Essay about "Project Based Learning" Method. By Lovisanejdens Högstadium, Finland

1. FINNISH STUDENTS WORKING
WITH THE PROJECT ”EUROPE
WORKS BY PROJECTS”

2.  The students have been involved in the project in multiple
ways during the years the project has been active.
 One of the aspects that the students have worked with in,
pairs or smaller group, has been a presentation of the
Finnish school system. The reason for this topic is that for
many years Finland has been at the top of the Pisa survey
results in e.g. Mathematics and Science and therefore
many countries abroad are interested in the reasons for the
extraordinary results.

3.  The students have by themselves (with some help from the teachers) worked with
almost all the levels in the Finnish school system all the way from kindergarten to
the university level. The levels were divided between the student pairs or groups
and then the students have searched the internet and other sources for
information about the Finnish school system. The following step was to summaries
the most important points about the school system in a Power Point presentation
and to add some suitable pictures to the presentation for each level in the school
system. One of the points of interest is that the education up the university level is
practically free of charge, which means that everyone has the opportunity to
become a Master or Doctor at the university without any financial support from
the parents.

4.  The students have also prepared some presentations about Finland’s
capital Helsinki, because when our Spanish students and teachers were
visiting our country in February-March 2017 we all visited the most
important sites in our capital. The student browsed the internet for
information about e.g. The Sibelius Monument, The Parliament
Building and a selection of churches. The students presented their
information in the bus as we were going to visit the particular site by
speaking in the microphone in the front part of the sightseeing bus.

5.  Before our students went to visit our Spanish friends, we had a small
exercise about Spanish words and phrases. The aim of this exercise was
of course to improve our students’ pronunciation and understanding of
useful words and phrases in Spain. As we experienced during our trip to
Spain, the local people are thrilled when a visitor from an other country
can say something in Spanish.
 Our students have also used e-twinning during this project to e.g. post
some pictures and videos but also some exercises in the project