Report Sintesi Finalndia

8/14/2019 Report Sintesi Finalndia

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National Report

Finland

PATCH-WORLd PArents and CHildren Working, ORganising and Learning together135285-LLP-1-2007-1-IT-KA3-KA3MP

Grant Agreement 2007- 3620/001-001This project has been funded with support from the European Commission.

This publication reflects the views only of the author, and the Commission cannot beheld responsible for any use which may be made of the information contained therein

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General survey on the impact of the new technologies on family life in

Finland

1. General use of ICT in the family

62,7% Of the Finnish population use Internet. Internet is used at least once a

week by 75%.The use of Internet has spread to all areas of communication and

is going to replace the time spent on using traditional media.

Most popular online activities of Internet users in Finland - in the spring of 2006

- (% of Internet users) were: e-mail 87%, finding information on products and

services 87%, Internet banking 81%, finding information regarding travelling

and accommodation 68%, reading online magazines 60%.

(Oksman Virpi: Children and teenagers' relationship with the new media and

technology, 2000.)

On the basis of the data given, young people use information technology mainly

at home as consumers just for entertaining purposes. No major differences

were observed in the use of information technology between boys and girls but

network communication was mainly characteristic of girls whereas computer

games interested the boys more. The home proved to be an important place for

informal learning about information technology, too. The study also analysed

the factors affecting the development of young people to becoming experts in

information technology. Signs of digital generation gaps related to information

technology turned up between parents and children. The biggest inequality

among young people was caused by the lack of broadband access in one out of

five families, even today. The opportunity to use information technology outside

their homes, e.g. as an optional school subject, didnt really compensate the

opportunity to use information technology at home. (Lahtinen Hannu:The

young and information technology - the mutual relations and how to measure

them, 2007)

2. Family communication and relationships

The ways of communication in families have changed a lot during the past fewyears. In the family there are big differences as regards the need to

communicate. Older kids are much more interested in their friends. Its

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important for grandparents and parents to get closer to the kids by using new

technologies. Kids would rather send messages than make a call to their

parents on their mobile phones. They don t want their friends to notice that

they called their parents.( Komu Tommi, 2004)

Since the autumn of 2000 the Family Portal-project has explored ways to

increase communication and information sharing between family members, and

how to organize family activities with the help of new communication

technologies. As well, the project identifies and promotes the specific needs of

family members, especially those associated with education, aging and gender.

The Family Portal-project pursued these goals by gathering information about

recent changes in family communication and uses this information to develop

human-centred communication technologies for families. The Family Portal-

project's multidisciplinary team combined psychology, communication and

computer science researchers who work in close cooperation with Sonera

(TeliaSonera Finland Oyj), a major Finnish telecommunications company.

The first year of the project produced a report concerning the use of

communication technology in the daily life of Finnish families. Fifty-sevenFinnish families were interviewed about their experiences and perceived needs

regarding communication technology in family communication, including

personal computers, the Internet and mobile phones. While the participants in

general expressed positive experiences in using IT technology in family

communication, the report indicated a strong interest in developing more

family-oriented communication technologies. Mothers were particularly

concerned about family issues and perspectives in the development of new

technologies. The families in the survey represent a highly educated and

motivated group who enjoy access to a wide range of different communication

technologies. (Family portal project by researcher Latvala Juha-Matti,

University of Jyvskyl, 2004)

The use of mobile communication devices is becoming increasingly common

among children and teenagers throughout the world. This does not mean,

however, that the development would lead to a universal communication culture

for children and teenagers: usage varies extensively depending on factors such

as the services and applications on offer and the traditional models of

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socialisation in the countries. The social innovations that children and teenagers

themselves produce when adopting new communication devices are a

significant factor in the variation. Awareness of these variations and the ability

to rapidly react to the needs that may be emerging within the youngest user

groups of communication devices is clearly important. Comparable material

assessing the changes and transitions in the mobile communication of children

and teenagers is still rare elsewhere in the world. ( eFinland, Researcher in

charge of the project, Ms. Virpi Oksman

University of Tampere, Department of Information Studies,2003)

3. Gaming and recreation

The Finnish game industry is often considered to be too dependent on mobility,

but actually this is not the case. Success stories such as Max Payne, Flat Out

and Habbo Hotel prove that there is a wide range of alternatives in PC and

console games as well. Success in the traditional game market combined with

mobile know-how ensures that the Finnish game industry is also well-positioned

to answer the challenge posed by multiplatform games in the future.

International research shows that the creative economy is going to challenge

the traditional industrial economy in the Western world, and the game industry

is the most rapidly growing sector of the creative economy. In the case of

Finland, this structural change has clearly been recognised, and measures have

been taken to adapt to the new situation. The rise of the game industry in

Finland is not a coincidence it is the result of continuous investment in the

sector.

The future seems bright. Nevertheless, investments are still important,

considering the future of the game industry. Both the industry and the public

sector have the will, know-how and resources to implement these

investments.(Centre of Game, Business, Research and Development, 2006)

4. Education

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In the spring of 2003, the communication skills of ninth-formers in 100 Finnish-

speaking and 11 Swedish-speaking comprehensive schools were evaluated. The

sample schools were chosen from different local government clusters, provinces

and objective areas of the European Communitys Structural Funds. A total of

3,898 students took part in the evaluation. All participants filled in a

questionnaire and 1,220 students chosen from the sample group took a

communication test. Background information was also collected from principals

and teachers. A total of 320 teachers of different subjects filled in a

questionnaire.

Communication was included in the curriculum of almost half of the sample

schools, and to nearly the same extent in the curriculum subjects of the mother

tongue and literature. Seven per cent of the schools had a separate curriculum

for communication education. The questionnaire revealed that almost all

teachers taught communication as part of their subject teaching. Slightly over

one fifth of the teachers gave separate lessons on communication education

and slightly more than one fourth taught communication as an optional subject.

As regards recreational activities, using the library and reading fiction,

newspapers and magazines had a positive impact on skills. Students with an

email address and an opportunity to use the Internet in their free time

outperformed those without them in all areas. Students who also spent a lot of

time searching for information on the Internet, web-browsing or chats ranked

best in the area of collecting information. Playing computer games, however,

had a negative impact on results.

IT is the most commonly used tool for collecting information in schools. The use

of word processing programmes and e-mail, as well as editing images, came

next. The students who had used the Internet a lot in searching for information

at school got better marks in all sections compared with those who used it less

frequently. 17% of the teachers reported that they used IT in teaching daily,

while 36% used it weekly and 38% less frequently. Nine per cent of the

teachers never use IT or use it extremely rarely. (Uusitalo Eira: Communication

skills of ninth-formers in comprehensive school,National board of Education2004)

5. Security and safety

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At school pupils get directions from teachers on how to act in Internet

communications: what information you can give, how to find information safely,

what is unethical and so on. They are also warned about bullying on Internet.

In 2005 a Finnish association called Pelastakaa lapset ry arranged a survey

dealing with safety of Internet. They asked children of age 4-12 about how

often they use Internet, which pages they visit, do the parents know with whom

they chat, etc. Results show that children have friends in Internet, including

unknown friends. Most of the kids sometimes visit pages which frightened

them. Parents claim that they discuss the Internet with the children, but they

dont know all the pages they visit or with whom they chat.

Conclusions were that parents should spend more time with their kids and

discuss the use of Internet more often. The computers are supposed to be in

rooms where you can check your childrens doings. (Article 2005, Association

of Pelastakaa Lapset)

6. Newsletter Patchworld. Issue I

In Finland schoolchildren use computers a lot at home, less at school.

Young people share, apply and produce media content for themselves and for

their peers, instead of being passive consumers of media, Suvi Tuominen, a

designer of juvenile work in the Mannerheim League for Child Welfare, wrote in

her article of a visiting author in Helsingin Sanomat, the leading Finnish

newspaper July 12, 2008.

There are computers in the homes of almost all 10 17-year-old children,

according to statistics. Nine out of 10 children also have Internet access.

Despite that fact, parents know little about what their children do on the

Internet. Neither do parents keep tabs on their online pursuits, argues Suvi

Tuominen. Parents do not know the web services their children mostly use,

where they communicate and publish.

The Internet has a lot of influence on childrens lives at home

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IRC-galleria.net has 489,515 registered users (12-7- 2008), and the average

age of users is 20, 1. Habbo Hotel in Finland has about 1,7 million visitors a

month. The average age of visitors in Habbo Hotel is lower than in IRC-

galleria.net. For comparison, there are about 500,000 teenagers in the age of

13 19 in Finland.

Children in Finland learn together at comprehensive schools for 9 years. A

recent doctoral thesis revealed that compared to the total time of these nine

school years, children are at their computers for some 4,5 years in total outside

school. The amount of what they adopt from the Internet must be quite big.

Computers play a minor role in schools

There are lots of computers in this country, but very little use of them is made

for educational purposes. This is one result of a recent SITES research about

the role of computers in Finnish schools. Finland belongs to the countries that

have invested big sums of money in computers and in networking, but as

teaching methods have not changed at all over the years, the advantages of

computers were not used in accordance with the money spent on them. The

capacity of computers is not utilized, as only few teachers have taken them into

real educational use.

The international SITES research was performed in 19 countries in the year

2006. More than 9,000 schools and 35,000 teachers were involved in the

research. The national study was coordinated by the university of Jyvskyl.

311 Comprehensive schools (grades 7-9) and 1,078 teachers of mathematics

and science were involved in the research. All these schools were able to

provide their students with computers and with data connections. The situation

was not bad in other countries either. Finland belonged to eight out of 19

countries where pupils had the most devices per student. However, there were

big differences between schools.

The capacity of educational ICT increased a lot between 1998 and 2006 in

Finland and in seven other countries. It did not mean that utilization of

computers increased correspondingly.

It was estimated that perhaps one third of students of the 8th grade used ICT

in social subjects, in foreign language and the mother tongue classes. Onlynine percent of math teachers and 15 percent of science teachers used ICT in

their lessons once a week or more often. More than half the math teachers and

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about 40 percent of the science teachers had never used ICT in teaching 8th

grade students.

Teachers prefer traditional teaching methods instead of using ICT

Teachers in Finland seem less inclined to adopt new technologies than their

colleagues in Singapore, Hongkong or Canada. On the international level they

took about an average position. It seems that traditional teaching methods are

preferred by the Finnish teachers more than in the countries that were most

advanced in educational ICT.

The headmasters of the schools are the key persons in the development of

computerization, the research states. - If we want to increase the use of ICT

in education, it is important to proceed with the factors of the school level, says

Marja Kankaanranta from the Research Institute of Education. - Increasing the

number of computers can have more impact only after these factors have been

apprehended, she concludes.

Two surveys in Finland

Teachers in Finland usually claim to have positive attitudes towards computers

and to open and distant learning. Despite of that, most of them contribute only

a little or nothing to ODL in their own teaching. This contradiction is mostly

explained by making some general excuses as to why it is not possible to take

ODL into use in ones teaching.

These general arguments were investigated in the Webropol interviews made by

OPEKO, the National Center for Professional Development in Education, in

cooperation with Euneos Corp. The results of this investigation were stated in

the summary by Johanna Muurimki from OPEKO and are included in the

materials of Bridging Insula Europae.

A second survey was made by Euneos in which the focus group of Finnish

teachers expressed their opinions about the use of computers in their own

teaching and about the situation of open and distant learning (ODL) in their

schools. Teachers were given the opportunity to tell more about their individual

thoughts concerning ODL. They were asked what kind of measures would

motivate them in the best way in taking ODL into use.

Barriers and limitations

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Teachers who had more experience in using computers in their teaching were

also able to see that curricula also provided opportunities to use ODL, whereas

beginners did not realize that. The more active teachers see systematic

promotion, enthusiasm of students and internationalization of the school as

motivating factors, and they feel the lack of these things more urgently,

whereas others emphasize items such as development of materials and facilities

and teacher-in-service training.

Teachers who are less active in using computers more often also were of the

opinion that the growth of ODL will be slow, or ODL will stay as it is and not

grow any further.

The worst barriers for introducing ODL in schools seem to be psychological and

social ones in the first place. Science, didactics of online and live online

teaching in this case, experience a long delay compared to scientific-

technological development. Teachers are offered more and more facilities of

educational ICT, but this abundance of new means does not bring us new

brains, unfortunately.

Utopia

Students and pupils work on their everyday experiences and learn to see school

subjects in the context of real life. Both teachers and students can give full flow

to their creativeness, which gives rise to innovations. Working together with

peers intensifies collaboration. There are both asynchronous activities

regardless of time and place and contacts strictly bound to the time and place,

on the other hand, such as live online sessions. Students and pupils learn

competences, more than abstract subjects. They feel stronger as their

competences grow better, and they can realize it by themselves, even with a

less strict control system of notes. This leads to a rise of enthusiasm and

engagement on both sides. Teachers have a better use for the unproductive

time they have used for controlling students. Teachers coach their students and

pupils, and let them set new and more demanding goals for themselves.

Teachers are there to help students to construct their knowledge content and

improve their skills. Evaluation is more versatile as there is more variety in

products of students. Products are recorded and saved in digital portfolios ofstudents. Sustainable competences of students are certified in documents such

as EuroPass. Intercultural knowledge of students increases in educational

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collaboration across borders. Better self-confidence and self-respect lead to

human growth.(An extract from Ilpo Halonens blog,

http://daf.eduprojects.net/blog/ , July 12, 2008)

Newsletter Patchworld. Issue II

- IThe project work of Patch-World is particularly important now that there is

a growing concern about the safety of the Internet. This is what Mr. Fabrizio

Boldrini, the director of Villa Montesca institute Italy, stated in the 2nd

meeting of the project partners of Patch-Wolrd in Karvia, Finland, on

Monday, October 6 2008.

- The children and the adolescents may come across the most dangerous

kind of people and come at web sites that are harmful for them, Mr Boldrini

said.

- There should more togetherness of children and their parents when it

comes to the use of the Internet, the project partners from nine European

countries concluded unanimously in their discussions about the role of

families as regards the Internet.

A great number of parents in Karvia started to participate in the Patch-World

project as early as in April 2008. They were highly interested in promoting the

chances of cooperation between schoolchildren and their parents using web

technologies. The interviews of families were recorded on video in May 2008.

During the school holidays in June-July research was made about the current

situation in families concerning the use of ICT in Finland.

After schools started again in the middle of August 2008, there were

discussions about the topics of Patch-World for parents in the local primary

Kantti school where Mrs Marjo Yliluoma, the local teacher involved in Patch-

World, chaired the meeting of parents. Besides, there were so called quarters

of an hour for parents were the parents participating in Patch-World were able

to express their opinions and suggestions.

The small municipality of Karvia (2786 inhabitants) was involved, to a great

extent, in the preparation and realization of the 2nd meeting of the Patch-World

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project October 5-7, 2008. The meeting was held in the free time center of

Karvia municipality, not far from the local Kantti school, where the participants

of the meeting also visited. On Sunday, the day of arrival, the attendants of the

meeting visited the Pohjankangas natural park, and they enjoyed an outdoor

lunch made of local food and arranged by local organizations. The

representatives of Karvia municipality greeted the participants of the meeting

and offered them a dinner in Loma-Raiso hotel in Karvia on Sunday evening.

The results of the interviews in the countries of the project partners were

presented and discussed by the partners on Monday October 6, 2008. The

meeting continued on Tuesday, October 7, and the results of the research were

further analyzed. The next steps of the project were discussed and decisions

were made about the future tasks of the partners, then.

The 2nd meeting of the Patch-World project took place in Karvia only 50 km

away from Kauhajoki, the place where the tragic school shootings occurred just

recently, on September 23, 2008. The sad coincidence emphasized the need of

work done by the Patch-World project. This fact may also have incited the local

press to report quite a lot on Karvia meeting.

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