Finland Will Become the First Country in the World to Get Rid of All School Subjects

[zorkuus]

This is exactly what I was thinking. I'm Finnish myself and I dread what will become of our youth once this goes through.

It' not going through though.

[Pengekaer]

It' not going through though.

Good. I expected better of the Finnish. You guys know how to run a school-system and a public sector, also carefully avoiding the extreme-leftist immigration policies of Denmark and Sweden.

[Azadina]

I skipped middle school.

Good for you It's not voluntary here.

[Ryzael]

Seems like many posters didn't actually read that it starts at age 16.

Shit, by 16, I had damn near nothing but electives left in high school anyway. I actually wonder if a more open system like this would have resulted in better results in some ways for me.

Shame. It should start at 8. Eliminate forced schooling past mid-level reading and math, invest some of the saved money in an official learning website and make sure everybody has access to the internet and a smart phone.

[zorkuus]

Shame. It should start at 8. Eliminate forced schooling past mid-level reading and math, invest some of the saved money in an official learning website and make sure everybody has access to the internet and a smart phone.

That's a horrible plan. Esp. in Finland where we're already getting good results by spending less on education than countries that are doing worse. There's no real incentive to save more, not when it comes with a big risk anyway.

[Ryzael]

That's a horrible plan. Esp. in Finland where we're already getting good results by spending less on education than many other countries.

No, it's a great plan. There's spending less, and then there's spending nothing compared to.

[May90]

Yeah, at the age of 16, I was done with the 10th grade (out of 11) and didn't really care about any subjects, aside from math, physics, programming and English, anyway. Doesn't sound like the Finnish experiment would lead to a much different result.

[Garnier Fructis]

These are Students 16 and up who are preparing to leave basic Education to prepare them for Studying or entering the Workforce. This will allow them to select classes that prepare them for that.

For example a future mechanic, might want classes in Metalworking, while someone preparing to get a degree in Mathmatics might want Math classes.

Did you not read it all? It said from the age of 16.

They are taught basics until then

The impression I got from the article is that the program is starting with seniors at age 16, but the goal is to remove all subjects by 2020.

I may be misunderstanding, though.

How are people supposed to advance in their career because their grades & progression into university depend on multiple subjects that they couldn't give a flying fuck about?

By doing the work, like the rest of us. This stuff isn't prohibitively hard at that level. Not even close.

[zorkuus]

No, it's a great plan. There's spending less, and then there's spending nothing compared to.

Yeah no.

"We're doing well so we must take risks!"
Said no one ever.

[Ryzael]

By doing the work, like the rest of us. This stuff isn't prohibitively hard at that level. Not even close.

Lol, we all wasted the time doing work that didn't matter instead of learning things that did so you should too. Not even hard, just grindy. Hey, just like a typical MMORPG! So much waste.

[Jonnusthegreat]

I like how this thread is full of people without any educational background pretending to be experts.

[Ryzael]

Yeah no.

"We're doing well so we must take risks!"
Said no one ever.

Meanwhile, here they are getting rid of school subjects. It was working so well, why the risk?

Besides I'm not even talking about Finland specifically going to this model. EVERYBODY should (and eventually will). It's merely untried and unproven, not really a risk. Soon as somebody proves the model everybody's going to hop on the train like they always do. All the math checks out, though, it works in theory, just waiting for the first practice to prove it.

[zorkuus]

Meanwhile, here they are getting rid of school subjects. It was working so well, why the risk?

But they are not. This is a sensationalist article.

[Twix]

Jesus.



This is what college is for.

How are people supposed to decide what they want to do if they don't have a base knowledge in multiple disciplines? What the hell happened to a liberal education?

Agreed. I had never taken physics, chemistry or biology in high school and ended up studying business at university. I hated working in business after graduating and decided to take physics and chemistry courses to see if I'd enjoy it. I immediately fell in love with science and regret not being exposed to it during high school.

[Garnier Fructis]

Lol, we all wasted the time doing work that didn't matter instead of learning things that did so you should too. Not even hard, just grindy. Hey, just like a typical MMORPG! So much waste.

It's not wasted time. If anything, people need better educations in a broad range of disciplines. Finland has a parliamentary system, and elections. If people get to choose how things are run, then they damn well better have an understanding of history, economics, government and science. Language and mathematics are basic skills for everyday life, and most careers.

[Kraenen]

Not sure about the actual news story but, purely unstructured/"discovery learning" has rarely been supported by strong evidence (Kirschner Sweller Clark 2006), although it does seem effective once the student has a grasp of the fundamentals. Overall what I've seen from the research is that kids need to be guided in order to develop proper learning methods and avoid bad ones, or avoid frustration and confusion, and that once that scaffolding is established a more unguided approach is actually somewhat effective.

[McFuu]

This seems like an interesting idea, my main concern is that kids don't know what they want to do for a living. And this sounds like a real easy way to set people up for failure.

[Deleted]

This seems like an interesting idea, my main concern is that kids don't know what they want to do for a living.

a) It's still not what Hubcap copypasted. His sources are full of BS.

b) It's the "lukio" -side of Finnish high school, which continues general education, and nobody who goes to lukio has any goddamn idea what they want to do for a living. Lukio education does not prepare you for any profession. There's no vocational studies there. For the non-Finns here, Finland has three different high school types; lukio - the general education one, ammattikoulu - a straight up vocational high school which teaches people to become car mechanics, cooks and hair salon workers, and kauppaoppilaitos - a business high school. It's almost sure any changes in education in Finland will affect the first one, and not even touch the two latter ones. So, yeah, no effect on kids who go to lukio knowing what they want to do for a living.

It's a bit like this:

Preschool up to year 6. This used to be optional, but apparently it's mandatory now. We call it "esikoulu".
Lower level "regular school", meaning elementary/grade school, or whatever, to year 12. This is known as "ala-aste".
Upper level of the aforementioned, to year 15. We call this "yläaste".

At this point, your grades will determine if you can go on to the "lukio" part of high school. If not, you get to choose from the two other options. A handful of people will actually choose to go to the two other options, regardless of grades, but most of the high grades just tend to gravitate to the lukio. Some people do drop out at this point, although they're typically 16, so getting a job isn't really that common at this point. So the three choices are:

Lukio - as said before, it's just higher level of general education. High level maths, physics, languages and so on, but nothing having to do with any profession or vocation.
Kauppaoppilaitos - different kinds of vocational routes, but typically having to do with the business side of things.
Ammattikoulu - straight up blue collar work routes. This is where you tend to go if you want to get a job. Or, where you end up with bad grades.

These tend to last 3 years, sometimes taking 4 or even more. From there, people can continue their studies, go to the army, or just start working already. The different routes after this are typically these:

Yliopisto - this is the true form of a university. If you're aiming for a PhD or something, this might be where you go. Mostly people who went to lukio tend to come here, but some from kauppaoppilaitos surely as well. Tend to have pretty strict requirements to get in, so I think most of these actually require you to be an "ylioppilas", meaning you did lukio successfully. This will continue general education but also allow you to get your masters and doctorates in certain fields.
Teknillinen korkeakoulu - this is the higher level of education for engineers and so on. People from both lukio and ammattikoulu tend to end up here. Just as high a level as the yliopisto, and leads to masters and PhDs.
Ammattikorkeakoulu - this tends to be the "easy version" of the higher level education. A lot of variance here, and most people who get through this one aren't even really often considered to have gone through the higher education level. Knowing from some experience, some of the places here are pretty general in what they teach, and tend to end up being pretty useless as well. Most drunks tend to end up in these, and then tend to end up wasting 3-5 years drinking.

There are some exceptions and some differences but those tend to be, or at least have been, the typical routes people take throughout their educational life. So, whatever changes have been made, or have been proposed, will more than likely, almost certainly, affect the lukio -part of it all.

[Rudkobing]

There will no longer be any classes in physics, math, literature, history, or geography.

/mind boggled.....

Oh, there just SLIGHTLY important......

[Sunseeker]

So they've basically lowed "college" to 16. Don't really have a problem with that.