Entrepreneurship, task 2.

Applying entrepreneurship education into teaching English

Part 1: Find a good, informative and scientific article/video on applying entrepreneurship education in your subject field. The purpose is to create a library of information that all students can use in Task 2.

I found this is a bit tricky task, as my subjects English and Russian language, as well as intercultural communication, are not vocational, but general subjects. On the other hand, that’s why English classes can be designed to suit any professional context. The most obvious ones for me, considering my backgound in tourism business and international companies are business and tourism studies. Thus, while the business students learn about entrepreneurship in other classes, I can expand on vocabulary, dialogues etc. in business negotiation situations, interviews and so on. Therefore I have chosen some literature on those fields, because the search for ’entrepreneurship education in English teaching’ did not produce any results, at least what could be considered appropriate or scientific.

The first article that I picked is an abstract of a study carried out among the Business Administration students on curriculum factors influencing students’ entrepreneurship intentions. Here is the link:

http://urn.fi/URN:NBN:fi:amk-2011060811409

The research was carried out by interviewing teachers of Business Administration and comparing the interview results with results obtained from the Entre Intentio survey. Among the good practices identified, the most important were the learning in teams, working with practice enterprises, developing entrepreneurial skills and attitudes through dialogue, as well as co-operation with businesses. The findings indicate that after the first year of studies, entrepreneurship intention factors are emphasized only for the students who choose the entrepreneurship orientation.

Business time article author claims that effective entrepreneurship education must be built around real-world experiences, not textbooks. So far teachers have not been expected to bring real entrepreneurial experiences into the curriculum, which is strictly defined by the K-12 objectives.

http://business.time.com/2012/05/23/why-were-so-bad-at-teaching-entrepreneurship/

Read more: http://business.time.com/2012/05/23/why-were-so-bad-at-teaching-entrepreneurship/#ixzz2OjbQAKxm

http://business.time.com/2012/03/05/how-entrepreneurship-can-fix-young-america/

This third article on How Entprepreneurship can fix young America (why not Finland) provides top tips of teaching entrepreneurship, which can be applied by a teacher:

1)   Combine academics with the real-world

2)   Investing in and mentoring young entrepreneurs

3)   Teaching technology inside and outside the classroom (I can relate to this!)

Task 2. Write an entry in their blog/or post here on how they would integrate the methods in your coming or post teacher practice.

I studied an article, provided by Teemu and written by James O. Fiet on The Theoretical Side of Teaching Entrepreneurship. Mr. Fiet suggests that there should be a solid study of entrepreneurship theory present in teaching, not just giving real-life example of success stories.

Ideas/principles: looking the world through other lenses than our own. In English classes, we can read selected literature on the theory of entrepreneurship, then combine the task with finding central vocabulary, making mini presentation in pairs in English and, to incorporate the aspect of creativity, to have a written assignment, for example, a blog post on students’ views and ideas about their own entrepreneurship, and how the material relates to that. Then other students could leave comments. Another task could be brainstorming with business theories with Popplet as the whole class. This could be a homework, each student working on a shared Popplet. The results and thoughts would be discussed during the next class.

I as a teacher could also simulate business negotiations in a role play in English, where different students play different characters, like an aspiring entrepreneur, foreign corporate CEO, a fellow entrepreneur, bank/investment institution etc. One role play idea that is a lot of fun for the students is to have two characters: an entrepreneur and a potential client, to whom the former will try to sell his business plan that is a real-life example, preferably his own that has been developed in other business classes or courses. There are two more people involved: those who verbalize the character’s thoughts. In other words, there is an actual conversation going in English, and those verbalizing the participants’ thoughts will also speak up after the character they are playing. This exercise combines a lot of elements. Another objective would be to encourage students to use English in spoken situations without taking themselves too seriously, because the Finnish students tend to be very shy to speak English publicly.

The teaching style, suitable for my purposes is project-based learning. First, the students have created a business idea and a business plan in another class. Then we would study central vocabulary. Then more vocabulary and phrases will be detected from a reading material, which is closely related to entrepreneurship, either theories or lessons. Then the students will give the mini presentation, and finally, they will incorporate their knowledge in the role play, where they are encouraged to use the vocabulary and other things they have learned. The topics which could be covered during the lesson are taken from the article (p. 3), and are as follows: strategy/competitive analysis, managing growth and discovery, idea generation, 
risk and rationality
, financing, and creativity.

Entrepreneurship and Intrapreneurship (Task 1.)

According to a Harvard Business School professor of Business Administration Tom Eisenmann, the term entrepreneurship is elastic and can mean anything from venture capital-backed startups to any small business. According to the Professor Howard Stevenson, the godfather of entrepreneurship studies at HBS, “entrepreneurship is the pursuit of opportunity beyond resources controlled”. Dr. Eisenmann argues that this definition works in practice, since entrepreneurship is seen as a distinctive approach to managing rather than a specific stage in an organization's life cycle (i.e., startup). Secondly, it has, and allows a specific role for an individual (i.e., founder), or a constellation of personality attributes (e.g., predisposition for risk taking; preference for independence). Therefor, entrepreneurs can be found in many different types of organizations, including large corporations. This is great news and affirms that entrepreneurship can be an engine of global economic development and a force for positive change in society. If the definition is put into other words, it could be said that an entrepreneur must be inventive, creative, opportunistic, and persuasive, because one rarely has enough resources.

(source: Harvard Business Review, http://blogs.hbr.org/hbsfaculty/2013/01/what-is-entrepreneurship.html)

Intrapreneurship

Definition by www.businessdictionary.com

Practice of entrepreneurship in an established firm. Intrapreneurship applies the 'start up' style of management (characterized by flexibility, innovation, and risk taking) to a secure and stable firm. The objective is to fast track product development (by circumventing the bureaucracy) to take advantage of a new opportunity or to assess feasibility of a new process or design.

Start-ups are a hot new term and they seem to have a close link with intrapreneurship. and the leading papers, such as Helsingin Sanomat, regularly publish articles and news about them and their events. On March 20, 2013, the paper published an article about the annual start-up conference and fair SXSW in Austin, Texas.

The media follows closely the Finnish start-up hatcheries. One of them, the major one, is located in Aalto University. The campus hosts Aaltoes, a Aalto University Entrepreneurship Society, which is the largest entrepreurship society in Europe. It revolves mostly around start-ups (which are serial entrepreneurships), which generally refers to high-tech, high-growth and scalable or other technology-related start-ups. According to them, ”community is a key to serendipity” (http://aaltoes.com/about-us/). Aaltoes has a lofty objective of being Aaltoes' goal is that Finland will be the startup hub of Europe and Russia by 2017. Aaltoes was founded in 2009. The founders of Aaltoes wanted talented people to embrace entrepreneurship and view it as a way to create something new and radical.

On Aaltoes home page, I followed the link to their Twitter hashtag #aaltoes, and there was a Tweet about 10 SXSW 2013 Lessons to Apply in Business:

http://www.forbes.com/sites/kauffman/2013/03/13/10-south-by-southwest-2013-lessons-to-apply-in-business/

There seems to be a lot going on as a new wave of entrepreneurship.

Can intrapreneurship be taught? Definitely, I think, but not effectively in a traditional classroom setting. I referred above to the Aalto University Entrepreneurship Society, who are doing Start-Up Sauna, recruiting start-up trainees to the Silicon Valley, conducting events and so on. One could also attend events like SXSW. And all this is definitely vocational.

C) What kind of effect would the development of Intrapreneurial skills have on me as a teacher? Person?

If I could apply the above-mentioned qualities of an (ideal) entrepreneur or intrapreneur, meaning being inventive, creative, opportunistic, and persuasive, these qualities quite well define the prototype of a new-generation person, whether you aim towards entrepreneurship or not. Life is shifting very rapidly, there is not much solid ground underneath. The society with its eroding global economics make sure that this doesn’t happen. You just cannot stick with what you learned or were taught, but just like with iVET, you need to find out stuff and learn by yourself, dig deeper, make many detours, extract and merge impressions, ideas, gut reactions, great lessons, and your life experiences to be “on the nerve of time”.

The teacher must follow the time and should be in the front line of knowledge, skills, and creativity. As the trend is, the teacher is the facilitator and the one who walks beside the learner rather than the one who pours information into student’s brain. The reality is that one teacher cannot know everything, but should be aware of what’s going on around him.

Special Education: Reflection

The Special Education in vocational school is not a very familiar topic, so I learned new things. First of all, I learned that the individual education plan (IEP) is a crucial tool in studies of a special-need student. It is based on the general curriculum and created individually for each student, and specifics about person's deeds are taken into consideration. The IEP reviewed three times a year according to Luovi interview. Flexibility is the key word. However, the IEP is not obligatory, but with its help the student will receive additional support and more teaching resources. There are six special-needs vocational education institutes in Finland, the nearest one Bovallius Institute in Pieksämäki. I have visited the premises in another context, but the facilities seemed good.
 It sounds like drafting the IEP and juggling with the best solutions for everyone is a lot of work, as the purpose is to get a profession and a degree, so a lot of teaching staff is needed to cater to the needs of special students. In addition, the need for vocational special education has increased and these days it'a about 12%, according to Wikipedia. The main purpose of special-needs vocational education is inclusion.
The special needs education has been taken into consideration in legislation (Act on Special needs education* and statute about special needs education**). I found a good template for special needs education in Finnish language***. It is meant as a tool for teachers who are involved in planning IEP's and teaching for special needs classes. The site also featured a classification of different disabilities and conditions. You cannot let you mind wonder though, and it needs to be kept in mind that not all "special" students are eligible for special needs education, meaning that if a student need some temporary measures and short-term extra classes, this is not considered special needs education. This point can cause some confusion, because it was suggested in the autumn that the students needing some extra attention are also covered in this lot. Also those with mild learning disabilities or social adaptation issues are not eligible (A 811/1998 § 8). I guess that in practice it means that they study in normal classroom and learn less, and are more likely to cause more trouble, but there are no extra resources. My brother-in-law has a dyslexia, or "reading disability" to some extent. Learning languages is very hard for him. However, he is good in maths and technical subjects, and he became a math, chemistry and physics teacher in secondary school. Plus he wrote his Master's thesis in 3 months. He is a great example of overcoming his learning difficulty. Plus he learned quite good English when they lived 3 months in Africa.
I recently encountered a young man who was finishing his primary school. He had a hearing impairment and used a hearing device. He wanted to study a social field, and this spring he would make the choices concerning his future studies. The doctor had recommended him an ear implant, which would improve his hearing and his career prospect. However, the boy refused, fearing that the operation may cause permanent damage. The doctor had explained that the operation was very quick and safe, and would significantly improve his quality of life, but the boy wouldn't budge. The parents were shattered and the doctor probably felt sorry for the boy, but he had to respect his will. I think the teenage boy just wanted to exercise his will and make his own choices, because maybe he hasn't had that much choice in his life. I wonder what an impact the small operation would have made to the boys working life and the future. The stubbornness may cost several employment opportunities, since in the current condition the young man could hear very little and had to rely on sign language. Anyway, he could always change his mind later, but the more time will pass, the less the operation will help him. I hope he would rethink his decision. This example shows how even the special-need students are individuals with individual needs, preferences and dreams. Some of the choices the make may not be in their best interest, so highly skilled and experienced teachers and mentors are crucial. In this case, two of the boy's teachers were present, but of course they cannot make someone change their mind.

Sources: * Laki ammatillisesta koulutuksesta (630/1998)
** Asetus ammatillisesta koulutuksesta (811/1998)
*** http://merjaritva.wikispaces.com/erityisopetuksen+lait

Sustainable development, Task 1: Ideas to Save the World

Sustainable development, or I would say, ecological living from the perspective of an individual, can be divided into four categories, if my memory serves me right:

1) travel & transportation
2) housing & heating
3) general consumption
4) food

I got this division from www.myfootprint.org, where I completed the Ecological Footprint quiz. The result was pretty much the average European's, 2,92 globes.

In today's Helsingin Sanomat newspaper, professor Atte Korhola, who works as the professor of Environmental Change, has his ecological footprint measured (section Science/Travel/Technology/Car, page 22), and he commented on the result. He travels extensively because of his international work, but he says in the past years the air travel has been made too demonic: using the internet causes as much emissions, and constant use of car is more harmful to the environment that an occasional trip to Thailand. He stated that air travel causes only 3% of the greenhouse emissions, and according to studies, flying also has impact of cooling the atmosphere down! I like that, because I love to travel, and I would travel by air much more if I could afford it.

Here are my suggestions and challenges for other iVETian to Save the World, according to some of the above-mentioned categories:

TRAVEL
1) Use your bike or walk if you travel less than 5 km. Carpool or use public transportation for longer trips. (Ok, not very original ideas, but I want to challenge on each point.) Or, join EasyTrip Finland http://www.easytrip.fi and
http://www.facebook.com/groups/easytrip/
This is a carpooling application on Social Media (and it may require an invitation, but let me know, I can invite you). An acquaintance of mine has launched this site.
2) When travelling, couch-surf or stay with your friends as much as you can. Also generously offer your friends a place to stay. I mostly do this and very rarely stay in hotels.

FOOD
3) Cook home-made meals and offer meals and coffee etc. to your friends and family rather than going out to a restaurant or café. Watch MasterChef for some great ideas and recipes. I used to go out to eat on Sundays, but these days I mostly do some gourmet cooking at home on weekends. My next ventures will be pizza blanc with potato slices and panna cotta caramelised with a gas torch with apple flambé. You can donate the money you saved to charities if you really want to make a difference.
4) Try a de-tox fast for a few days by drinking only fruit juices and smoothies. Buy a juicer to make freshly squeezed juice. Our favourite is apple-carrot. Chilled orange juice is also awesome, cause the pulp and the white layer add texture to the juice. I love the juicer, because I don't have to peel or chop the fruit - I only need to wash & halve the apples and the machine takes care of the rest. Too bad that fruit is so expensive in Finland, but use whatever is affordable during the season. You can dump all the leftover salads etc. to a juicer AND it's a good way to smuggle broccoli etc. healthy stuff to juice without kids noticing.
5) Form food communities with your friends, colleagues, or people living in your flat. I don't mean those that collectively buy organic food, but this collective takes turns in cooking. There can be themes in cooking generally or differing by day, e.g. seasonal/local/organic ingredients, theme cuisines like Thai, Mexican, etc. For example, if you eat your own meals at lunch, find 4 others, and each cooks for all of you once a week. This was my new, original idea.

GOODS
6) Set up clothes potluck parties. I mean, invite a bunch of people over, and ask everyone to bring clothes, shoes, and other stuff that they don't need. Put them in display all over your house and pick whatever you like. There can also be a rule that you can take as many things as you brought. I have attended a couple of these events. I got to meet new people and I found some really nice clothes that are still in my wardrobe. This is a good alternative if booking a table in a second-hand shop is too time-consuming and if you don't want to take the clothes to a charity without compensation.

GLOBAL RESPONSIBILITY
7) With your colleagues or friends, start sponsoring a child from a country of your choice. The child get a chance to going to school, getting an education and then supporting his or her family. There are a lot of organizations who are involved, e.g.
http://www.fidainternational.fi/development-relief/child-sponsorship/
http://www.plan.fi/en-GB/frontpage/activities/sponsor-a-child/
http://www.worldvision.org

 Have you tried any of these? What do you think?