Finnish schools: Less homework, better student performance

By John St. Lawrence
Posted 9/29/16

There are no private schools in Finland. The public schools are social equalizers which are designed to level the playing field for students irrespective of the social or economic position of their parents. They promote equity and

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Finnish schools: Less homework, better student performance

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There are no private schools in Finland. The public schools are social equalizers which are designed to level the playing field for students irrespective of the social or economic position of their parents. They promote equity and cooperation, not competition. The length of the school day, teacher training and curriculum - which they continually seek to refine and improve - is structured and supported by research and is focused on thinking processes and applications, not on testing. There are no standardized tests in Finnish schools until age 16.

Finnish pre-school (kindergarten) is compulsory at age 6 but formal schooling does not begin until age 7, when they feel the children are ready. Elementary school hours are from 9:00 a.m. to 2:00 p.m. and students have 75 minutes of recess. Students and teachers receive free meals; and before and after-school day care programs are subsidized and available on a sliding-fee scale. 

Teacher training programs are highly selective and master’s degrees are mandatory. Teachers teach 3 or 4 seventy-five minute classes a day with a high degree of professional autonomy, and typically teach for life. Teachers spend their non-teaching time giving remedial help to individual students, assessing student progress and developing lessons. There is no common core curriculum, only national competency guidelines. In Finnish opinion polls, the teaching profession has more social status and respect than doctors or lawyers.

Finnish students rarely, if ever, receive homework, but if they do they are usually able to complete it during school hours. Finland believes that their youth should have the freedom to play and discover, to develop outside interests and participate in extra-curricular activities without the burden of homework. 

Paradoxically, “Finnish teachers invest less time in teaching and Finnish students spend less time in studying than do their peers in other countries.” According to studies by the international Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD), Finnish students not only have the lowest amount of homework in the world but also the lowest amount of instruction time (5,400 hours). The U.S. average is 7,500 hours.

Immigrants constitute about 5 percent of Finnish society. In Helsinki, roughly 10 percent are immigrants and 40 languages are spoken. Remarkably, “the level of student performance has continuously increased and variations in student performance has decreased during a period when Finnish society has become more culturally diverse and socially complex.” The differences in test scores between the weakest and strongest students is the smallest within OECD countries.

Students from around the world are periodically tested in reading, math and science with the international PISA exam. Since the year 2000, Finnish students have been at or near the top in overall performance. They compete respectably with countries like Singapore and South Korea where most students attend classes day and night, and hire tutors. 

The Finns believe that learning should be joyful, and that less is more. They have found that there is little to be gained from increases in classroom technology, longer school days, more homework or instruction time. 

Voluminous amounts of education research and studies have been done, but the political elites ignore it. Education and teacher preparation should be restructured in line with research and best practices, but not by private equity funds, neoliberal ideologues or ignorant know-nothings unschooled and unconcerned with the literature, and unable to articulate or demonstrate a coherent philosophy of education or theory of epistemology based upon the science.  

Because an education model raises test scores does not prove its efficacy, any more than using a bull hook to train an elephant. We know better, or we should.  Sending a child to school for nine hours a day and then expecting them to spend their nights doing homework - even if their scores are off the charts - is not education but child abuse. And those who promote these schools should not be allowed anywhere near children.

In Finland, the average person borrows 17 books a year from their public library. How many books are taken out by the average American; and why do so many stop reading for knowledge and pleasure after their formal education has ended?

It is not what we teach children that does the damage, it is how we teach them. A resident of Johnston, John St Lawrence contributes to these pages occasionally and, as he point out, still reads books and has an interest in education reform.

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