Browsing by study line "Class Teacher, Educational Psychology"
Now showing items 1-20 of 33
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(2022)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.
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(2023)Objectives. The aim of this study is to examine elementary school teachers’ views on reading comprehension and teaching reading comprehension. The objective is to gain information about the different ways in which teachers think about reading comprehension. Another objective is to gain information on the ways in which teachers teach and assess reading comprehension. Methods. The study was conducted in Finland as a qualitative research. A semi-structured thematic interview was used to collect data. The interviews were conducted between February and May in 2023. The sample (N = 6) consisted of 4 class teachers and 2 teachers who taught Finnish as second language. After transcription the data was analyzed by using qualitative content analysis method. Results. According to teachers reading comprehension is a complex phenomenon. There were multiple factors that teachers associated with good reading comprehension such as language skills, the home literacy environment and textual factors. Reading comprehension was viewed as a tool for learning and a way of making it through everyday life. Teachers mentioned that it was important to support good reading experiences and reading motivation among students. Reading comprehension was taught simultaneously with different subjects. Instruction of reading comprehension also meant teaching of strategies and supporting children’s interest for reading. Instruction of reading comprehension is an important aspect of teaching as a whole. It’s important to support teachers in their efforts to nurture literacy.
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(2022)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.
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(2022)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.
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(2023)Technology education has become a more multidisciplinary part of basic education, and related skills are to be developed also in the early years of primary education. The goal of multidisciplinary technology education is not only understanding and using technology, but also learning other future- oriented innovation skills. Multidisciplinary technology education projects have been shown to support the learning of innovation skills, but little research has been done on this topic in the early years of primary education. This thesis examines how teachers view the This works! technology education project to support the learning of social and emotional skills and creative and critical thinking of their students in the first years of primary education. The data was collected from the answers to a This works! user survey (n=100) and through thematic interviews (n=6). Descriptive data from the numerical responses to the survey were examined to provide an overview. The qualitative data from both the verbal responses to the survey and the interviews were analyzed using both theory-guided and data-driven qualitative content analysis. For social and emotional skills, the analysis was guided by the five core competencies of social and emotional learning (CASEL, 2020). For creative and critical thinking, the analysis was data driven. The research was conducted as a case study with some features of a design-based research. The This works! technology education project was seen to support students' learning of social and emotional skills in all five core competencies of social and emotional learning. The project was seen to support the group work and cooperation skills, but also the learning of emotion regulation, perseverance, consideration of others, recognition of strengths, and shared decision-making. The project was seen to support students’ creative and critical thinking skills through hands-on activities, encouragement of creativity, inventing and imagining, evaluating and sharing, and problem-solving. The skills were practiced in collaboration with others and by working with recycled materials, in the design, construction, presentation and evaluation of moving future machines. The results are in line with previous studies and show that a multidisciplinary technology education project can support the learning of innovation skills in the early years of primary education.
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(2022)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.
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(2022)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.
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(2023)Goals. The purpose of this study is to describe and analyze primary school teachers' experiences of bullying and its prevention, as well as to assess the effects of the Mieli ry's "Hyvää mieltä yhdessä" handbook in the school environment. Previous research findings indicate that bullying is a serious phenomenon occurring within groups, which has been observed to evolve and diversify over the years in response to societal changes. Despite anti- bullying efforts, bullying continues to occur in schools, as evidenced by bullying research. The aim of this study is to develop an understanding of the importance of practicing emotional and interpersonal skills in anti-bullying work. Methods. The study is qualitative research conducted through semi-structured theme interviews in a primary school in Helsinki. Five primary school teachers from grades 1 to 3 participated in the study, all of whom have utilized the Mieli ry's "Hyvää mieltä yhdessä" handbook in their own work. The data was analyzed using a theory-guided content analysis method. Results and conclusions. The study revealed that bullying tends to occur particularly in situations where children have more freedom without adult supervision. The most common places in school prone to bullying incidents were transitional periods, lunchtime, and recess. According to the teachers, the internal values and attitudes of the group, as well as thorough group cohesion, influence the manifestation of bullying in the classroom. The teachers observed that regular practice of emotional and interpersonal skills not only promotes those skills but also enhances friendship skills. Developing these skills in primary school reduces and prevents the occurrence of bullying within the school community, lays the foundation for effective interaction, and fosters important relationship skills. According to the teachers, clear rules and shared practices within the school community promote the well-being of students and teachers, and foster students' positive attitude towards schoolwork and cooperative activities with diverse individuals.
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(2022)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.
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(2022)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.
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(2022)Tiivistelmä - Referat - Abstract According to research, teachers' own reading hobbies influence their literature teaching. Reading has been found to have many benefits and therefore educating and encouraging reading in schools is important. The aim of this study is to investigate the reading of future class teachers in their free time, this study does not include the course literature included in their studies. This study also unfolds what class teacher students think about teaching and reading literature in school and what kind of methods or practices of teaching literature class teacher students are going to use as teachers. The data of this study consisted of the responses of 38 class teacher students at the University of Helsinki. Responses were collected by using an e-form. Of the respondents, 30 were women and eight were men. Half of the respondents were fifth year students. The study is a qualitative study, and the data was analyzed using content analysis methods. Student responses were categorized, and the results were written open. As a conclusion a large proportion of class teacher students had an active reading hobby and they enjoyed reading. Reading had been important to many in childhood as well. Class teacher students described receiving the same type of benefits from reading and literature as studies describe the benefits of reading and literature. The meanings of reading were similar in childhood and today. The class teacher students also told the reasons why they don’t read as much as they would like. The answers to the reasons for not reading were mostly about technology and then about the lack of time and having a lot of reading in their studies. Almost all class teacher students considered the teaching of literature important and were able to name methods of teaching literature that they themselves intend to use in school. However, many had not felt that they had received enough of their studies to teach literature. Thus, the reading hobby of class teacher students and their attitude towards the teaching of literature seems to be mainly such, that it can have a positive effect on their future teaching and students.
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(2022)The purpose of the study was to find out, if the character strength intervention that is based on the See the Good! -character strength pedagogy by Lotta Uusitalo and Kaisa Vuorinen influences children’s well-being. Many previous research show that character strength education advances children’s well-being. The intention of this study was to examine more closely what kind of effect the character strength intervention has on chil- dren’s subjective well-being, school related happiness and self-esteem. These influ- ences were observed between boys and girls and between boys and girls of different age. The aim of this study was to offer relevant research data for care and education sector for them to understand what kind of significance the character strength education has for children’s well-being. This study was carried out as a quantitative intervention study and the intervention was a part of a larger #uuttakoulua initiative. The data was collected in the beginning of the intervention in September 2019 and then again when four months of the intervention had passed in December 2019. The final measurement in 2020 wasn’t used because of the coronavirus pandemic. 240 comprehensive school students took part in the study. There were twelve municipalities and nineteen comprehensive schools involved in the #uut- takoulua initiative and those who wanted participated in this character strength interven- tion. This study consisted of a sample group with 184 students and a control group with 56 students. An electronic questionnaire was used to collect the data and the data was analyzed by SPSS-program with Wilcoxon signed rank test. Generally, there were no statistically significant differences in different well-being sectors in the sample group during the character strength intervention. However, there was a statistically significant rise in subjective well-being in the 10-year-olds from the sample group during the intervention. In the same way there was a statistically significant rise in school related happiness in the 12-year-olds from the sample group. Whereas the 11- year-olds’, from the sample group, the subjective well-being lowered statistically signifi- cantly. Little differences from different genders emerged when boys and girls of different age were compared. The results of this study indicate that character strength intervention has moderate effects on children’s well-being. Further research is needed to get confir- mation for the results of this study.
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(2022)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.
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(2023)The aim of this study was to examine the experiences and perceptions of teachers who teach secular ethics of secular ethics as a subject at school and of teaching it in primary school. In this study I’m interested in the history of secular ethics as a school subject and the status and nature of it as part of Finnish worldview education. Also, I’m interested in the national core curriculum regarding secular ethics and the skills required in teaching secular ethics in primary school. Secular ethics is an alternative to religious education. Primarily it was directed at students who are non-affiliated. Nowadays secular ethics teaching groups consist of not only non-affiliated pupils but also of pupils of minority religions. Secular ethics has been around for almost four decades, but study shows that it is still widely perceived as a vague or scattered school subject. Unlike religious education secular ethics has scarcely been researched. In this study the research questions are: What experiences do the teachers have of teaching secular ethics in primary school and of the teaching groups? What experiences do the teachers have of their own teacherhood as a secular ethics teacher and of the national core curriculum regarding secular ethics? What experiences and perceptions do the teachers have of secular ethics as a school subject in primary school? The study is qualitative, and the data was gathered by theme interviews with seven teachers. The interviews were conducted as remote interviews in the autumn of 2021. The study does not aim to achieve generalizability. The aim is to deeply understand the experiences depicted by the interviewed teachers. The data was analyzed using content analysis. The results show that the teachers have witnessed the growth of the number of pupils in secular ethics education and that the teaching groups are in many respects heterogeneous. The teachers experience challenges with respect to, among other things, educational material, and their own insecurity regarding subject matter knowledge. The teachers have somewhat conflicting views of the national core curriculum regarding secular ethics. They find secular ethics to be an important but undervalued school subject. They enjoy teaching it and hope that all pupils would have access to secular ethics education. A possible common subject for all students in worldview education is something the teachers are curious about, but it also raises concerns about a possible over-representation of religious content.
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(2022)Objectives. Family background and school bullying victimization has been a popular research topic globally yet studies focusing on Finnish school system are still rare. Usually, family background is studied from the perspective of socioeconomical background. Previous studies have found that family background factors and several other individual factors may influence the likelihood of being bullied. The theoretical framework of this study focuses mainly on factors related to parental relationship and parental behaviour. The purpose of this study is to deepen the knowledge on how different family background factors predict bullying victimization among fourth and fifth grade primary school pupils. Methods. The data used in this study consists of a Finnish school wellbeing survey that was conducted in May 2019. The survey is a nation-wide study with target group being one cohort of fourth and fifth grade primary school pupils. The survey received a total of 99 632 responses of which 70 814 fulfilled the criteria of the employed analysis methods. A literature review acted as a basis for forming 11 family background variables and a gender variable. The influence of different variables on school bullying victimization was then analysed through a binomial logistic regression using a forced entry method. Accuracy and goodness of the regression model was tested with multiple accuracy measures, Hosmer-Lemenshow test and classification table. Results and conclusions. In contrast to previous research, the family background factors of this study did not significantly predict school bullying victimization. Even though the logistic regression model itself was statistically significant, it was capable to explain only 8.4 percent of the total variation in school bullying victimization variable. In this model, the neglect of parental duties proved to be the best predictor for school bullying victimization. Of the different forms of parental violence experienced by pupils, mental violence was the most significant predictor. The results also indicate a minor gender difference in bullying with boys having higher odds of being school bullying victims.
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(2023)Objectives. Adolescents’ social media use has become more common in the last ten years. At the same time, adolescents’ mental health disorders have increased in Finland, and today up to 20–25% of adolescents suffer from some kind of mental health disorder. The simultaneous increase of these two phenomena has raised concerns that does the use of social media cause mental health problems for young people. In previous meta-analyses, a slight connection has been found between the adolescents’ depression symptoms and the use of social media, but in cross-sectional studies it has not been possible to verify the direction of causality. This thesis examines the relationship between Finnish early and late adolescents’ depression symptoms, extraversion, neuroticism and the use of social media. In addition, adolescents’ extraversion’s and neuroticism’s moderating effect to the connection between depression symptoms and social media use is examined. Methods. 13–14-year-olds (N = 1319) and 18–19-year-olds (N = 751) from the capital region of Finland participated in the data of the study. Participants’ depression symptoms were measured with the DEPS-10 scale, personality traits with the shortened and translated version of the Big Five Inventory, and social media use with the Socio-digital Participation Inventory. Associations were examined using hierarchical linear regression analysis. In addition, interaction terms were used to examine whether the subject's extroversion and neuroticism moderated the connection between depression symptoms and social media use. Results and conclusions. In subjects aged 13–14, the increase in subject's depression symptoms and extraversion were related to increase of social media use. In 18–19-year-old subjects, the increase in subject’s extraversion and neuroticism were related to increase of social media use. Low extraversion and high neuroticism were also related to increase of depressive symptoms in both age groups. However, extraversion and neuroticism did not moderate the relationship between depressive symptoms and social media use in either age group. From the results of the thesis, the conclusion can be drawn that adolescents’ extraversion and neuroticism are both essential factors when studying the adolescents’ depression symptoms and social media use. The connections observed in the thesis are in line with previous meta-analyses.
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(2022)As forests flee further away from the everyday environments of Finns, concerns arise about the alienation of forests and the distance of adolescents from the forest. Previous studies have shown that adolescents’ human-forest relationships require exposure, and human-forest relationships are known to be built on significant life experiences. This study aims to describe and analyze the human-forest relationships among Finnish adolescents. This thesis examines the human-forest relationship of adolescents, the factors that affect the human-forest relationships, and the thoughts and concerns that adolescents have about the forest. The aim of the thesis is to form a picture of the dimensions and factors that the human-forest relationship of adolescents holds inside. In this thesis, the dimensions of the human-forest relationship were examined based on Palmer's (1998) tree model of environmental education and previous data on forest relationships among adolescents. The thesis has been implemented as part of the research project Vaikuttavia metsäsuhteita – seurannan kehittämisestä ennakointiin. The material for the thesis was collected through six focus group interviews with 13–17-year-old adolescents (n=21) during the spring and autumn of 2021. The material of the semi-structured thematic interviews was analyzed using theory-based content analysis. The material was used to examine the dimensions and factors affecting adolescents’ human-forest relationships, and the effects of their ideas on their activities. The results of the thesis show that the human-forest relationship of adolescents is multidimensional. Most adolescents considered forests important and experienced a positive relationship with the forest. Based on the results through significant experiences and individual factors, the human-forest relationship may also be affected by an individual forest identity. Based on the thesis, the forest relationship of adolescents arose through different dimensions and included numerous factors that affected the activities and well-being of the adolescents. The forest was seen as a social and functional environment and, if necessary, a place of calm. In addition to calming down, the forest was a prominent place for leisure, and experiences in the forest were shared with significant people as well as pets. The results showed that adolescents were concerned about changes in forests and the environment, and in principle, the concerns they experienced were related to their local environment. The results of the study show the need to support adolescents’ human-forest relationships through environmental education. The results can be used to develop ways to support the strengthening of forest relations and forest identity among adolescents.
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(2023)Goals: The aim of the study was to examine, how Finnish middle school students experienced social support from their teachers during the COVID-19 pandemic in the fall of 2020. In addition, the study sought to find out connections between specific types of social support provided by the teacher and middle school students assessment of their self-regulated learning skills during the emergency remote teaching period. Potentially, the results of the research provide teachers with ways to support their students in their studies, even in the middle of a crisis in distance learning context. Based on earlier studies, social support from the teacher, as well as self-regulated learning skills, are connected to learning outcomes and school attachment in distance education. Methods: The research was carried out using a quantitative research tradition. The methods used in this study included analysis of the statistics, linear correlation analyses, multivariate analysis of variances (MANOVA) and linear regression analysis. The data used in this study is a part of a larger longitudinal study conducted in autumn 2020 as part of the Schooling, teaching and wellbeing in the school community during the COVID-19 pandemic (CEA, University of Helsinki; REAL, Tampere University; NEDIS, Tampere University; Ministry of Education and Culture) project. The final sample included 36,542 students from grades 7–9 from different schools around Finland who had participated in the anonymous online survey implemented by the project team. Results and conclusions: According to the results and the analysis methods used, Finnish secondary school students experienced very little social support from their teachers during the emergency remote teaching period in the autumn 2020. Boys received slightly more social support from their own teachers than girls, and non-binary students even less than boys or girls. There was a positive correlation between all four types of social support from the teacher and the self-regulated skills assessment given by the middle school student. Regarding the types of support mentioned above, there are no clear differences between the types in terms of the strength of the effect. Nonetheless in the future teachers should be able to support their students learning during difficult periods of time by providing them social support, even in remote teaching context.
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(2024)In this study, the actions of teachers are examined in the light of attachment theory. Attachment theory explains individual behavior based on early childhood caregiving experiences, leading to the formation of either a secure or insecure attachment model that influences an individual's behavior in close relationships throughout their lifespan. In attachment theory, the teacher-student relationship is seen as an attachment relationship closely resembling the bond between a child and a parent. The focus of this study is on the role of the teacher, aiming to investigate how the teacher's insecure attachment model affects the teacher-student relationship and whether it influ- ences the use of specific disciplinary methods in the classroom. Discipline is categorized into five common methods, as identified in previous research: angrily shouting at students, sarcasm, humiliation, collective punishment, and removing students from the classroom. The study employs a quantitative research approach, gathering data through an online survey from 134 teachers. The survey includes the use of ECR-R, STRS, and Discipline Scale instru- ments to examine teachers' attachment patterns, the quality of the teacher-student relationship, and the use of five different disciplinary methods. Data analysis involves analysis of variance and correlation testing. Respondents are categorized based on their attachment patterns, resulting in 101 secure and 33 insecure individuals, including 12 with avoidant attachment, 10 with ambivalent attachment, and 11 with fearful attachment. The results of the analysis of variance indicate that there is a statistically significant or nearly significant difference between teachers with secure and insecure attachment models in three var- iables measuring the quality of the teacher-student relationship. In the closeness variable, a nearly significant difference is observed between securely and ambivalently attached individuals (p = .040). In the conflict variable, a nearly significant difference is observed between avoidantly and ambivalently attached individuals (p = .024). In the dependence variable, statistical signifi- cance is found between securely and ambivalently attached individuals (p = .008) and between avoidantly and ambivalently attached individuals (p = .002). According to the correlation test, in- secure attachment has a statistically nearly significant correlation with angrily shouting at students (r=.35) and collective punishment (r=.377). Additionally, it is observed that secure attachment has a statistically significant correlation with the use of sarcasm (r=.311) and humiliation (r=.308), and a nearly significant correlation with angrily shouting at students (r=.229), collective punishment (r=.225), and removing a student from the classroom (r=.215). The findings indicate that teachers with secure and insecure attachment models impact the teacher-student relationship both positively and negatively in terms of conflict, closeness, and dependence. Securely attached teachers use disciplinary methods in a more diverse manner, while insecurely attached teachers primarily use yelling and collective punishment as effective means. The research emphasizes the importance of considering the teacher's attachment model in educational research, as its role in teaching is significant.
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(2022)Aims. The aim of this study was to find out what kind of social reality is produced about teachers’ occupational well-being in Finnish newspapers’ opinion section in the time of the pandemic. This was seen to include the question of who talk about the subject and how, what kind of subject positions are given to teachers and what kind of power-relations are included in the conversation. The news about teachers wanting to change fields and recent studies of teachers’ decreased well-being (including the research produced by The Trade Union of Education in Finland) justify the currentness of this study. The pandemic made significant changes to the everyday life which also raised the question about teachers’ occupational well-being and working conditions. In this study the occupational well-being of teachers is seen through the occupational well-being theory of Rauramo (2012), Self Determination Theory (Deci & Ryan, 2000) and Job Demands – Resources –model (Demerouti et. al., 2001). Methods. The epistemological and ontological backround was based on social constructionism and the method of analysis was critical discourse analysis (CDA). The research data included 29 writings which were from three Finnish newspapers. Four of the writings were from Aamulehti, four from Turun Sanomat and 21 from Helsingin Sanomat. The data was gathered in November 2021 and the writings were published from March 2020 to October 2021. The participants of the conversation were teachers, other professionals of the field of education, politicians, and external participants of the field of education. The participants were categorised into groups by writer status and the voice of the writing, and the categories were teacher, neutral and defender of teachers. Results and conclusions. There were four discourses constructed from the data. The discourses were The concern about teachers, Teachers in distress, Satisfied teacher and The change of society. Teachers were given different subject positions in each discourse and they were The help needer, Exhausted teacher, Capable worker and satisfied teacher and The executor of the impossible task. The subject of teachers’ occupational well-being was mostly seen as a problem that needed a solution. Teachers held the decision makers accountable, whereas the other participants argued that the teachers were responsible for their own well-being. The discussion about the subject had an emphasis on negation as well as the most recent studies on teachers’ occupational well-being. The negativity of discussion can decrease the attractiveness of the education industry which is already reflected from recent studies.
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