me if you think the American model is winning.

A good education, therefore, is not ruled out by poverty, uneducated parents or crime - and drug-infested neighborhoods. In fact, those are the very areas where Geoffrey Canada has success with his charter schools.

I love how two of the pps want to just remove our inner city and poor kids from our Education statistics. Sure. We'll just continue to ignore that population instead of reforming the education system itself.

I also wouldn't be so certain US would rise to the top by self-selecting a tiny population.


I'm just curious if you applied any critical thinking to your evaluation of "Waiting for Superman."

Do you know who produced it and what their (financial) motive is?

It's basically propaganda for the charter school movement and a knee-jerk attack on teachers' unions. It's basically right-wing propaganda to privatize public schools. Bullshit.


This. And I hate the teachers union. I love the Teach for America Teachers though. Suck it. Bring more young people who care-- what's the downside? All the one's we've had have been phenomenal.
Anonymous
Anonymous wrote:Of course, some of it is funny...

"Finnish schools vary so little because the schools have the same curriculum".

ummmm--maybe it is also because the Finnish socio-economic/language population also varies so little from school-to-school.

The rest is pretty interesting though. I have heard over and over about play-based learning in the early years. Second child is going that route. First child was in a more academic setting.


yes, finland is not exactly a melting pot of diversity. There are a bunch of white, Finnish people there and that's it. They don't deal with the massive diversity that is great but also is challenging to the UNited States school systems.
Anonymous
Anonymous wrote:Does Finland have affirmative action?


LOL
Anonymous
Starts at home- not in the school. Parents modeling appropriate learning behavior, setting expectations and accountability and creating a home where learning is celebrated..... The school Yates would work much better, then.
Anonymous
Anonymous wrote:DD started school in Europe in a game-based environment. (I wouldn't call it play-based, it is quite carefully planned.). When we moved back to US she went into 1st grade. She was placed in the lowest reading group (she was never explicitly taught reading there).

The school basically treated her as if she were behind. Until that is, she took her first standardized test, in I think it was second grade, or maybe third. She got 99s all the way across. I went in to have a chat with her teacher about her placement. Fortunately, I had the test results, which put the teacher on the defensive. She switched her to the highest reading and math groups. (She had little choice) DD has never looked back. The academic awards started pouring in.
She now has a realistic shot at the top colleges and we attribute it to her early ed.

Our other child, a few years older, missed the early ed in Europe, and had a middling high school career.

Needless to say, we are big believers in the game/play-based early ed model!


Funny! We had the same experience. My children are not yet out of high school, but it will be interesting to see if there is a difference.
Anonymous
Anonymous wrote:
Anonymous wrote:Of course, some of it is funny...

"Finnish schools vary so little because the schools have the same curriculum".

ummmm--maybe it is also because the Finnish socio-economic/language population also varies so little from school-to-school.

The rest is pretty interesting though. I have heard over and over about play-based learning in the early years. Second child is going that route. First child was in a more academic setting.


I thought that at first, too. Actually, the population in Finland is more diverse than you would expect with a growing influx of immigrants from Bangladesh, Iraq, Russia and parts of Africa. In one of the Finnish schools that has been successful, half of the population came from somewhere else. You can read the article here.

http://www.smithsonianmag.com/people-places/Why-Are-Finlands-Schools-Successful.html?c=y&page=1


I Haven't read the article yet, so forgive me if it's in there, but I wonder if the immigrant children are together with the Finnish kids. We lived in another European country that had "black schools" (yes, people called them that) where the children went until they could learn the language. Those children never had a shot at college. They were basically tracked into vocational school from the moment they got there.
Anonymous
I've said this before on previous Finnish education threads here, but I'll say it again. This comes from some experience, as DW lived in Helsinki and I visited her often.

Don't look at PISA scores, look at the end outcome. What type of innovations come out of Finland? The only successful companies are Rovio (Angry Birds game), Supercell (Clash of Clans - also a game), and formerly Nokia which would be bankrupt already if not for Microsoft's huge cash injection last year. I suppose Marimekko is a Finnish "success" depending on who you talk to.

Yes, Finland has a small population, but even when scaled for that, why do we see so much more innovation coming out of the US? How can the US children, so poorly educated according to PISA scores, end up producing so many innovations compared to their counterparts in Europe and Asia? Why does the US dominate in terms of top universities and Nobel prize winners?

My theory (and it's a theory) is that PISA scores do measure one aspect of ability (math/science), but school systems who focus too much on it fail to teach creativity and teamwork skills.

Is there a problem in the US education? For sure. The kids at the lower levels of the socioeconomic scale lose out, and the teacher's unions put the best interests of the teachers and not their pupils as the priority. There is definitely room for reform, but the Finnish model is not necessarily the goal.
Anonymous
Anonymous wrote:I've said this before on previous Finnish education threads here, but I'll say it again. This comes from some experience, as DW lived in Helsinki and I visited her often.

Don't look at PISA scores, look at the end outcome. What type of innovations come out of Finland? The only successful companies are Rovio (Angry Birds game), Supercell (Clash of Clans - also a game), and formerly Nokia which would be bankrupt already if not for Microsoft's huge cash injection last year. I suppose Marimekko is a Finnish "success" depending on who you talk to.

Yes, Finland has a small population, but even when scaled for that, why do we see so much more innovation coming out of the US? How can the US children, so poorly educated according to PISA scores, end up producing so many innovations compared to their counterparts in Europe and Asia? Why does the US dominate in terms of top universities and Nobel prize winners?

My theory (and it's a theory) is that PISA scores do measure one aspect of ability (math/science), but school systems who focus too much on it fail to teach creativity and teamwork skills.

Is there a problem in the US education? For sure. The kids at the lower levels of the socioeconomic scale lose out, and the teacher's unions put the best interests of the teachers and not their pupils as the priority. There is definitely room for reform, but the Finnish model is not necessarily the goal.


Look, I think the Finland worship is idiotic, too. But, you're really kind of wrong in stating innovation lacks in Finland. It has been puting more into R&D than the US, for example, by about 50%, for nearly a decade. To wit: http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2005/07/13/AR2005071302227.html

It is also No. 4 in the world in the Global Innovation Index: http://www.wipo.int/pressroom/en/articles/2012/article_0014.html The US is No. 10.



Anonymous
Anonymous wrote:
Anonymous wrote:I've said this before on previous Finnish education threads here, but I'll say it again. This comes from some experience, as DW lived in Helsinki and I visited her often.

Don't look at PISA scores, look at the end outcome. What type of innovations come out of Finland? The only successful companies are Rovio (Angry Birds game), Supercell (Clash of Clans - also a game), and formerly Nokia which would be bankrupt already if not for Microsoft's huge cash injection last year. I suppose Marimekko is a Finnish "success" depending on who you talk to.

Yes, Finland has a small population, but even when scaled for that, why do we see so much more innovation coming out of the US? How can the US children, so poorly educated according to PISA scores, end up producing so many innovations compared to their counterparts in Europe and Asia? Why does the US dominate in terms of top universities and Nobel prize winners?

My theory (and it's a theory) is that PISA scores do measure one aspect of ability (math/science), but school systems who focus too much on it fail to teach creativity and teamwork skills.

Is there a problem in the US education? For sure. The kids at the lower levels of the socioeconomic scale lose out, and the teacher's unions put the best interests of the teachers and not their pupils as the priority. There is definitely room for reform, but the Finnish model is not necessarily the goal.


Look, I think the Finland worship is idiotic, too. But, you're really kind of wrong in stating innovation lacks in Finland. It has been puting more into R&D than the US, for example, by about 50%, for nearly a decade. To wit: http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2005/07/13/AR2005071302227.html

It is also No. 4 in the world in the Global Innovation Index: http://www.wipo.int/pressroom/en/articles/2012/article_0014.html The US is No. 10.





Finland is a country of 5M people. The United States has 315M! Of course he US has a more innovaters.
Anonymous
Anonymous wrote:
Anonymous wrote:
Anonymous wrote:I've said this before on previous Finnish education threads here, but I'll say it again. This comes from some experience, as DW lived in Helsinki and I visited her often.

Don't look at PISA scores, look at the end outcome. What type of innovations come out of Finland? The only successful companies are Rovio (Angry Birds game), Supercell (Clash of Clans - also a game), and formerly Nokia which would be bankrupt already if not for Microsoft's huge cash injection last year. I suppose Marimekko is a Finnish "success" depending on who you talk to.

Yes, Finland has a small population, but even when scaled for that, why do we see so much more innovation coming out of the US? How can the US children, so poorly educated according to PISA scores, end up producing so many innovations compared to their counterparts in Europe and Asia? Why does the US dominate in terms of top universities and Nobel prize winners?

My theory (and it's a theory) is that PISA scores do measure one aspect of ability (math/science), but school systems who focus too much on it fail to teach creativity and teamwork skills.

Is there a problem in the US education? For sure. The kids at the lower levels of the socioeconomic scale lose out, and the teacher's unions put the best interests of the teachers and not their pupils as the priority. There is definitely room for reform, but the Finnish model is not necessarily the goal.


Look, I think the Finland worship is idiotic, too. But, you're really kind of wrong in stating innovation lacks in Finland. It has been puting more into R&D than the US, for example, by about 50%, for nearly a decade. To wit: http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2005/07/13/AR2005071302227.html

It is also No. 4 in the world in the Global Innovation Index: http://www.wipo.int/pressroom/en/articles/2012/article_0014.html The US is No. 10.





Finland is a country of 5M people. The United States has 315M! Of course he US has a more innovaters.



The index is qualitative, not quantitative. But then, I reckon you're a product of American schools and don't understand what that means.
Anonymous
Anonymous wrote:
Anonymous wrote:
Anonymous wrote:DD started school in Europe in a game-based environment. (I wouldn't call it play-based, it is quite carefully planned.). When we moved back to US she went into 1st grade. She was placed in the lowest reading group (she was never explicitly taught reading there).

The school basically treated her as if she were behind. Until that is, she took her first standardized test, in I think it was second grade, or maybe third. She got 99s all the way across. I went in to have a chat with her teacher about her placement. Fortunately, I had the test results, which put the teacher on the defensive. She switched her to the highest reading and math groups. (She had little choice) DD has never looked back. The academic awards started pouring in.
She now has a realistic shot at the top colleges and we attribute it to her early ed.

Our other child, a few years older, missed the early ed in Europe, and had a middling high school career.

Needless to say, we are big believers in the game/play-based early ed model!


This wasn't Finland, but a Northern European country with the same basic approach. I should add that the early ed is also very community oriented both inside the school and tied to the community at large and the some of kinds of things the kids do would never be allowed here. Like taking a 2-hour walk, lighting candles, using kitchen knives, etc. The play, games, and puzzles, though are where the magic happens.


This sounds very much like my kids N Arl preschool which has a mega long wait list. It is a game approach as well. I am certain it is the best for my child, but I have often worried about the exact scenario you describe, e.g., judged against the Kumon kids from the get go. I have no doubt it will pay off later. Kids with this play approach have been shown to routinely outpace peers by third grade.


NP here. I plan to send my DS to kumon starting at age 5. Doing 2 hours of kumon will not prevent DS from learning from play for all the hours of the week. He plays plenty.
Anonymous
Anonymous wrote:DD started school in Europe in a game-based environment. (I wouldn't call it play-based, it is quite carefully planned.). When we moved back to US she went into 1st grade. She was placed in the lowest reading group (she was never explicitly taught reading there).

The school basically treated her as if she were behind. Until that is, she took her first standardized test, in I think it was second grade, or maybe third. She got 99s all the way across. I went in to have a chat with her teacher about her placement. Fortunately, I had the test results, which put the teacher on the defensive. She switched her to the highest reading and math groups. (She had little choice) DD has never looked back. The academic awards started pouring in.
She now has a realistic shot at the top colleges and we attribute it to her early ed.

Our other child, a few years older, missed the early ed in Europe, and had a middling high school career.

Needless to say, we are big believers in the game/play-based early ed model!


I started school in S Korea. My parents taught me to read English before I moved to the US so I never felt behind. I though school in the US was so easy. I ended up going to Harvard.
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