the learning teacher magazine · 2 the learning teacher magazine 2/2017 the learning teacher...

The Learning Teachermagazine

The Learning Teacher Network No 2/2017ISSN 2000-2610

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2 THE LEARNING TEACHER MAGAZINE 2/2017 THE LEARNING TEACHER MAGAZINE 2/2017 3

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Authors in this editionSherma Amar Bahadur, Gerard Dunne, Stephen Hall, Maarja Hallik, Helen Horton, Nadiya Kostyuchenko, Marco Lamas, Jori Leskelä, Elma Mahmutovic, Nikolaos Manesis, Cristina Popescu, Magdalena Sweczyck .

Articles with no author mentioned are produced by the network’s admin team.

Content

Editor .................................................................. 2

Training for Teachers: PISA - Finnish and European Education Systems ............ 3

Philosphy for Children ..... ............................. 5

Educating Primary Teachers in Human Rights in Greece............................... 7

Teaching English as a Foreign Language ........................................................... 8

White space for teaching and learning .... 9

The Importance of Parent Involvement in Schools ............................. 10

Model for Entrepreneurship Education . 11

United World College in Mostar – Educating for a Sustainable Future ..... 12

Experiences of Educational Change in Estonia ........................................................ 13

Curriculum Development in Relation to Low Income Countries .......................... 15

IdeaLab as a Place for Creativity in Sumy State University, Ukraine ......... 16

Whilst being in the city of Leipzig I was impressed by its history and immense wounds in several respects. The religious reformer Martin Luther (16th century) began his disputes here with represent-atives of other religions of that time. Centuries later the Battle of the Nations between France and a coalition of other countries delivered a beat. Napoleon lost the largest battle in 1813 before the First World War. About half a million soldiers were involved.

Somewhat more than 100 years later, the main synagogue of the city was set on fire (1938), the beginning of the most shocking historical period in Europe leav-ing the world speechless. And then again an episode started where, as they say in the STASI museum, romantic feelings are absolutely displaced. 2017 holds so many signs of also having learned from all this cruelty: a massive school building with a

Leipzig banner above the entrance: Ein Land das Fremden nicht beschüzt, geht bald unter (Goethe) - A country that does not protect the stranger, soon goes under. The same banner is on the wall of a theatre and oth-er places.

In the most important museum of Leip-zig, 23 immigrant learners are being in-formed about Western European culture. And then in the college hall of the Uni-versity of Leipzig: democracy for children. The mayor (Oberbürgemeister”) of the city is explaining the demographic future of the city for children (age 8-13) in the huge (blue) theatre hall of the university. At the end of the session children could ask questions. They were critical and he was transparent, explaining what the consequences were for an increase of inhabitants to be educated and for the need for school buildings, larger groups of children in one classroom, more teachers etc. Yet the city is open for new people, wherever they come from. Education and politics come together in an atmosphere to build a positive future.

Gerard de KruifEditor

The Learning Teacher Magazineis published by

the Learning Teacher Network

EDITORGerard de Kruif,

Badhoevedorp, the Netherlandseditor with legal responsibility

EDITORIAL BOARDCharlotte Tüxen, Naestved, DenmarkAngela Gooch, Bexhill, England, UK

Line Mareel, Brugge, Belgium

GRAPHIC PRODUCTIONShift Brand Design

Mostar, Bosnia and Herzegovina

COVER PHOTO Copy rights UWC Mostar

AUTHORS IN THIS EDITIONThe authors are listed in the middle

column of this page

ADDRESSThe Learning Teacher Magazine

c/o The Learning Teacher NetworkBox 5089, SE- 65005 Karlstad

SWEDEN

E-MAIL AND [email protected]

GUIDELINES FOR CONTRIBUTORS AND AUTHORS

www.learningteacher.eu/magazine

The publication is published four times a year on a quarterly basis.

The publication scheme is posted onthe network website.

Materials in the magazine can be used or copied only by permission by

the author or the editor.

Views expressed by the authors in the magazine do not necessarily

correspond to the view of the editorial board.

VOLUME 8 No.2/2017June 2017

ISSN 2000-2610

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The Programme for International Stu-dent Assessment (PISA) organized by the OECD is one of the most reliable wide-scale standardized student assess-ment studies in the world. In 2015, more than half a million 15-year-old students completed tests in science, reading, and mathematics. PISA emphasizes the stu-dents’ ability to think independently rath-er than to rely on memorized methods and results, which makes it well suited for the comparison of different education systems.

The Finnish education system is con-sidered one of the best in the world. Ac-cording to international studies carried out by the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (three times a year) Finnish schools have the highest rate of knowledge in the world. Their

students have fantastic results from the natural sciences and mathematics. In ad-dition, children and adolescents read the most.

Why is it like that? This question tried to be answered by the representatives from the school, Dr Magdalena Szewczyk and the headteacher, Jerzy Babiak, during the five-day training: PISA - Finnish and European Education Systems funded by the programme POWER SE “Foreign mo-bility for school education”.

In a series of lectures and visits to sev-eral schools, teachers from Polish schools in Wroclaw, from Spain, Germany, Bel-gium, Turkey, Bulgaria and Romania tried to unravel the secret of the success of Finnish schools. In all, we were accompa-nied by the director of a high school Mr. Esa Räty, owner of the EduKarlala which

Training for Teachers: PISA – Finnish and European Education Systems

organizes courses in Europe. The most surprising fact is that stu-

dents from Finland belong to the group, which in a year spends the least time learning. No school is favoured and no teacher and subject is more important than the other. Finland does not give their students standardized tests. No-body knows what the points obtained in school tests are. There is no school ranking. Finns appreciate the integration of society, and also put a lot of effort in maintaining relationships with people who require special attention. It gener-ates a great system of trust in teachers, who are highly valued in the environ-ment. Individual schools have curricu-lum autonomy; individual teachers have classroom autonomy. It is not mandatory to give students grades until they are in


the 8th grade. All teachers are required to have a Masters’ degree.

Finland does not have a culture of neg-ative accountability for their teachers. According to Partanen, “bad” teachers receive more professional development; they are not threatened with being fired. Finland has a culture of collaboration between schools, not competition. The Finns believe that the school should prepare the child for something very im-portant: to arrange a successful life and to become an independent person. The most important aspect of education is learning to be independent and practical thinking - in other words, to solve prob-lems. Instead of memorization of rules, young people learn how to find them in books or on the Internet. Finnish schools do not set homework because it is as-

sumed that mastery is attained in the classroom. The schools have sports, but no sports teams. Competition is not val-ued. The focus is on the individual child. If a child is falling behind, the highly trained teaching staff recognize this need and immediately create a plan to address the child’s individual needs. Likewise, if a child is soaring ahead and bored, the staff are trained and prepared to address this appropriately as well.

Finnish teachers do not intervene in conflicts between students. In this way, they allow them to prepare for various eventualities of life and enable the devel-opment of effective defence capabilities. The people pride themselves on an edu-cational system that offers equal opportu-nities in education for all. Education from pre-primary to higher education is free of

charge in Finland. The new core curricula for pre-primary and basic education adopt-ed in 2016 focus on learning, not steering.

Finnish teachers are highly educated and strongly committed to their work. During their training, the teachers can also enjoy the very picturesque Koli Na-tional Park, participate in cooking Finnish dishes at the cooking school, try a cold dip in the lake at the Club Polar Bear, bask in a Finnish sauna and swim in a cold pool. Surely the fruit of this course is to in-tegrate teachers from Europe who are happy to spend time together, and share their impressions of a positive way of life.

Magdalena SzewczykPhd Private Salesian High SchoolWroclaw, Poland [email protected]

Philosophy for Children“It is not what the man of science believes that distinguishes him, but how and why he believes it. His beliefs are tentative, not dogmatic: they are based on evidence, not on authority or intuition.” (Bertrand Russell)

In September 2016, philosophy was in-troduced as an official subject on the national curriculum at second-level (ages 12-16) in Ireland. This historic step marks a new venture for Irish education. Never before has philosophy been part of our formal curriculum. Given its newly-mint-ed status on the formal curriculum, this short article offers a brief explanatory survey of the following questions:

What is Philosophy? What is P4C? The 4 Cs of P4C (Philosophy for Children).

What is Philosophy? Philosophy derives from the Greek words (Philo and Sophia), meaning a lover of wisdom. Stretching back as far as ancient Greece, it has been a subject in some form or another for thousands of years. Central to philosophy are the following questions: what should I believe? What is worth knowing? And what should I do? Unlike most of Kipling’s honest serving men, philosophy is not so interested in when or where or how, but rather why. Philosophy looks to the why of things. Why is there something rather than noth-ing? What do we owe others, if anything? What is a meaningful life? What exactly is a life well lived? Should robots (or their

owners) pay taxes? Is there a difference between who I am and what I do? Is there such a thing as a ‘just war’? Can anyone ever truly know what it is like to be me? Is it better to be happy for a short time, or contented for a long time? What is jus-tice? What is fairness? What is equality? What is truth?

Philosophy digs deep and looks to the why of things. Some refer to it as the art of questioning through which we probe for answers to these kinds of why ques-tions. But it is far more than that. It is a fresh way of looking at the world; a distinct and interrogative method that looks for clarity; forges distinctions; gives examples; seeks out counterexam-ples; elicits exceptions to generally-held rules; looks for reasons why things are the way they are, and argues why things ought to be different. It prizes the dispo-sition and ability to see the same thing everyone else does, but somehow see it differently – it treasures those who see the world through the wonder-filled eyes of a child, but with the experience and intellectual rigour of someone who has lived a thousand lifetimes. It prizes reflection; it prizes criticality; it prizes depth; it prizes wisdom.

Imagine you are walking through one of the greatest libraries in the world. Miles and miles of books are weighing down these enormous and overbearing book-cases. Our task is to answer one simple question: what is kindness? No doubt we can find millions of examples of kind acts, but will we ever have a proper definition of kindness? Is kindness doing something good for someone else without hope of reward or notice? Is kindness something we ought to aspire to? Are there limits to our kindness? Should we strive to be equally kind to each and every person? Can Google teach us what kindness is?

What started out as a simple question has since morphed into a multi-layered and complex equation. This is not to say that philosophy is always complex, or that it delights in hair-splitting distinc-tions of little use in our search for truth. What philosophy does offer however, is the gift of open-mindedness; the skills of clarity and precision; the ability to exca-vate unwarranted assumptions; the skill of separating fact from fiction; facts from ‘alternative facts’; the joy of exploring ‘blue-sky’ curiosity, and, the gift of see-ing the same thing everyone else sees, but seeing it in a fresh and new way. It


also offers students the means by which they can formulate cogent arguments, defend their positions, and stress-test the reasons people use to justify their beliefs or actions. Philosophy has a pen-chant for teasing out the implications of our thinking around questions in a slow, thoughtful and reasoned manner. There is no great rush in P4C – it is a slow, delib-erate process which invokes a measured and defensible rational judgment about what we ought to believe or do.

To reach our judgments, we first en-gage in the art of critical enquiry – a means of collaborative conversation aimed at yielding some sort of insight or truth. The purpose of this enquiry is to broaden, not only the students’ intellec-tual horizons, but also the facilitator’s. In so doing, the traditional boundaries of constructivist teaching are broken down. In this new paradigm, teachers and stu-dents are equal – they are now co-enquir-ers tasked with seeking putative answers to their carefully chosen questions.

What is P4C?Philosophy for Children is a pedagogical approach developed by Professors Mat-thew Lipman and Ann Margaret Sharpe in the late 1960s. The pedagogy was conceived whilst he was teaching philos-ophy in Columbia University, New York. At this time, there was a return to generic thinking skills across the curriculum in the United States. To capitalise on this development, Lipman and Sharpe sought to nurture a population of students who were curious, rigorous, reasonable, critical, collaborative and creative. Largely in an

attempt to equip students with the nec-essary tools of critical enquiry, particularly in relation to the circular relativism of ‘one truth for you and one truth for me’, they set about formalizing an enquiry-based approach to philosophy, based on the principles of Socratic Dialogue. Socratic Di-alogue is fostered by means of a commu-nity of enquiry (the class) where students are afforded the space, time and tools to formulate their own student-led enquiries based on questions they have devised, both individually and collaboratively. Here, the focus, unlike other subjects on the curriculum, is not on what you think, but rather, on how you think.

P4C is based on a rubric comprising 4Cs: caring thinking; collaborative think-ing, critical thinking and creative thinking. Overseeing all of these processes is the art of metacognitive learning – the abili-ty to stand outside of your opinions and views, to get out of the way of yourself, so to speak, and calibrate your reasoning. Each of these pillars uphold the same principles, so none are more important than their counterparts.

Caring thinking refers to the art of lis-tening and valuing what others have to say about a particular topic. Listening, as we mentioned before, is not just about being able to repeat what a person said, but rather calls for the person to show sensitivity and interest in what is being said. It calls for understanding. It calls for maturity and insight. It demands concen-tration and effort.

Collaborative thinking requires stu-dents to respond and build on what their peers say, by finding common ground to

support the views and common under-standings of the community of enquiry. Again, this requires maturity, teamwork and the art of collective deliberation.

Critical thinking refers to the art of in-terrogative questioning which seeks to impartially evaluate the strength of the evidence, reasons and arguments people offer to justify their beliefs or actions.

Creative thinking calls for students to connect the dots of their reasoning, find conceptual connections and furnish ap-propriate examples, comparisons, criteria, alternative explanations or counterargu-ments to people’s positionality.

Finally, to police these processes, both individually and collectively, in an effort to keep them honest, we have reflective reasoning – otherwise known as metacog-nition. This calls for students to think critically about their thinking. In some re-spects, this calls for them to step outside of their reasoning (or get out of their own way) and ask themselves the following question: are my reasons strong enough to withstand pressure from other peo-ple’s conflicting reasons? Metacognition requires students to always carefully consider contradictory evidence wherev-er they may find it.

In summary, P4C is an innovative peda-gogy that deserves more attention from educators. Some are quick to dismiss it, arguing it simply extols the benefits of circular reasoning. Others still, maintain that it is a luxury that educational sys-tems cannot afford. Regardless of your views on the subject – it has far more to offer than critics realize, both cognitively and ontologically. All one can say is – TRY IT AND SEE!!

This is a link to websites of interest to P4C teachers and learners:http://www.sapere.org.uk/Default.aspx?tabid=82

A list of useful books and PDF posters, some of which are free to print:http://www.sapere.org.uk/Default.aspx?tabid=289

Some of the latest research on the edu-cational efficacy (literacy and numeracy in P4C):http://www.sapere.org.uk/Portals/0/SAPERE%20P4C%20Research%20 map%20-%20first%20draft%20June%202011.pdf

Video clips of enquiries in primary school classrooms:http://www.sapere.org.uk/Default.aspx?tabid=189

Gerry DunneAdjunct Lecturer in Education at Marino InstituteDublin, [email protected]

Since the early 1990s, the Greek Ministry of Education gradually introduced several innovative programmes such as Health Education. Health Education aims to pro-tect, improve and promote mental and physical health and social well-being of students, by developing their social skills and their critical thinking and by upgrad-ing their social and natural environment. The main objective of Health Education is to change students’ attitudes and be-haviour, enhance their self-confidence as well as the ability to adopt positive life-styles. Active learning methods are used in these programmes such as role-play-ing, working in small groups, artistic crea-tion, etc. The themes of the programmes are distributed in nine (9) axes, one of which is “Interpersonal Relations - Mental Health”.

The role of school counsellor is to ed-ucate teachers (in-service education) by organising seminars and educational programmes such as the above so as to support teachers’ professional develop-ment. Taking into account that Greece is a country with thousands of refugees and immigrants as well, Human Rights is a recurrent topic mentioned in prima-ry school in various subjects (Language, Environmental Studies, Civil & Social Ed-ucation, History and Religious Studies) and various lessons. Teachers are asked to update their knowledge for teaching in multicultural classes. Therefore, six sem-inars on Human Rights lasting 6 hours each were organized, using participatory techniques. Seminars were attended by all teachers of the 2nd Educational Region of Primary Education in Achaia Prefec-ture (Southwest, Greece), divided in six groups based on the grade they are cur-rently teaching. Teachers afterwards had to implement some of the techniques in their classroom. 1

Then, three teachers’ activities that were implemented in the seminars are presented.2 The first activity was called the “Frozen Image”. The members of the group, who had chosen randomly a title on human rights should stay still and speechless (“frozen”) so as to depict the right they had chosen. Other groups tried to understand which right each group presented. The next activity was entitled the “Suitcase of Rights”, where each group had to “fill” its own suitcase

1 In 2nd Educational Region are operating 18 schools with a personnel of 180 teachers.2 I appreciate Mrs Papakonstantinopoulou Ar-temis, responsible of Health Education in re-gion of Achaia, who organized and implement-ed the seminars.

with the rights considered as the most important. In the last activity teachers discussed a topic in groups using the “World Café” method. Everyone should go through all table-stations, while there was a host on each one. The host con-tinued to be the same throughout the process and summarized the views of previous “visitors” to new ones so as to

In-service Education: Educating Primary Teachers in Human Rights in Greece

encourage the topic’s progress. At the end, the host presented in the plenary session a summary of the results. Visual representation (schemes, etc) was sug-gested, but the use of written speech was also allowed.

After the completion of the seminars, teachers implemented the activities in their classrooms on the International Day of Human Rights - December 10th. Stu-dents participated in several activities and wrote poems, songs, played in yards, created posters and tales, etc.

Then, they presented the activities im-plemented on Grade E in a primary school of Patras (aged 11 years old).

Teacher and students read the book ‘Peter’s Great Walk”. They created the “Suitcase of Rights” and decided to deal with the right for Peace. In groups, they discussed and wrote what peace means for them, while they also created posters.

They tried to put themselves in the place of people living and experiencing war and what we need to do in order to help these people. They said that people must respect one another even those from different nation, religion or tribe. We are all citizens of the world and have the same rights. It is necessary to respect the diversity of other people, not to vi-olate human rights and not discriminate against other persons.

Dr. Nikolaos ManesisSchool CounsellorAchaia, [email protected]


Culture is a way of life of people who share it. It can be everything like lan-guage, religion, costume, food, habits, social habits, music etc. Culture is the way of thinking and understanding the world and our own life also. It can vary within a country, region, and society, sub-group and within a family as well. Culture is a crucial tool for survival too. Furthermore, culture is a civilization in itself since it is connected with the or-igin of people.

People not only use language as a means of communication, but they also express their values, beliefs and world

One may say that teaching a language means teaching its culture too. Learn-ing and teaching a foreign language remains incomplete until and unless the learners learn culture belonging to the language. ‘Have you eaten supper?’ is not a question but a conversation start-er for a Chinese. ‘Have you taken tea?’ is a conversation starter for a Nepalese. Likewise, ‘How do you do?’ is for a native speaker of English. Indifference to these sorts of cultural tidbits may trigger mis-understanding between two speakers. Therefore, the students of a foreign lan-guage need both linguistic and intercul-

Culture into TEFL (Teaching English as a Foreign Language)

teaching language is impossible with-out teaching its culture. It is widely realized that the common practice of English language teaching has been focused for preparing the students to be able to communicate effectively. On top of this, the students are also learn-ing English culture. Though embedding English culture into teaching English as a foreign language is significant, teach-ers are hardly doing it. As different cul-tures may have something in common, the process of comparison and contrast can be an analytical tool to master the target language (TL) skills.

This workshop is a follow-up to ‘Where is the White Space?’ which was run at the Tallinn Conference and resulted in an LTN magazine article about White Space. This new workshop explores how the concept of White Space is being used to create a ‘Less is More’ approach to Teaching and Learning and as a tool for empowering learners to take greater control of their own learning. Conference delegates sign-ing up for the workshop will be invited to take part in an online dialogue prior to the conference using a ‘flipped classroom’ approach with those planning to attend the workshop. The pre-conference online discussion will be used to shape some of the content of the workshop itself by sharing ideas about ‘How to use White Space for Learning’.

Further information:In our previous workshop we wanted to raise the question, ‘Where is the White Space?’ in order to initiate a dialogue about the concept of White Space for learning and to consider it as a purpose-ful means of deliberately building and designing space into learning activities for learners to think, imagine and shape

their own ideas and their own learning. The workshop introduced the concept of White Space for learning, considered White Space perspectives and initiated a dialogue by asking the question....where is the White Space?

Subsequent interest both from partici-pants at the conference workshop in Tal-linn, which surpassed our expectations, and from those who attended the confer-ence but missed the workshop, yet still acknowledged that it had been a stimu-lating session, have resulted in a follow-up Learning Teacher Network magazine arti-cle and a blog. Interest has also been ex-pressed by some influential participants at the conference workshop, who have used the material and ideas from the session subsequently within presentations and keynote speeches elsewhere.

We feel that there is both sufficient scope and active interest in the concept of White Space to run a follow-up work-shop session at the Aarhus Conference in Denmark in September 2017. Our idea is to pick up from the point at which the last conference workshop ended, with partic-ipants locked in discussion and dialogue about their practice and experiences,

The Follow-up Experiment of a Tallinn Workshop - White Space for Teaching and Learning

views through it. Culture is a typical and a common identity of the people of the group who share the same world view. But it is a fragile phenomenon too since it is constantly changing and easily lost as it exists only in our mind. Since culture com-prises language as its part and it finds its survival in the expression of language, it can be said that culture and language are intricately interwoven. Language has two roles: as a means of communication and a carrier of culture. One particular language is a mirror of a particular language.

In general, native culture of the foreign language learners can be understood as ‘indigenous culture’ or ‘local culture’. These both can be the source of native culture while teaching foreign language because both can be sources of knowledge and can influence the language learners. Thus, throughout this article the author will use these terms interchangeably.

tural competence to truly communicate effectively.

Local culture is local wisdom that promotes character education as well as assures national identity. Integra-tion of the local cultural values can be a way of preparing the learners’ cultural background and identity that ultimately forms nationalism in their mind. So, the sole emphasis on Target Language (TL) and target culture (TC) makes foreign language learning incomplete and hand-icapped. Barfield and Uzarski (2009) say ‘integrating local indigenous culture into English language learning not only edu-cates learners about indigenous people in their own countries and through the world; it also makes learning English more relevant for indigenous students in those classrooms.

On account of the inseparable rela-tion between language and culture,

Hence, keeping all these facts in mind, all the ELTs need to integrate the local culture while teaching English as a for-eign culture. Nevertheless, caution is necessary while designing curricula and teaching EFL as this may inadvertently promote nationalism or an ethnocentric view of the foreign language and cul-ture. A marked balance between curric-ulum design and the teaching/learning process is requisite to ensure that nei-ther of cultures erodes the values of the other. It rather promotes their nationalis-tic feeling which is also one of the char-acters of educational goals.

Amar Bahadur Sherma Senior English Language Teacher at Euro SchoolFounder Member, Sustainable Education [email protected]

sharing ideas about the potential of White Space to transform teaching and learning.

What we propose is to use the stimulus of the Learning Teacher Network maga-zine article and the blog that we have set up, to generate further thinking and dis-cussion about White Space. We wish to in-itiate further dialogue, this time about the why, where and how of White Space, by publishing an academic article about the underlying principles of White Space and by running a workshop at the Learning Teacher Network at Aarhus, Denmark in September 2017 titled, ‘Developing White Space for teaching and learning’. We plan to set out our ideas prior to the workshop and to invite workshop participants to read our articles and to engage in an on-line forum as part of the White Space blog prior to the workshop, if they wish. We

anticipate that this will create a range of differing opinions and views about White Space which will inform the workshop purpose, design and content. As a result, a significant proportion of the Aarhus work-shop participants will have already helped to shape the workshop content and will have shared ‘ownership’ of the shape and direction of the workshop when it is run at the Aarhus Conference.

We believe this will create a unique conference experience with a workshop that has evolved from a dialogue and discussion, which in turn was started at the previous conference. We feel that the dynamics of such a workshop could be highly creative as well as being a col-laborative and stimulating experience for everyone involved that will create a real buzz at the 2017 Learning Teacher Network conference.

Steve Hall and Jori Leskela Senior Lecturer, School of EducationFaculty of Business, Education and Law Stoke-on-TrentUKSteven Hall: s.j.hall@staff s.ac.uk Jori Leskelä: [email protected]


Nowadays the turning point requires lifelong learning in a broad perspective, where formal education, non-formal and informal education remain an ongoing dialogue in an effort to avoid school and academia being isolated from the socio-economic community in which they are integrated. My position (Lamas, 2012, p.78) is that the curricula function is also one of predict-ing and promoting interaction between academic knowledge and industrial expertise. Otherwise, to attain quality in educa-tion it must be sustained in the four axes that the UNESCO re-port of 1986 declared as indispensable: learning to know, learn-ing to do, learning to be and learning to live together.

We can therefore not keep on talking about reproducing knowledge which is outdated and irrelevant to the contexts in which the study of the action takes place. We must look for new insights and build new knowledge in response to the needs and challenges of the community.

I have been involved for more than a decade studying the relationship between education and entrepreneurship, in re-search projects, participating in events and presenting papers and posters as a result of the dialectic theory/praxis. The jobs and the responsibilities I have assumed in a continuous interac-tion allow me to go further in clarifying ideas for the promotion of education for sustainability.

Entrepreneurial culture is installed both in a university and work context. Entrepreneurship education is thus assumed as a general concept and in a general context requiring lifelong learning to be implemented in a broad perspective using formal, non-formal and informal education which enhances in the indi-vidual the power to (under)create action according to his identi-ty and by his involvement in the praxis, thus creating favourable conditions for his own training in developing competences of abstraction and conceptualization.

To enhance such power we must try to promote learning that might involve students not only in the content of specific sub-jects but also in the complexity of knowledge resulting from the complementarity between different areas, thus making trans-disciplinarity emerge. We recognize that scientific and technical skills are basic, but without the behavioural skills they do not bring benefits to the academic, labour and social community.

Considering all these variables I decided to create a model for Entrepreneurship education in any scientific area involving a process of innovation and interaction. Its most obvious feature is the promotion interaction of (i) university/working environ-ment; (ii) learner/context of learning; (iii) subject/object lead-ing to objectivity; (iv) subject/subject focusing on knowledge

Model for Entrepreneurship Education – Teaching-learning Process for Entrepreneurship Classes in Higher Education

shared by inter-subjectivity. The interaction leads to the flexi-bility of the process, continuing suitability, innovation and cre-ativity. I emphasize how important it is to take in consideration (i) the problem; (ii) the difficulties emerging at any time; (iii) the threat that appears unexpectedly. These difficult circumstances are an integral part of the working context and they stimulate students to look for ways to overcome them thus becoming cre-ative and innovative.

My methodological answer consists in the planning of a set of classes that focus on the concepts in question and their in-teraction.1. Introduction and concepts of entrepreneurship (Lessons 1-2)

a) Concept and evolution over time;b) New times – New challenges; c) Cases of innovation and entrepreneurship.

2. Entrepreneurial Culture (Lessons 3-4)a) Entrepreneurial culture; b) Entrepreneurial environment; c) Entrepreneurs.

3. Creativity and innovation (Lessons 5-7)a) Concepts and principles;b) Creative process; c) Innovation; d) Techniques and tools to promote creativity and innova-

tion.4. Business Model (Lessons 8-11)

a) Business Models; b) Business Plans; c) Strategic Analysis and Formulation (PEST Analysis, SWOT,

Mission, Vision and Objectives); d) Economic and financial feasibility plan; e) Presentation and defence of projects

5. Resources (Lessons 12-13)a) Human, financial and material; b) Project financing.

6. Start-up (Lessons 14-15)a) Creation of new business; b) Implementation and development.

Marco LamasCentro de Estudos InterculturaisISCAP-P.Porto, [email protected]

Parents offer their children affection and a social and cultural background contrib-uting thus in defining their personali-ties and identifying their individualities. Therefore it is advisable that the family environment should be supported (and supportive) and not replaced during the process of the young generation’s edu-cation.

An effective educational environment is one which signs an alliance with the student’s family background, respecting and valuing its relationship, acknowledg-ing its importance and pulling it towards the didactic process of education and also engages and uses it actively with any ed-ucational and social possible resources.

Schools often don’t engage parents be-cause they don’t think they can or believe that families don’t want to be involved. For their part, parents are sometimes hesitant to become involved in school because they don’t have extra time or because they don’t know how to be in-volved.

But the biggest problem is the dis-connection between the school and the families. Often parents believe that they are not welcome judging from their own education history. They often have had a less-than-satisfactory experience with their own schooling, and so they don’t

feel like being involved is guaranteed to be a good experience.

Despite these communication barriers, both schools and parents want the rela-tionship to improve, if only for the benefit of students.

A Romanian analysis of more than 40 public opinion surveys in 2007 showed that 75 percent of teachers say their stu-dents would do better in school if their parents were more involved, and 82 per-cent of parents feel that children whose parents are not involved sometimes “fall through the cracks” in school.

Our school’s philosophy is that you can never communicate too much, communica-tion being an essential ingredient in par-ent involvement, and we are doing a pret-ty good job of keeping our parents in the loop creating a welcoming school climate by engaging families in school planning and volunteer opportunities, providing families information related to child de-velopment and creating supportive learn-ing environments, having teachers make personal contacts with families through e-mail, phone calls or home visits, making regular homework assignments that re-quire students to discuss with their fam-ilies what they are learning in class.

Involvement allows parents to moni-tor school and classroom activities and

The Importance of Parent Involvement in Schools

to coordinate their efforts with teachers to encourage acceptable classroom be-haviour and ensure that the child com-pletes schoolwork.

Positive effects of parental involve-ment have been demonstrated in our school at the pre-primary, primary and el-ementary levels with the largest effects often occurring at the elementary level. Students with parents who are involved in their school activity tend to have few-er behavioural problems and better aca-demic performance, and are more likely to complete their education than students whose parents are not involved in their schoolwork.

Parents are the most important part-ner in a child’s education and schools can reap large dividends by capitalizing on their support. Of course such relation-ships require a lot of work by both educa-tors and parents but we strongly believe that although success will not come easy, the rewards are too great for a school not to try!

Cristina Mihaela Popescu English teacher/ Head teacher School StrejnicuPrahova County, Romania [email protected]


When UWC Mostar opened its doors 11 years ago, with the goal of providing high quality education to students from Bos-nia and Herzegovina and other parts of the world, while simultaneously serving as a bridge between the divided commu-nities in Mostar, many were very scepti-cal about the future of this school. The school’s legal founder is the Foundation Education in Action, whose main aim is to advocate for pre-university education reform in Bosnia and Herzegovina, be-lieving that quality education lies in the foundations of every successful socie-ty. The honorary President of the UWC Movement is Queen Noor of Jordan.

UWC was founded in 1962 with the vision of bringing together young peo-ple whose experience was of the politi-cal conflict of the cold war era, offering an education based on shared learning, collaboration and understanding so that the students would act as champions of peace. We remain committed to this goal today but have expanded our reach to embrace the tensions and conflicts that exist within as well as between societies.

Being part of the global UWC move-ment, currently consisting of 17 colleges and 1 administrative centre in London, UWC Mostar tried to promote the move-ment’s values in a war-torn, still divided post-conflict society and contribute to the rebuilding of trust and mutual under-standing. The school has 200 students aged 16-19 from over 60 countries of the world, with a special accent on post-con-flict countries.

It was not an easy task; many looked with scepticism on this “strange” school, students walking around in their nation-al costumes, bringing their cultures and

traditions to a very closed and untrusting community. But the staff and students prevailed in their attempts to show that people of different ethnicities, religions and nationalities could indeed live to-gether. As part of integrating in the com-munity, UWC Mostar introduced the con-cept of community service through the Creativity, Action, Service (CAS) program, which is a compulsory component of the International Baccalaureate (IB) program. By volunteering in local institutions such as the local orphanage, homes for the elderly, the settlement of internally dis-placed persons, a Roma settlement and schools for children with special needs, UWC Mostar has demonstrated that stu-dents can show compassion, give back to community and contribute to making this world a better place for everyone. It has challenged deeply-rooted traditions of “being cared for” into “care about others” and raised awareness about the needs of the most vulnerable groups of society. In that regard, UWC Mostar has reacted to the executive order issued by US Presi-dent Donald Trump and invited students from all 7 countries affected by the travel ban to join our school. We will have stu-dents from all the 7 countries from Sep-tember 2017. It is a small action for our school, but a sign of solidarity and posi-tive action.

Nowadays, UWC Mostar stands as a “lighthouse for education” in Bosnia and Herzegovina. It has opened the minds of thousands of students and teachers from Bosnia and Herzegovina to new ways of teaching and learning. The socialist prac-tices, very comprehensive, yet very strict regarding education, taught us that the teacher is in the centre of the educational

process. A student-centred approach has only started being introduced in recent years. In cooperation the Foundation Ed-ucation in Action, UWC Mostar has been running teacher training programs with the aim of transferring best practices from the International Baccalaureate pro-gram to local teachers in Bosnia and Her-zegovina. In the last 11 years, over 1000 teachers, school heads, an education min-ister and employees of pedagogical insti-tutes attended conferences, seminars, study visits and workshops organized by the Foundation.

The war in the 90s left the educational system in Bosnia and Herzegovina deep-ly segregated, with students of different ethnic backgrounds learning different curricula in different classrooms, even in physically separated parts of one school. Being located in a local school, teaching two curricula, UWC Mostar has been try-ing to engage all students in joint activ-ities, by organizing practical classes in labs, joint projects and competitions. For the first time after the war, joint Physics competitions for high-school students were held in our school through the in-itiative of UWC Headmistress Valenti-na Mindoljević. It is safe to say that the whole UWC Mostar community is living its mission daily.

This small school in Mostar is a proof that it is possible to achieve great progress, with restricted funding, but only if there is a bunch of motivated folks wanting to make a difference!

Elma MahmutovićHead of DevelopmentUWC Mostar, Bosnia and [email protected]

United World College in Mostar – Educating for a Sustainable Future

Centre for Innovation in Education - Experiences of Educational Change in EstoniaThe Centre for Innovation in Education (CIE) was established in 2012 with the aim of promoting innovative approach-es in teaching and learning, testing and developing ideas, launching new partner-ships and particularly focusing on improv-ing teacher education at Tallinn Univer-sity. The centre plays a strategic role in the implementation of Estonia’s Lifelong Learning Strategy. We currently have EU funding to run our activities.

Examples of CIE activities: Teacher’s Academy, Gathering, analysing and dis-seminating best practice, School devel-opment projects, Interactive and inter-disciplinary project days, Partner schools’ network.

Why are we talking about the ‘changed approach to learning and teaching’ in Estonia?As in many other countries, we are tak-ing a critical look at our education system in Estonia. Although Estonia’s position is relatively high in international compar-ative tests, we still face many challeng-es such as how to make education more inclusive, learner-centred, and help our students as well as teachers be happy at school. And most of all - what kind of people, and what kind of a world are we creating through how we educate?

The approach to learning and teaching for us is rooted in a constructivist and hu-manist way of looking at education. The Lifelong Learning Strategy states that it supports each learner’s individual and social development, the acquisition of learning skills, creativity and entrepre-neurship at all levels and in all types of education - sometimes referred to as 21st Century skills. It is grounded in the need

to respond to, and to pro-actively guide social change and globalization, but it is also research-driven and evidence-based.

What does it take to change?Within the university, CIE is part of the ‘trio’ of educational innovation centres: TU Centre of Excellence in Educational Innovation and Centre for Educational Technology. Although the activities of


Having spent a major part of my career as a teacher trainer, retirement gave me the opportunity to spend a year in Papua New Guinea (PNG). I spent that time, on a voluntary contract with the Voluntary Service Overseas (VSO), working along-side lecturers in the teacher training colleges on a collaborative project to de-velop a national programme for literacy, numeracy and science for their trainee teachers. What follows is a reflection on the insight that this opportunity gave me and some thoughts about the wider implications for the teaching community.

Low income countries are no exception in the global striving of governments to demonstrate their status through the success of their education systems as measured by such international tests as the Programme for International Stu-dent Assessment (PISA) and Trends in International Mathematics and Science Study (TIMSS). In order to achieve suc-cess, there is a perception that curricula should be modelled on those countries who score highly in such tests. Whilst the sharing of examples of best practice in both curriculum design and pedago-gy can indeed inform the international education community, I issue a word of caution. The wholescale translation of curricula does not always match within a unique cultural context. In PNG, for example, when classifying animals, the following logic applies:

All birds have wingsBats have wingsTherefore, a bat is a birdMy own understanding of the issue of

conceptual differences was further rein-forced by exploring the concept of eth-nomathematics, a field of research with which I had been previously unfamiliar but which parallels much that is already written about sociolinguistics.

Furthermore, I am mindful of the fact that the majority of 21st classrooms in income rich countries are full of technol-ogies which, if used well, do enhance the curriculum. There is often an assumption that we cannot teach without the latest gadgetry. However, such tools are only as effective as the pedagogies employed in using them. Much as children today need to be able to engage in technology, there is also a need to reconsider and go back to basics. In countries, such as PNG, where even a reliable source of electricity can-not be guaranteed, the teaching of basic mathematical and scientific concepts be-comes a greater challenge. A task I often set in workshops is to ask, ‘If you take an average sized shoe box and go around your house, what would you find to put in your shoebox that would support the teaching of science?’

Additionally, PNG is linguistically both very rich and very diverse with 850 identified languages but with English recognised as the international norm for communication, this has become the language of instruction across all educa-

Curriculum Development in Relation to Low Income Countries

the centres overlap and align, it would be fair to say that the CIE is mostly about educational development, whereas the other two centres are more focused on research.

The ‘educational development’ ap-proach in CIE is quite practical - doing things schools benefit from as directly as possible. Having said that, most teachers are interested in specific methods and tools they could use. Often they want ‘easy solutions’. Indeed, we are gath-ering information about methods that work and disseminating the best practice. For example we have a team working on making videos and writing articles, a team is working on tailor-made school development programs, which will later become case studies to learn from for other schools, there are events and semi-nars. But whilst we do that we know that experience is the key.

We believe that rather than simply tell-ing schools “Here’s what you need to do” or “Here’s evidence”, we should create a process whereby we start moving togeth-er and asking questions along the way. For example, by enhancing collaboration between our partner schools, our teacher trainers and researchers at the university, they become equal partners in the learn-ing and innovation process. They meet, visit each other’s classes, test and analyse methods and share their experiences. The researchers are also piloting collaborative projects with teachers in an effort to start up Living Labs - user-centred open innova-tion ecosystems. It might push people out of their comfort zone but we see that it is the only way to change and people actual-ly like taking an active role!

In addition, training is a very impor-tant part of the centre’s activities. Our Teachers’ Academy is developing and delivering new in-service teacher train-ing programs - about 1500 teachers participate annually. Also, they run an extensive mentoring programme to support new teachers during their first year of teaching. Another one of CIE’s most successful training programs is Ed-ucation4Future (E4F), meant for school leaders and teachers and collaboratively run with partners from the Netherlands, Liechtenstein and Switzerland. Over the past few years we have seen the impact it has had on the participants’ develop-ment. The year-long program revolves around a discussion framed by the OECD

Education Trends report. Participants get to know the educational contexts of participating countries and implement a school development project in their schools.

In conclusion, one could say that we are experimenting with different ap-proaches to educational development and change. How is educational develop-ment happening in your school/universi-ty/country? You can get in touch with us by writing to [email protected] and share your story!

Maarja Hallik, CIE partnerships coordinatorUniversity of Talinn, [email protected]

tional institutions. Lecturers and teach-ers are, therefore, delivering all of their teaching in a second language. Globally this is not an uncommon phenomena, but one that is worthy of further reflection.

As practitioners in today’s world of in-creasing globalisation, we need to find a balance in our curricula between univer-sality and cultural relevance. It is impor-tant not to become so focussed on meet-ing fixed targets that we lose sight of the need for creativity in our approaches to teaching and learning.

For me, once my physical journey end-ed, my personal one did not. Through the University in Lancaster (UK) I have now embarked upon a research project, ex-ploring the issues that surround curricu-lum development in low income countries with a particular focus on the intersection between governments, NGOs, and teach-er trainers. I am hoping to head overseas again under the auspices of the VSO, in the near future.

Helen Horton([email protected]), UK


In many cases the educational process is formal in the University.

In November 2016 initiative, young teachers thirsting to implement non-for-mal educational techniques and to en-gage students’ creativity into the study process established an IdeaLab.

IdeaLab is a creative educational space at Sumy State University which inspires both teachers and students to try new active learning techniques. The room is equipped with a 3D-printer, multimedia projector, multi touch board, several lap-tops, document camera, video camera etc. that makes it possible to use the audito-rium both for traditional classes and for collaborative work on different projects.

IdeaLab’s interior was jointly designed by students and teachers and was cre-ated mostly by their own hands. They spent lots of hours after classes creating little colourful light bulbs, a hand-made tree, motivating pictures etc. Both stu-dents and teachers found such a collab-oration productive and as a result felt more confident with each other.

At the moment IdeaLab is a space where students meet to discuss their ideas and projects, work in groups, pre-pare for different competitions and have inspiring classes and talks or just spend

some time playing business games and having some rest.

Different types of activities were organ-ized in IdeaLab during the last half a year, including training, interactive seminars, educational films and different types of contests.

Pitching of students’ ideas was the most popular competition being a new

IdeaLab as a Place for Creativity in Sumy State University, Ukraine

experience both for teachers and stu-dents of Sumy State University. Pitching is a technique of presenting an innova-tive idea during a very short period of time.

To pitch an idea means to bring an idea to someone with the power during several (two or three) minutes. The con-test includes the pitching itself as well

as a question and answer session. A jury made up of experts in the topic puts for-ward the points to every idea, addresses questions to the presenter and ranks the proposed ideas. The best variant is to in-vite practitioners, local authorities, NGOs and/or representative of international or-ganizations to act as jury as they can help students implement their creative ideas into practice giving them useful com-ments, practical advice and sometimes − financial support for the best ideas.

The first pitching contest was held in Sumy State University in December 2016. Since then three additional pitch-ings were organized.

I would like to mention several creative ideas among a variety of ideas on eco-nomic, energy and environmental issues presented for the pitching contests:• “Urban garden” (The idea is to create

garden in the city so that poor people

with a help of students will be able to plant vegetables to get food). The idea got positive feedback from Sumy regional implementation unit of UNDP “Community based approach to local development”.

• “Online centre “Single window” for dis-abled people” (The idea is to create an online center to help disabled people to draw up documents on disability, to

apply for subsidies, social security etc. not leaving their house. This is espe-cially useful when there are a lot of changes in legislation). The creator of this idea was invited to work in coop-eration with local authorities.

Students found the pitching of ideas exciting. They did their best while pre-senting their own ideas under strong competition within a tight time limit and got useful comments from jury. Teachers found the contest interesting for them-selves and useful for students from the position of developing skills of concise oral presentation.

I believe that this just the beginning as students have lots of creative ideas which can make their life in the campus more comfortable and joyful, and in many cases, can improve the life in the city.

The latest news and information con-cerning the coming events in the IdeaLab is available online on https://www.facebook.com/idealab.sumdu/

Nadiya KostyuchenkoHead of Teachers Training FacultyAssociate ProfessorSumy State University, Ukraine [email protected]


The library at Dokk1 is a centre for knowledge and culture which disseminates and makes a variety of media come alive across genres and formats. The library is the citizens’ house. At Dokk1, 350,000 media for children and adults are available: books, audio books, ebooks, magazines, music and games. Digital media is a priority and the staff are constantly keeping abreast of the future.

Every day events, exhibits, debates and many other things are taking place in the library, which is also the frame for the cultural year: Aarhus2017, and a very popular study area for students and playground for children.

As part of the conference, we offer the choice of visits to:

WelcomeThe Learning Teacher Network’s 12th Interna-tional Conference will be held at the four star Marselis Hotel in Aarhus, Denmark on 21-23 Sep-tember, 2017 with the title ‘Re-thinking Educa-tion’.

The focus of the 2017 Conference will be Qual-ity Education and investigates how to empower learners, schools and teacher education to re-think education and its practice with the purpose of learning and educating for sustainable devel-opment

Locating the 12th International Conference in Aarhus is not a coincidence. During 2017 Aar-hus and the 18 other municipalities in Central Denmark Region will be the European Capital of Culture with the overall theme ‘Re-think’. The minds are set on three core values: Sustainability, Diversity, and Democracy. Aarhus examines these values and set them in play in a number of cross current demonstrations, experiments and proto-types.

A wide range of interesting events will take place in Aarhus this year and the theme of the conference matches very well the theme of the cultural capital year.

The Learning Teacher Network’s 12th Interna-tional Conference will be composed of very rich content and high quality presentations, with high-ly recognized keynote speakers, interesting visits to newly built cultural institutions and schools, and a selected number of sessions of workshops, lectures, paper and poster presentations.

We welcome you and hope to see you and col-leagues at this inspiring event in September 2017

Re-thinking Education Welcome to the 12th International Conference

Aarhus, Denmark 21-23 September 2017www.learningteacher.eu/Aarhus-conference-2017

Programme Thursday the 21st September:15:00 – 17.30 Registration16:00 – 16:30 Meeting members of LTN 17:30 – 19:30 Cultural/ musical Program and Conference Opening Session. Magnus Persson - memorial celebration by Charles Hopkins Keynote Speech: “Rethinking Education in 2030 Perspective” Mogens Lykketoft, former president of U.N. 20:00 - Welcome dinner.

Friday the 22nd September:8:15 - 11:00 Optional: school visit or Teacher Training College or Library/Cultural Centre, 11:15 – 12:00 Keynote Speech: “Construction Mindsets” - Simon Kavanagh12:00 – 12:30 World Café meetings12:30 – 13:30 Lunch13:30 – 14:30 Keynote speech: “Creativity and Education” - Lene Tanggaard14:30 – 15:00 Coffee break15:00 – 16.00 Parallel Sessions A16:00 – 17:00 Parallel Sessions B17:00 – 17:30 World-café meetings20:00 - Conference Dinner

Saturday the 23nd September:9:00 – 10:00 Keynote speaker: Charles Hopkins, “Re thinking Development of Sustainable Education”10:00 – 11.00 Parallel Sessions C11.00 – 11:30 Coffee Break11:30 – 12.30 Parallel Sessions D12:30 – 13:30 Lunch13:30 – 14:30 Parallel Sessions F14:30 – 15.30 World-café meetings including coffee15:30 – 16:00 Plenary/Harvesting ideas from the world café meetings16:00 - 16:30 Cultural/Musical Program and Closing session

World caféPart of the conference will be participation in a World Café, which is a structured conversational process, intended to facilitate dis-cussion, linking ideas within a larger group to access the col-lective wisdom by sharing feedback and inspiration which has emerged during the conference.

Mogens Lykketoft Former Foreign Minister in Denmark, and Former President of the UN General Assembly

Simon Kavanagh International manager of Kaos PilotsKaos Pilots is a hybrid business and design school, a multi-sided education in leadership and entrepreneur-ship. Teaching programs are designed to help students be-ing co-creators of the future, BA Des Ed., Field of StudyARt & design education & visual communication tapping into their creativity, giving it a direction, creating a setting that will get them there and navigate the uncertainties that will follow.

Simon Kavanagh’s work as International Manager consists of promoting and cre-ating collaboration between the school and international organizations, co-creating new solutions to learning and creating bridges between the Design and Business worlds.

Lene Tanggaard Cand. psych., Ph.d. Director of Center for Quality StudiesCo-director of the Interna-tional Centre for the Cultural Psychology of Creativity (ICCPC)Author of “Fooling Around, Creative Learning Pathways”, “In the shower with Picasso „and “Creativity with a Danish Edge”.

Charles Hopkins Prof, Charles Hopkins, UNESCO Chair, York University, Toronto, Canada‘The crucial role of ESD in achieving the Sustainable De-velopment Goals : Key new es-sential aspects for Education 2030”. Charles Hopkins is the UNESCO chair on Reorienting Teacher Education to address Sustainability. Within this appointment he coordinates an international network of teacher education institutions from 55 countries. He is also a United Nations University (UNU) Chair on Education for Sustainable Development, de-veloping Regional Centres in (ESD) globally).

Keynotes

Via University college is an internationally oriented insti-tution of higher education, and offers a wide range of edu-cational programmes within education, health, design, tech-nology, business, social education and animation. The focus is on developing the future of public and private professions. http://en.via.dk

Frederiksbjerg school is situated in the district of Aar-hus city centre. It is already a gathering point for the children and youth of the local society. Inside, the building offers a great variety in space, light and materiality, thus creating an adaptable and sentient learning environment with a focus on health and fellowship. Outside, the school adapts to its historical surroundings by means of height and materiality. http://frederiksbjergskole.dk/

The next issue of the Learning Teacher Magazine will be published in September 2017. Articles may be submitted no later than August 15 2017.

20 THE LEARNING TEACHER MAGAZINE 2/2017

Register for the 12th International Conference in Aarhus, Denmark from 21-23 September, 2017

Full Conference information on:www.learningteacher.eu/aarhus-conference-2017

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