Prior learning experiences of vocational education

The following is an assignment to be completed for the VOC1 unit.

Description of experiences of vocational education

I studied Russian and English interpretation, translation, and intercultural communication in former Joensuu university (nowadays University of Eastern Finland), in the Institute of Intercultural Communication in Savonlinna for 6 years. The years were interesting and somewhat leisurely. We carried out studies at individual pace, 5-6 years. Sometimes I would have classes only 3 days a week, since the school was small and the course range was limited. There was very little reading -I read about 10 books relating to studying, apart from Master's thesis. On the other hand, there was a lot of homework, preparation for simultaneous interpretation classes: learning vocabulary etc.

Learning methods

Practice and simulation

Studying was very practical. Interpretation lessons consisted of interpretation situations that we had prepared beforehand and that the teacher and fellow students evaluated and commented. In translation lessons we evaluated texts that we had translated at home. We also had lecture courses, but I can hardly remember anything from those. I guess the usual thing happened: the notes of the lecturer are transmitted/copied to the notes of the student without enter into either parties head (or understanding).

It was after the first year of studies that a friend of my grandmother told me: 'A teacher'. I did not know her, and she did not know anything about me, but she felt I would become a teacher one day. I did not pay much attention to this, and I definitely did not feel it was my cup of tea. One year before this I had returned from Thailand where I had taught Finnish primary school subjects during one year to two Finnish boys, who attended an American school. This was my first teaching experience. One of the boys was easy to work with and completed the tasks, while the younger one was much more interested in soccer and hanging out with his Thai friends than figuring out what strange Finnish words like 'löntystellä' (clumping or shuffling around) meant.

Up until recent years I had thought I am not teacher material. I prefer working independently and I don't consider myself very entertaining or engaging personality, whom the students would like (I thought this would be a prerequisite, and still I think it is one of the key factors for a teacher to enjoy his work). Ironically enough, adjacent to our university department and connected by corridors, was a teacher training faculty. Compared to our student body, they seemed outgoing and social, inspiring and energetic. They were talkative and loud and had a lot of parties and other social events. They had to read tons of books: in average 3 books per exam, while we had to read only the lecture notes. They graduated in a tight 4-year schedule, while we could take our time, and for most it took at least 5 years. The talked about portfolios : -), creative projects, and lesson plans. I had some good friends among the teachers-to-be, but I was glad I didn't have to do what they were required.

Teaching faculty

Part of our teaching staff was native English, German, and Russian teachers. I found the British lecturers quite easy-going and easiest to relate to. Our American professor was a member of city council and eco-green figure with a long beard and saggy clothes, but I loved this classes on Creative writing and American society. The Russian teachers, loyal to their own upbringing, were strict. They had lived in Finland over 10 years, but they did not speak any Finnish – a relic from the Soviet past, maybe. In other words, this was part of our cultural exposure.

The most boring courses were lead by a man who had published his own dictionary, Mr. Heikki Särkkä (sorry to say this; anyway, I still admire his expertise). The courses were, respectively, translating documents and lexicography (working with vocabulary and compiling dictionaries). I did learn on those courses, but he had not teaching skills or abilities to relate to students.

The worst experiences are credited to a Finnish teacher of English subjects. Her lecture course on the development of English language was enjoyable, but after the exam she turned into a wicked witch. None of the 16-20 students passed the test. She did not ask test questions on the lecture material, but extra reading she had hinted. I didn't pass the second test either. The third try was a personal oral examination. She was quite unhappy with my pronunciation and would have deserved an Oscar from her reactions to my answers: ”Ohh! Uhh! As if a knife have pierced my heart (when I heard your lousy answer)”. I passed the test finally, but the balance of horror continued on the technical translation course. None of the students dared to answer her questions on class, because the wrong answers triggered exaggerated expressions of unbelief and disgust. Everyone just stared at the desk, and she proclaimed: ”Oh, you are so innocent” (meaning: you are so stupid!) The questions did not concert translation, but basics of molecular chemistry and energy layers or details of paper making machinery, which, of course, every respectable student should have mastered. - I did not even have chemistry in high school, so I was deemed to take her courses twice. Her teaching method: humiliating students. Interestingly enough, my favourite subject was simultaneous interpretation, even though she happened to teach that course in English. I felt somewhat apprehensive towards the teacher, but I discovered one of my brightest talents right there.

Tutors and mentors - Power of positive feedback and trust

I had a teacher who played a big part in finding my strengths. It was one of my Russian teachers, who took notice of me. I didn't think there was anything special about me, but she certainly did. She had an unlimited belief in my abilities and skills, and on my opinion, her idea was way too optimistic. What made the difference, though, was that she believed in me and that I had a great potential. She urged me to apply to a special training programme, sponsored by the EU. I did, and was accepted. At that point I wanted to finish my studies, so I declined. When I submitted my thesis, written in Russian language, she invited me to her place. She paid the taxi and we toasted with champage.

It's all about relationships (Marilyn, principles of teaching)

After finishing my Master's degree, I began studying theology in an English programme. Our main teachers were an American couple, who had been teaching in Europe for about 10 years. Their teaching was based on the idea that 'it's all about relationships'. They had crafted the lessons with care, but they put a lot of effort into team building, grouping and team spirit. They invested their own time and financial means to create extra events, such as movie nights, birthday and other theme parties, a Thanksgiving dinner, Finnish evening and get-togethers complete with pop corn, soft drinks and homemade bakery products. They shared their own life with its joys and strugges with us and made personal friends with us. The lady became my mentor and she helped me in my inner journey in ways I could not have imagined. They poured love to us and make students changed for better as a result. I am indebted for that special year.

This beloved teacher lead a course called Principles of Teaching. It shaped my idea of teaching, and for the first time I could image teaching as something I COULD do.

Fellow students

One common denominator to most students was interest in languages and other cultures. Our department was quite small, consisting only of about 300 students and few dozens staff members. The English major students were most normal, and the Russian majors most unique, or personal. I was both. 70-80% of students were girls. I did not interact with other students very much, my friends were elsewhere. My best friend at university was a girl who was married to an Egyptian man. On our free time we played duets with flute and she cooked me exotic Egyptian dishes during Ramadan. My friend turned to Islam at some point, so she started wearing a veil and skirt, but this did not disturb me or cause any visible reactions by others.

I attended many events where I could socialize with international students. One semester I was a tutor to a French girl, but she was very independent and did not need much help. I got to know especially a few Japanese exchange students. One Japanese guys baked me Finnish pulla and Spanish potato omelets, I cooked him Korean seaweed soup and pulgogi, a marinated pork dish. A Japanese girl taught me to cook chicken in a Japanese way, and an Italian girl showed how to make pasta a la carbonara. Now in aftermath I could say that spending time abroad and with international people helped me deepen my understanding and offered real-life experiences of intercultural communication.

Positive and negative experiences

During my studies, I worked in Russia in the summertime in a cultural exchange project in a support team for foreign teams that lived in children's summer camps. I fell in love with Russia and Russians since the first 3-month term and returned back every summer. I worked together with Russians, Finns, Amercans, and Australians. On weekends, we would take an 'elektichka', a local train to St. Petersburg. Those were colourful and fun summers, even though we rarely took a day off.

I also spent 10 weeks in England, studying linguistics. I got a scholarship and joined an international student body. I made some Korean friends and learned some Korean, including the alphabet, on my free time.

During the school year I took up a part-time job at a hamburger restaurant. I also had some hobbies: modern dance, drama etc. It had not occurred to me that I could tire myself down, so gradually I became very exhausted and I was in the brink of burn out. I managed to get through my last years and accomplish everything, but I realized I had to slow down and start taking some time off. I tend to tire off easily and I have to take care of my well-being, but I recognize it is not always easy for several reasons. First of all, I am very active and love to learn and try out new things. Secondly, I am not very good at saying no. And third, I tend to pack my schedule too full of things, and as a very meticulous and try to do everything as well as can.

Learning on iVET program

My learning experience during the iVET program has been very different from the earlier ones. The learning methods are self-study and small group preparation of the materials, giving and attending presentations actively with discussing and other tasks in an e-learning environment. So far we have had 6 contact days, plus 2 during the optional Managing People course. We have covered a wide range of information in a very small time span. The downside is that I have not learned some of the material deeply as we only quickly scratch the surface. There simply is not much time to spend with an individual topic. A pro side is that the networking has been efficient and friendships are being developed, because we hold regular planning sessions in the internet. Certain friendships are probably deeper than during my university days. This is very valuable and I am sure that I will maintain these friendships after the program. I have used e-learning environment already before, but Optima is very confusing and frustrating. It takes too much time to navigate there and try to locate the correct materials or discussion threads. I have previous experience of Moodle, and it is much more flexible. There has been only minor technical difficulties during the virtual sessions, so it has not hindered learning. On the other hand, we are undergoing a massive renovation in my apartment, and we have not had Internet access for 4 weeks, which makes it difficult to attend planning sessions with my team, commenting e-mails, and even holding presentations. Already one I have had to attend the virtual session in a public space, and just as it was my turn to speak, refreshments were being served for a conference session downstairs, so there was background noise and distraction. I will face a similar situation next week, and I will see how that one goes. My best learning experiences so far has been EduTech and EduPreneur boot camps. The learning methods: innovation, debate, scavenger hunt, contest, etc. have been very creative and I have learned a lot. I want to apply these ideas to my teaching when ever they are applicable.

What did I learn from the presentation on curriculum (VS1)?

The topic of curriculum was very interesting as I have never received teaching about this subject before. The most interesting part of the presentation by Saturn was the four approaches to curriculum, which are:

1. curriculum as a body of knowledge to be transmitted

2. product

3. process

4. praxis 

(Marsh, C. J. & Willis, G. (2003). Curriculum: Alternative approaches, ongoing issues. (3^rd ed.). Upper Saddle River, NJ: Merrill Prentice Hall)

The first one, representing the curriculum as a body of knowledge is the traditional view. This is how it was carried out during my years of study. Mostly our studies were practical and we did not have to read a lot of books, like our fellow teachers-to-be – they had to read about 1,000 pages per exam whereas we had to read less than 10 books during 6 years of university. Anyway, on our few lecture courses we were busy copying the notes of the professor from the overhead projector to our notes. And during the exams we did the opposite: quoted the lecture notes as answers to essay questions. I don't think I can recall much of the information I learned. If the same principle applies to curriculum, I doubt this teacher- or information-based learning is beneficial for anyone, rather a waste of time.

I learned that curriculum can also be seen as a product. Now the first association to be is productizing, service design, utility design... and exporting education, as the Finnish universities of applied science are designing education training packages to Chinese nurses and so forth. Let's see what this means. The definition goes: “Education is seen as technical exercise and the results are measured.” There could be a danger here that the students are only seen as recipients of information or the theatre performed by the teachers, not as individual with their specific talents, interests, and learning needs. In other words, this is teacher- or maybe content-based learning focuses on the subject matter and assessment methods, not on students as learners.

Third, curriculum can be treated as process (and this already sounds much better to me). This model is more flexible, as it allow the teachers to evaluate the process and to make the necessary adjustments. It offers principles of choosing the content, to evaluate the strengths and weaknesses of individual students. I think this model is best applicable in small groups, where the teachers knows all students quite well. On mass lectures there is no benefit from it.

Fourth, the curriculum can ben see as praxis, i.e. something applied into practice. The praxis model combines theoretical information into real-life practice, and I can see how there are limitation to this, too. For example, this may not work very well in linguistics, but in nursing this model could be beneficial.

I can see that the obvious benefit of a fixed curriculum is that there is a clear frame of reference. Thus everyone will yield the same learning goals, so the level of teaching is maintained stable. If we move towards a student-focused teaching in the information society, the teacher needs to take their students special qualities into consideration, if not in curriculum, in the subject matter, carrying out the exercises or the evaluation. As a summary I comment that this presentation opened my eyes to see the different aspects of curriculum and what factors there are behind it. I feel somewhat competent of creating curriculums for my future students, regarding the subject and the outline of what I will be teaching.

A new term: Somejusting - Someutua

This excerpt is taken from the latest issue of women's Olivia magazine 10/12:

"A new word: Somedjusting (Someutua)

(noun) An assumption that the discussion carried out in the Facebook is significant from the perspective of the society, even though it is only chatting among few dozens of friends, who generally agree."

Discussing the 21st century skills and information society

I have been reading and viewing the material for the Edutech Boot camp. I have gotten a pretty good view of why mastering modern technology is important for a teacher. I especially liked the report on Educators, Technology and 21st Century Skills (http://www.waldenu.edu/Documents/Degree-Programs/Full_Report_-_Dispelling_Five_Myths.pdf)

which are as follows:

* Critical thinking and problem solving 

* Communication 

* Collaboration 

* Creativity and innovation 

* Information, media and technology skills

* Life and career skills, such as flexibility and adaptability 

* Initiative and self-direction 

* Social and cross-cultural skills 

* Productivity and accountability 

* Leadership and responsibility 

Sounds very much like the 21st century work places, for which purpose we are training future employees. The society is definitely moving in this direction, and this trend can be seen for example in the job recruitment announcements. It is not enough to master the required skills, one must be cooperative, creative, efficient, initiative, besides having good social and linguistic skills and a good education. I mean in theory. Who masters all these skills? Maybe so AD's in the creative field? Well, that is a 21st century profession. Sometime the recruitment ads offer only the ideal and even utopistic image of what they are looking for. In the end, if you have the exact degree, you may get hired. Other valuable skills have no significance. Not even the work experience counts, without the degree. 

However, it is undeniable that people employ 21-st century skills more and more in the information technology society, just as we live in the postmodern times, and this has to be taken into account on every field. Ability to collaborate, I am currently reading a book called A Primer on Postmodernism by Standley J. Grenz (William B Eerdmans Publishing Co., 1996), and I was almost shocked to discover the resemblance: networking is important. Hierarchical structures have been replaced by a more decentralized, participatory form of decision making. We live in the global village. We are able to gain information from anywhere in the world almost instantly. (And for many purposes, we often do need to find this information).

While there is global consciousness, there is a simultaneous erosion of national consciousness. There is a broad awareness of cultural dicersity, as well as centerlessness of the postmodern ethos: in other words, there are no more common standards to morals, ideas, opinions, or lifestyle choices. While some become techonologically literate, other switch to escape the hectic life and its demands and opt for a slow life and move to countryside to grow their own vegetables in a wooden home that they warm by firewood and carry the water from the well. The universe has become a “multiverse”. How can a today's and tomorrow's teacher respond to this challenge? Is it enough to master the technology?

Managing people

I attended a course called Managing People in the end of June in Oulu. It was lead by Dana Linkeschova and the course material was a book The 7 Habits of Highly Effective People by Stephen R. Covey. Here is a summary of what I learned and some of my thoughts.

Reading through Stephen R. Covey's book, I started formulating my own Constitution, or 10 (actually even more) commandments on his suggestion. I have come up with the following ones so far, which are my core values and guidelines:

• Try almost everything at least once in your life.
• If you miss an opportunity, never mind. For most things there will be a second chance, sooner or later.
• Never give up. Your effort could make the difference.
• Be proactive.
• Treat everyone with respect and kindness. You never know, if the person you are interacting with will be your future neighbor, boss, or someone else significant.

• Practice forgiveness as much as you can. Be the first one to ask for forgiveness, even if you think it was not your fault.
• Have as much fun in life as you ever can.

• Travel as much abroad as you can. Travel light.
• Do not let go of friends easily. Do not let an offense ruin a friendship.
• Be merciful to yourself. Do not let a minor thing ruin your day.
• Do not accumulate debt, other than for a real estate.
• Do not let the sun set on your anger.
• Keep your life simple. Do not gather riches in this world.
• Be grateful and content with what you have, and remember to count your blessings.

Considering the principle on being proactive

One of the basic tenets of Mr. Covey is being proactive (Stephen R. Covey: Tie Menestykseen -  Seitsemän Toimintatapaa Henkilökohtaiseen Kasvuun ja Muutokseen, Gummerus Kirjapaino, 376 s., 1. painos 1997 (Finnish translation of the book). It means contributing to relationships around us and where ever we are involved, rather than being passive, negative, or waiting for others favors towards us.  I have started to pay more attention and effort on being proactive in job seeking and interpersonal relationships. Since the economic situation is tough and finding work is difficult, it would be easy to give up, thinking that I will not be invited to a job interview anyway and not compose another job application. In friendships it would be easy to respond to something hurtful by turning one's back rather than encountering the person and tackling the issue. In both cases it takes courage and perseverance, and the end result is not known in advance, but that is the only way to achieve something.

I agree with what Mr. R. Covey's thought that we are not hurt by what happens to us, but by our reaction to it (p. 79). Furthermore, we are not hurt most by others' actions towards us, and not even our own mistakes, but our reactions to both (p. 98). The author quotes Rolfe Kerr of not being afraid of making mistakes, which is not an easy lesson for the Finns, but rather that you do not know how to react to them in a creative and positive way, and to learn from them (p. 113). It is widely believed in America that an entrepreneur who has not gone bankrupt at least once or twice is not reliable. In other words, there must be evidence of having learned from mistakes. Does our current Finnish school system allow this? When I went to school, every performance on PE classes were always measured and this constituted our grade. Short-track running according to the achieved time, and in the swimming hall we got a grade as to from how high from the jumping tower we would jump. I ventured to jump from 3 meters, feet first, and got a 7. 10 points were awarded to anyone who would jump from 5 meters head first. I don't think anyone did that, though. In this case, it didn't really measure what we had learned in sports, as we were not really taught anything, but this case measure how brave, or foolhardy we were. I have always liked sports, and I have gotten medals and trophies in high jumping and later in floorball up to a Belgian and Turkish championships, but these sports classes on 8th and 9th grade did not foster love for sports. I hope that as a teacher I will measure progress, what the student has actually learned, and how well.

I think there is a lot of truth in not allowing other' actions hurt us and neither our thoughts about the deed. If we keep repeatedly thinking about something negative, it feeds the resentment, anger, bitterness, and other negative emotions. This, in turn, consumes a lot of physical and emotional strength, and captures our attention. Someone anonymous has said: “Pain is inevitable, misery is optional.” As a Finn, there is a strong natural tendency towards gloominess and melancholy, when something not so pleasant happens, but I try to battle this.

I recently read a book by Joyce Meyer about the battlefield of the mind (Battlefield of the Mind: Wnning the Battle in the Mind, Warner Books Inc., New York, 1995) which has similar thoughts with Mr. Covey. Meyer's book was an eye-opener, and talked about how our attitudes and thoughts really shape our mind, emotions, and relationships. For example, we may cause a lot of damage by thinking negative thoughts about our loved ones (or colleagues, bosses, whoever). Then we gradually begin believing our perceptions, that are sometimes misinterpretations, since we cannot know what the other person is really thinking. It is a relief to gradually be delivered from that cycle of ill thoughts and replace them with positive, proactive ones.

Time management square

The first time I heard of this four-square field of time management was in a marriage seminar last year, and the idea immediately struck a cord with me. According to Covey, the principle is that the importance of things is related to the results, and that urgency is often based on other people's expectations and priorities, rather than ours (p. 159). I admit urgency versus importance is sometimes difficult to determine or prioritize. I have a natural tendency to do the most time-consuming and demanding task first, and then do the nitty-gritty. On the other hand, if the biggest task is also the most vague, such as learning a new computer software, I will do the smaller and easier yet important things first, so that I have achieved at least something during the day, since learning new software may take all day, and then it is hard to measure achievement. This corresponds with the Pareton principle, according to which 20% of the activity creates 80% of the results (p. 164). As a task and goal oriented person, I like counting my achievements and crossing them over from my priority list.

Management and leadership

Mr. Covey states that management is doing things right, and leadership is doing the right things (p. 107). I used to study in Belgium in a private college that was administered by American rules and run by European staff. This meant that we had a lot of rules, some of which did not seem very sensible, such as, 'Wearing jeans is not allowed in class' and 'Do not bring away bread from cafeteria', since it may attract mice in the dorms, was the logic.

The Belgian-Italian staff stuck to the rules tightly, and either challenging them or neglecting them always lead to negative consequences, such as “last warning notes” or being considered a rebel. In Finland, we call that someone who initiates. For example, it was my chore to wash the lunch dishes with an industrial dishwasher. I came up with a practical solution of providing plastic baskets, where the eaters could put the dishes directly, rather than everyone stacking the dirty plates on top of each other with sticky pasta cheese that got stuck everywhere. My suggestion was greeted with anger, because I had dared to challenge the existing system, and the conclusion that “in case the health authorities visit the school, we may be in trouble.” In some another instances the responses were: “Because I say so”, and “Because we had always done it this way.”

Reading about the difference between management and leadership, I realized that the school was run by management principles, whereas in Finland leadership principles are practiced. In leadership, people within a system are allowed and even encouraged to come up with new, practical solutions, whereas in management system, new suggestions may be considered challenging the authority

of those who are in charge. I think management blossoms in places where strong hierarchy and elaborate power systems govern. In other hand, in Finland where solidarity is the norm, coming up with new ideas is welcomed and accepted more readily. On the other hand, the Finnish people

are very obedient to rules, whereas in countries where hierarchy is stricter, people tend to break the rules more often. And so it goes: Where people are trusted and are allowed to use their imagination and strengths, they do not feel the need to rebel or go against the system, but they come up with ideas and suggestions that are beneficial for the whole community.

Emotional bank account

The emotional bank, which some call emotional tank, or love bank in relationships, never closes.

According to Stephen R. Covey the emotional deposit must be as important for the receiver as for the one making the deposit (p. 202). This is a big reason why an emotional account gets more withdrawals than deposits. One also needs to know the love language of another person in order to make deposits, to communicate the feedback in an understandable way.

Several years ago I had a boss who was a gentle person and very good with negotiating difficult matters, and I admired him for that. I worked as his assistant, but I felt that my work was not appreciated very much. I got positive feedback from some individual tasks, but as a person to whom spoken words mean a great deal, I felt I would have needed more direct positive feedback. On some occasions I expressed that, but it did seem to make any difference. As a result, my loyalty and appreciation for my own work suffered. I knew that I did good work, but I concluded that I was capable for so much more, so eventually I sought after other employment. If I will ever be in a leadership position, I try to remember how much genuine, positive feedback means, and how much it improves the willingness and motivation for work. The concept of the love bank or tank is related to Maslow's hierarchy of the basic needs. This can be applied into classroom setting by giving the students positive reinforcement, and this making positive deposits. It does not only improve learning and increase motivation, but it also helps student's self-esteem, and leaves a positive mental note that there is someone (a teacher) who cares. I hope that I can be a teacher like this to my students.

Virtual session 1 - Learning theories and modes of learning

I will shortly introduce the content of our team's presentation on Virtual Session One.

Piaget's constructivist learning theory

While the traditional view of learning means that information is poured into student's heads, the constructivist tenet implies that new information is built on previous one, and in some cases, the new material replaces the old. New content on college or university level may prove the previous information incorrect or incomplete, and it takes effort and energy to accept it (Wankat & Oreovicz: Teaching Engineering, Ch. 14: Models of Cognitive Development: Piaget and Perry, p. 265-266). For example, when I started studying linguistics, I had the idea that the English language was a “pure” or “genuine” language, like Finnish or Yoruba. On the course of the Development of the English Language I was shocked to discover that English actually is a hybrid, a mixture of Old Norse, Latin, French, Celtic, and other influences and loan words. Of course loan words exist in other languages, too, but especially English is a good example of a language, where the historical events, wars, occupation etc. has influenced the language in a very significant way.

According to the constructivism view, a professor is a facilitator and transmitter to enable learning (Wankat & Oreovicz: Teaching Engineering, Chapter 15: Learning Theories, p. 285). Useful tools are, e.g. key relations charts, memory boards and concept map of networks.

Kolb's Learning Cycle

Kolb's learning cycle for complete learning involves ACTIVE EXPERIMENTATION, REFLECTIVE OBSERVATION, ABSTRACT CONCEPTUALIZATION and CONCRETE EXPERIENCE. A good learner involves all these four steps, even though there are invividual preferences. A person can learn other styles that are not innate to him. (p. 292)

I love all kinds of personality tests and like, so there are some quite similar traits for these. For example, an American author and speaker Tim LaHaye has widely applied the Four Temperament Theory, which has four main types: sanguinic, choleric, phlegmatic, and melancholic. These correspond to four personality colours yellow (outgoing, people's person), red (strong achiever), green (easy-going negotiator), and blue (perfectionist, artistic). There is resemblance to Kolb's four types (p. 294), linked to above-mentioned learning stages: DIVERGER is clearly the peaceful mitigator, while ACCOMODATOR is the yellow type: very social and non-systematic. However, the other two, ASSIMILATOR and CONVERGER and a bit more difficult to recognize, but still it seems to make sense: the former, assimilator, as logical researcher, planner and developer could be the melancholic, perfectionist type, whereas the converger as the logical, practical problem-solver the red type, choleric achiever.

Maslow's Theory of Motivation

Pretty much everyone knows the Maslow'shierarchy of needs. The basic principles of Maslow's theory are as follows: A person is motivated to fulfill an unmet meed. An unfulfilled need becomes a priority, until it is fulfilled. When the basic, low-level need (such as sleep, food or security) is fulfilled, a higher-level need (esteem, self-actualization) gains more importance (p. 298).

Grades relate to esteem needs. A positive feedback gives confidence and increases motivation. The highest level of needs is self-actualization, i.e. the need to reach one's potential and to create. Because it takes time to learn to satisfy one's needs, only mature people are able to pursue self-actualization, even though, I must add, even a child is satisfied, when he can draw something or learns to stand up and walk.

We had a lively discussion of this topic after the presentation. These may not apply to the Western world any more, since the basic needs of students (food, shelter, security, finances) are fulfilled. However, there are parts of the world where these things have not materialized, and I find it hard to focus on studying, when I am hungry.

Learning modes

Each person has a favourite mode of learning, and they affect in our ability to learn in different situations. Some of these modes, or styles, are auditive, kinestheticand visual (see the video link) (p. 290-291).

Auditive style is favoured in the Western educational systems in the form of lectures and printed material. Kinesthetic refers to different senses: taste, touch smell, and feelings. Vocational training employs this approach for teaching chefs, artists, craftsmen, therapists, and the sportsmen learn this way, too. Visual mode means processing the information through pictures, and it is preferred by most. “A picture is worth a thousand words.” This approach is used especially in Asia.

Myself, I am a visual person and learner. No wonder I also enjoy reading, photography, performing arts and travelling (well, there are many aspects, but one of them is seeing different and amazing sceneries). I relax best by reading. I guess my spouse is auditive. He is a musician, and always loves to listen all new albums etc. I get tired of music and sounds. When I want to relax, I prefer silence. For me, words are important; for hi, the tone of voice.

To sum up the content: The best teacher accommodates different learner's needs to facilitate learning and creates exciting lessons with humour, energy, and motivation through positive reinforcement. Learning is more thorough and retained better, if multiple modes are used to input and process the information.

After the first virtual session

We had the first virtual session today and I am starting to get an idea what these studies are all about. And I like this! Let me recap a little and tell you of what has happened since the last post.

First, I have been working all summer. I submitted a four-month project last Friday, so I am finally looking forward to have some days off this week. I took a course in Managing People in Oulu in the beginning of June. We bought an apartment with my husband, moved in and have been renovating it the past 1,5 months.We have been preparing our presentation with my team. I have been practicing sports and tried to keep up with other responsibilities in life. I have undergone some medical treatments. I have contacted one primary school and asked, if I could do my teaching practice there. They were very positive about it. I also met with a friend who lives in Asia and she said I could also do part of my teaching practice there.

The first feelings about the first virtual day is relief. A lot of work in way too short time, considering everything else happening in my life. But we made it!! And I'm proud of my group. We had polls, videos and a short exercise, topped off with some creative questions. We have many talents in my team, and everyone participated nicely.

More insight and reflection on the content will follow.