Browsing by study line "Class Teacher, Educational Psychology"

This study’s purpose was examine the needs for game educators training material for a game education company named School of Gaming. Game education is still rather new field of education. While game education has been studied the study of professional game education is lacking. This master’s thesis was carried out as a design-based research that produced a game educators training material for School of Gaming. Design-based research encompasses problem analyses whose focus is to examine both the theoretical as well as empirical needs of the design product. The theoretic problem analysis for this study came to be from the studies of extracurricular programmes’ instructors and their behavior’s correlation to the participants’ positive youth development. There seems to be a common finding in this field of study that the close relational distance between instructors and participants is in positive correlation with the positive youth development. Don Hellison’s Teaching Personal and Social Responsibility model acts as the theoretic framework for this design-based research. The model is originally created in the context of physical education but it can be also applied in the field of game education. The model defines the underlining values and principles that affects physical education as well as stages of development for the skill of personal and social responsibility. The empirical need for the game educators training material was studied by interviewing active game educators from School of Gaming. The interviewees were picked from those who had been trained through the first version of the training material, were actively working as game educators in School of Gaming and had started working within six months by the time of the interview. Total of nine game educators were interviewed. The interview was carried out as half-structerd theme interview. The questions of the interview were divided in three themes: the strengths of the training material’s first version, the weaknesses of the whole game educator training and the possible future reform of the training material. Deducting from the problem analyses the training material went through a reform. The language as well as structure were systematised, the contents dividing were changed to make the whole material more understandable and better suit the need of the training. A new sections about the importance of seeing children and youth as individuals, facing of difficult situations in game education as well as the importance and practicalities of communicating with children’s or youth’s homes. The training material was made to be used by School of Gaming.

The purpose of this study was to describe the experiences of special needs teachers and classroom teachers in the integration of students with special needs into general education and the teachers' cooperation. The term integration is used from special needs students who studies partly in a general classroom with peers. The pre-integration form is segregation, where students are isolated from other students, and the post-integration form is inclusion, where the school adapts to the needs of the pupil. The aim of the study is to find out how integration is implemented in today's schools and how classroom teachers and special needs teachers perceive the benefits and challenges of integration in everyday school life, and thus the implementation of inclusion and related cooperation. The study was qualitative research. The interview was attended by three special classroom teacher and classroom teacher pairs who implemented integration. The data was collected as a semi-structured thematic interview and analyzed by theory-guided content analysis. According to the research teachers defined integration in more dimensions than in the previous definitions of integration. Integration was also thought as a transition from general education to special education. Teachers saw the benefits of integration as factors that can be utilized by the individual student in need of special support, while challenges were seen in organizing integration. According to the research as a benefit the teachers mentioned the increase in the pupil's social skills and as a challenge they mentioned physical learning spaces, as well as the teacher’s communication. Teachers attitudes for inclusion were mainly reserved as inclusion was seen as a means of saving. Some teachers felt that studying in general education was not suitable for everyone. Based on the results of the study, the teachers were pleased with their collaboration. The benefits of cooperation were mentioned more than the challenges. For integration or inclusion to take place, teachers should have a common understanding of teaching and a desire to develop their own activities. The school's resources also influence the organization of special needs education.

The aim of this thesis is to study disinformation as a cultural phenomenon from the point of view of media education. Disinformation, aforethoughtful misleading information sharing, is a form of information advocacy. The civil impact of disinformation has been considered as a global threat by several parties. In this thesis I elaborate on how the case of disinformation appears in lives of children who have grown during the era of social media and how media education corresponds to it. In this thesis recognizing disinformation is proposed to require a way of media critical thinking. The thesis includes an analysis based on an interview with a professional media educator. In the analysis I seek for understanding for meanings of disinformation as a cultural phenomenon and as a part of educational work. The method of this thesis is a phenomenographic, theory-based content analysis based on an interview with a media education expert. For this thesis I had an interview with media education expert, docent Sara Sintonen. The interview questions came to prominence from the theoretical framework. In the analysis I clarified the media educators meanings for disinformation as a part of media education. I analysed the thoughts of Sintonen in relation to the literacy, articles, and writings from the theoretical framework of this thesis. The expert of media education defined disinformation as non-truthful knowledge, which appeals to emotions. As for the strenghts of media education the media educator appointed the high-quality content and democratic practices. As for the challenges of media education the way of seeing media education by usability and not by the content was pointed out. As for the key features of media education for example the role of the teacher was seen as a social influencer on for their close circle. As for prevention of disinformation the media educator named collective crowding and common value base. Relevant features also included dialogue, counter-sounds and striving for understanding.

Tiivistelmä - Referat - Abstract In recent years, open-plan schools have been widely discussed in schools, homes and the media. There are both passionate supporters and unwavering opponents to these more open and adaptable environments. There is a limited amount of research evidence for new learning environments, but they are still common in many schools around Finland. This master`s thesis examines the opinions of classroom teachers about the advantages and disadvantages of new learning environments in primary education. Classroom teachers are also allowed to tell what kind of new learning environment would be best suited for primary education. The research material has been collected from two Facebook groups of teachers. A total of 22 classroom teachers responded to the survey. Respondents wrote their answers freely. The material was analyzed using the method of data-driven content analysis. The majority were positive about the new learning environments in primary education. Teachers said that the new learning environments benefit beginners in many ways: for example, students learn to work together and develop their thinking and learning skills. They facilitate functional and diverse teaching. Students can be divided and flexibly divided into different groups and differentiation is easy. On the other hand, teachers also carefully described the challenges of new learning environments in the primary school context. Often new learning environments have too much noise and stimuli. Respondents put forward many ideas how existing environments should be modified to allow for quality primary education.

The goal of this thesis is to examine how teacher define challenging behavior and their causal attributions for the challenging behavior. Previous research has shown that teachers tend to describe challenging behavior more as externalizing behavior problems (aggression and hyperactivity). The behavior is often attributed to causes from students’ inner reasons and family. The research was done as a qualitative study based on interviewing seven class teachers working in schools in Helsinki. The interviews were carried out via the web application Zoom. The first research question was analyzed by inductive content analysis and in the second research question by deductive content analysis based on Weiner’s (1986) attribution theory. The study found that teachers described challenging behavior, as in previous studies, with features from external behavior challenges. The participants described challenging behavior broadly, and it was divided into four categories: challenging authority, disturbing others, physical violence, and emotional uncontrollability.Causes of challenging behavior were mainly attributed to factors from students’ families or the student. Teachers reported the causes of challenging behavior in five broad categories: lack of boundaries, attention-seeking, challenges of learning and attentiveness, emotional and interaction skills, and the teacher. Only one interviewee considered the teacher to be the main reason for student’s challenging behavior. Teachers should be aware of their perceptions of the causes of students’ challenging behavior. When a teacher attributes challenging behavior to external, unstable, and controllable factors, such as their own teaching, the teacher believes that their own actions can affect student behavior. On the other hand, if the challenging behavior is attributed to internal, stable, uncontrollable reasons such as student’s family, the teacher does not feel able to affect the behavior.

The aim of this master's thesis was to find out the possible relation between self-efficacy and text comprehension skills in third graders. The goal of the thesis was also to form different groups based on the variation in the variables of self-efficacy and text comprehension of third graders and to examine the formation of these groups using background variables. The thesis' theoretical starting point was the individual psychological point of view, which was based on Kintsch and van Dijk's (1978) Construction-Integration Model and Bandura's (1987, 1997) Theory of Self-Efficacy. I had three research questions in the dissertation. First, I examined whether there is a connection between the self-efficacy reported by third graders and their performance on the text comprehension tasks of the reading test. The second goal was to find out what kind of groups can be found between the results of text comprehension tasks and self-efficacy. Thirdly, I examined how the groups differ from each other in terms of gender, studying Finnish as second language, participation in remedial education and receiving enhanced support or special support variables. For the first research question, I performed a correlation analysis and regression analysis. For the second research question, I conducted a two-step cluster analysis. For the third and last research question, I performed a cross-tabulation. The research material has been received from the CEO of Lukuseula reading test, Lauri Ståhlberg, who originally collected the data. A total of 747 respondents have participated in the data collection, of which 48% were boys and 52% were girls. 13% of the respondents were 8-year-olds and 87% 9-year-olds at the time of the answer. The responses to the data have been collected in the electronic reading test in the fall of 2022 around Finnish elementary schools. The results of the thesis showed a positive connection between students' self-efficacy and their ability to understand the text already at the beginning of the third grade. In boys, a positive statistically significant connection of self-efficacy appeared with the results of both the title task and the coherence task. For girls, there was only a positive statistically significant connection between the coherence task and self-efficacy. In boys, self-efficacy is therefore more widely connected to text comprehension skills, while in girls, the connection is probably more task specific in third grade. Between the results of the text comprehension tasks and self-efficacy, four groups could be formed: “Good self-efficacious readers” (39%), “Weak readers with average self-efficacy” (32%), “Weak readers without self-efficacy” (16%) and “Young self-efficacious and average readers” (13%). The groups differed from each other regarding the covariate of enhanced and special support statistically very significantly. There were significantly more students receiving enhanced or special support in the groups “Weak readers without self-efficacy” and “Weak readers with average self-efficacy” than students not receiving the support. The groups also differed from each other in a statistically significant way regarding the studying Finnish as a second language variable. The percentage of students who studied Finnish as a second language was the highest in the group “Weak readers without self-efficacy” where the difference to students who studied Finnish as a first language was remarkable. Remedial education variable on the other hand, had a statistically almost significant connection between the groups formed in the cluster analysis in the cross-tabulation. Gender did not affect the distribution of the groups. The results of the thesis emphasize the need to focus not only on reading skills, but also on strengthening positive reading self-efficacy at an early stage of the educational path, to prevent and reduce the challenges of Finnish children's reading and the polarization of reading skills.

Emotional and interaction skills, or social and emotional skills, help school children to become aware of their feelings, create positive relationships and make responsible decisions. All of these skills are needed to success in life and school. There has been a great deal of intervention research in teaching social and emotional skills, but it is still unclear how these skills are learned and can be taught effectively so that as many children as possible can benefit from these skills. More research data is needed on how different aspects of social and emotional skills (self-awareness, self-management, social awareness, relationship skills, and responsible decision making) develop during socio-emotional skills interventions. The aim of this study is to continue Burakoff’s Master’s thesis in the spring of 2021, in which students who participated in social and emotional intervention were divided into three different skill level groups. Burakoff found that those who rated themselves as weak improved the most in socio-emotional skills, but surprisingly, those who rated themselves as good improved the least. Burakoff viewed developments in socio-emotional skills as a whole. The purpose of this study is to examine the development of students’ social and emotional skills when viewed through five different socio-emotional domains and at three different skill levels. The secondary data used in this study were collected from five different European countries and the data were analyzed using the Wilcoxon Signed Rank test. The results obtained are in line with Burakoff's finding, as looking at the different domains, the intervention has succeeded in developing the different domains of socio-emotional skills statistically significantly only in the group of weak. In the group of good, all domains decreased statistically significantly. The results did not suggest that the domains developed in a certain order, but it seems that social awareness would be the domain that developed the most of the sub-areas with the intervention. In addition, in the group of good, self- awareness may have increased as a result of the intervention.

As a result of inclusive thinking, students with disabilities are increasingly being transferred to mainstream classes. According to the current support model, support measures must be transferred with the student, and according to the Basic Education Act, a special support decision entitles the students to receive full-time special education. In full-time co-teaching between a special classroom teacher and a classroom teacher, students from all three levels of support study in the same classroom. Previous research has shown that co-teaching is one effective way to achieve inclusion. The aim of this study is to find out what benefits teachers perceive from full-time co-teaching. The study examines how responsibilities are shared between the co-teaching couple from the perspectives of teaching design, implementation, and evaluation. In addition, this study examines how co-teaching supports inclusive education. This study was conducted as a qualitative study. The research material was obtained through interviews with a total of three special class teachers and three class teachers. The teachers who participated in the interviews formed a total of three full-time co-teaching work pairs. The data were analysed by data-driven content analysis. According to the study, the benefits experienced by teachers from co-teaching were reflected in terms of both the benefits to teachers and the benefits to students. The most significant benefits that teachers received from co-teaching were the importance of dialogue, the reduction of workload, the improvement of well-being at work and one's own professional development. Teachers perceived the benefits to students to be primarily social, such as a broader social environment, multi-adult presence, and peer learning. In terms of the division of responsibilities, the study showed that each working group shared responsibilities according to their own interests and specific competencies, especially in terms of teaching planning. Teachers used a wide range of co-teaching models. With regard to evaluation, the importance of the working couple was emphasized, as evaluations were always preceded by a joint discussion. The teachers interviewed felt that co-teaching would increase student equality and student participation, which they felt were included in the definition of inclusion. The results of the study thus confirm previous research findings on the positive link between co-teaching and inclusion.

The goals: The aim of this study is to examine primary school teachers' perceptions of inclusion, co-teaching, and their interconnections. The study aims to explore teachers' understanding of the meaning of inclusion, their experiences with co-teaching, and the factors that they perceive to influence co-teaching and the implementation of inclusion. The goal is to determine the impact that teachers perceive co-teaching to have on the realization of inclusion. Methods: For the study, Finnish primary school teachers (N=10) were interviewed. The interviews were conducted as semi-structured thematic interviews and were held remotely using various video call services. One interview was conducted as a paired interview, and the remaining eight were individual interviews. The data was analyzed using phenomenographic analysis. Results and conclusions: According to the teachers' perceptions, successful co-teaching has positive effects on the implementation of inclusion. From the students' perspective, co-teaching was seen as beneficial. Students felt supported from the perspective of multiple adults, instruction was more individualized, and their needs were addressed more quickly compared to teaching alone. The ability to identify the need for support and find effective learning methods for individuals was also highlighted as a benefit of co- teaching. In co-teaching, instruction was flexible and adapted well to the student population. The allocation of adult time and resources was perceived to be better for individual students or smaller groups compared to teaching alone. Assessment was also seen as more objective when multiple teachers were involved. Successful co-teaching was also found to lighten teachers' workload and support professional development. However, co-teaching requires certain prerequisites. The study resulted in three different understandings of inclusion that influenced teachers' practices. These understandings were: inclusion as a cost-saving measure, inclusion as a phenomenon of equality, and inclusion as a phenomenon similar to integration. These understandings appeared in the data as separate, overlapping, and intertwined. The results of the study provided indications that positively perceived co-teaching supported the implementation of inclusion, while neutrally or negatively perceived co-teaching weakened the conditions for inclusion. However, due to the relatively small data and the focus mainly on positive co-teaching experiences, reliable conclusions cannot be drawn.

Abstract The theoretical framework for this study comes from Carol Dweck’s (2000, 2006) theory of mindsets. Mindsets impact on core beliefs that individuals hold about the malleability of qualities of the human condition. A person with a growth mindset believes that abilities can be developed. A person a with fixed mindset believes that people have a certain amount of abilities, such as talent and intelligence. Mindsets have an impact on learning results, persistence and goals. Mindset also affects on how person reacts to challenges. Whilst theory of mindsets is internationally known and well researched, there has been less research regarding young children’s mindsets. The aim of this study is to examine what are the school subjects third grade pupils like and which factors influence that. In addition, study aims to examine what factors in learning motivates third grade pupils and how mindsets are presented in pupil’s answers. This study examined third grade students from two primary schools in Helsinki. The data of this study was collected as a part of Kirsi Tirri’s Copernicus research project’s intervention which utilized growth mindset pedagogy. The data of this study was gathered before intervention. The study utilized both qualitative and quantitative methods. The analysis was performed using inductive and deductive content analysis. Statistical methods were used to examine how two factors, gender and school, impact on pupils answers. The results of this study showed that mathematics was clearly the most popular subject, which differs from the previous study. Results suggest that subject-specific motivation was most often affected by a factor inherent in the nature of the subject, such as calculation. Factors behind learning motivation highlighted learning environment, especially it’s social dimensions. Mindsets were one of the factors that affected subject-specific motivation and learning motivation. Most pupils reflected a fixed mindset. Mindsets were presented in many ways. Pupils answers highlighted attitudes towards challenge. The results also implicate that mindset can differ in different subjects.