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TEACHER AS A KEY FIGURE
IN THE SYSTEM OF CONTINUOUS EDUCATION
M.-M. Salo
Vocational and Higher Education Teacher Education in Finland. The
profession of teaching is highly respected in Finland. Teacher qualifications are prescribed by law and these national requirements guarantee that the standard of teacher education remains high. Those who want to gain teacher qualification for working in vocational institutes, universities of applied sciences, adult education centers, liberal adult education units, and upper secondary schools in Finland have to complete a 60 ECTS credit post-graduate level program in pedagogy provided by teacher education units at five universities of applied sciences. The general entrance requirement for the studies is a Master’s level academic degree. In some cases a Bachelor’s level degree in the professional field concerned is sufficient. Additionally, all teacher education applicants are requested to have the minimum of three years work experience in their respective professional field.
Competences Emphasized in Programmes for Vocational Education and Higher Education Teachers. Teacher Education College of JAMK University of Applied Sciences has defined competence areas which represent the four core competences considered necessary for teachers working in vocational schools or in universities of applied sciences. The following figure illustrates these four interconnected competence areas.
CONTINUOUS LEARN,Nq
Deration & interaction
Facilitating Learning - The First Competence Area. Facilitating learning always constitutes a practical activity irrespective of whether it takes place in an educational institution, the student’s workplace or in virtual environments. High-quality teaching facilitation of learning and their development are based on a sufficient theoretical knowledge of learning, the building of competence and of human beings as learners and builders of their own competence. Knowledge of the fundamental principles of learning and a theoretical understanding of human activity, which is based on a valid conception of learning, thus constitutes one of the core competences of a teacher. Teachers must also understand the diversity of people as learners. As student’s cultural backgrounds become increasingly
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diverse, teachers must have the capacity to act in accordance with the capabilities of the learners and to respond to the individual learning needs of different learners.
Developing the Educational Environment - The Second Competence Area. In addition to facilitating learning, the work of a teacher involves developing different educational environments. First, a teacher is always a member of his or her immediate community. Developing the activities of an educational institution or unit requires that each teacher possess both individual and community-oriented capabilities for research, development and innovation activities. Being a teacher thus also involves a strong element of entrepreneurial thinking and a requirement of quality and financial awareness. Both educational establishments’ and individual teachers’ work environments consists of various cooperative relationships with local and regional professional fields. At its broadest, the operating environment of a teacher consists of different national and international networks. Knowledge of the preconditions of sustainable development on both global and local levels and identifying the directions of change in society and working life constitute essential competence requirements for teaching work.
Cooperation and Interaction - The Third Competence Area. Teaching work has always been social in nature and based on interaction between people. The social nature of the work has been defined in different ways in different times, but teaching/learning situations have always been based on human interaction. The capacity for positive, ethically sustainable interaction with learners is the corner stone of high-quality learning. Cooperation and interaction are closely linked to facilitating learning and developing the educational environment. Cooperation is often related to aspects such as national or regional planning and implementation of teaching or different development projects carried out in cooperation with working life. Interactive competence is closely associated with the guidance of the learning process, for example.
Continuous Learning - The Fourth Competence Area. The requirement of continuous learning is connected with other competence areas. The concept of reflection is what joins these areas of competences together. To act as a teacher is to share individual expertise jointly with a community. Defined in this manner, the professional competence of a teacher contains the element of a professional acting in a reflective manner: a teacher is a researcher and developer of his or her own work, who, in cooperation with others, is constantly building his or her own competence and the competence of the community.
Teachers Professional Development and Continuing Education: Teachers as Key Figures in the System of Continuous Education. Teachers working in vocational or higher education institutions are not only facilitators of learning. They also have roles as collaborators of the world of work, developers of educational institutions and managers of networks. Vocational or higher education institutions cannot be successful without a broad view on teacher’s role. We in Teacher Education College of JAMK University of Applied Sciences consistently update our programmes and curricula in order to react to the changing competence requirements of the teachers and to provide customer-needs driven in-service training for educational institutions.
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CHANGING THE PARADIGM OF CONTINUING EDUCATION
Free competition Consultative Rigid structures
I II approach I I disappearing I
Pedagogical
objectivism
Pedagogical
co-creation
The changes and needs visible in teacher training and curricula are also present in the field of continuing education. The paradigm has shifted from merely running courses to building networks with different organizations and agents side by side with working-life connections. In Finland Finnish National Board of Education (FNBE) and Finnish Ministry of Education and Culture have traditionally played a leading role in funding in-service-training for teachers. Finnish National Board of Education announces every fifth year a new development plan for Education and Research. This plan can be seen as a guideline for continuous education organizers: which themes they should focus on in order to improve Finnish teachers’ abilities to act in different educational positions and situations.
In addition to developing the teaching skills JAMK University of Applied Sciences Teacher Education College has ran several training programmes directed at school principal during the last years both in Finland and also abroad. One example is "Pedagogical leadership and curriculum development in-service training” programme aimed at principals and funded by the Kaluga Ministry of Education. The overall aim of the programme was to provide participants an overview of the central themes of leadership in school organizations. The programme enhanced participants to 1) understand the meaning of pedagogical leadership and their own role as pedagogical leaders in developing their own institutions, 2) obtain new tools for developing their own institutions, and 3) get acquainted with and benchmark the structure and the principles of the Finnish educational system.
Teacher Education College of JAMK University of Applied Sciences carries out the ideology of lifelong learning while organizing training for teachers and educational institutions. Our post-degree programme provides pedagogical qualification for teaching. After that we offer qualified teachers many possibilities to update their knowledge and enhance their competence in profession of teaching. All our activities represent the ideology of lifelong learning: it does not only enhance social inclusion, active citizenship and personal development, but also encourage competitiveness and employability.
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