Understanding Students Better with SEL – A Finnish View
Janna Kinnunen has been a teacher for many years, gaining experience working in all settings, from pre-school to higher ed. After the pandemic, she joined the team at Otavia, Mikkeli City, Finland, an institution offering online-only tuition to students who cannot or prefer not to attend physical classes. Although everyone has long since returned to the classroom, Janna still teaches at Otavia. She values the convenience of remote work and the reward of working with students who benefit from a different approach. Janna was at Atlantic to work on understanding students better by studying SEL (Social and Emotional Learning) methodologies.
We spoke to Janna about Otavia, her reasons for studying at Atlantic, and to get her views on our centre, Galway, and Ireland.
First off, Janna introduced herself:
I am a Finnish teacher of English, Finnish and literature. And for the past four years I have worked for the exclusively online Otavia online upper and lower secondary school. I don’t do classes, but we have an online learning platform and non-stop courses that students can take and complete at their own pace.
I have online meetings, guidance sessions, things like that, accreditation meetings, skills demonstrations. So I work from home basically. I’ve never seen any of my colleagues in person, but I like working this way.
We do offer some scheduled courses with online classes as well. Besides, we have a campus near Mikkeli with regular classroom teaching. Still, a majority of our courses are online and non-stop.
When asked about her motivation to come to Atlantic, she said:
Because of that style of teaching or the way our school operates – and it has been operating for the past 25 years – I started feeling like I sometimes lack a connection with my students and would like to deepen or explore the ways that social and emotional learning can be utilized in that context.
When I was still at uni, I decided, I made a vow, a solemn vow, that I would teach people, not things. And lately, it has started to feel a bit like teaching things more than people.
Her SEL course choice proved positive indeed:
It was exactly what the doctor ordered for me. We focused on the ways students can be involved and engaged in activities in their own learning and reflection, taking into account more holistically all the aspects of learning, not just language, but the content as well.
It’s about learning to learn. I also learnt to be more mindful when teaching. That’s one of the biggest things, and that’s something that I will be looking to incorporate into our course materials as well.
We discussed giving feedback, how to work and how to form specific tasks in a more emotionally and socially inclusive and mindful manner. So that’s definitely something that has had and will continue to have an impact.
Otavia – Delivering Education to People in All Situations
Otavia is a City of Mikkeli public enterprise providing secondary education, basic education, and adult education exclusively online.
Over the last 25 years, Otavia has gained expertise in the provision of distance learning and online pedagogy, instruction of multicultural groups, staff training in the education sector, and sustainable development.
During our conversation, Janna highlighted that many students would not get an education if it weren’t for Otavia. The student demographic, she said, was broad:
We get students from very different backgrounds. I teach Finnish and literature at lower secondary level, but we follow the adult curriculum. Our students have not completed or are struggling to complete their basic education for one reason or another. We do get some youngsters as well who might, for instance, for medical or social reasons struggle to take part in classroom teaching. So they study online.
We get students who live abroad with the parents and other students who, for various reasons, are unable to take part in the classroom and normal school.
For the upper secondary school, anyone can apply. We do have a thorough vetting system to make sure our applicants are well suited to do this kind of education.
Some students might join us for some individual courses to fill in the gaps, up their grades or just to try out online studying.
But we have students do their whole degree with us. They go through each and every course and at the end, they take the matriculation exam and get their grades. So they get A levels essentially.
We also get a lot of adults who might be working or living in remote locations, where in-person upper secondary education might not be available to adults. A lot of professional athletes have to complete secondary education as part of the contracts.
Students progress through the work in their own time, with teachers available to lend support anytime.
English Language and Irish Culture
During her stay, Janna also attended our English Language and Irish Culture course, where she met people from different parts of the world:
We had a lovely group of seven students from various backgrounds. Not all teachers either. I think we had librarian and then we had primary school teachers, secondary school teachers, university teachers. So quite a wide variety of people from different places, I think Poland, France, Germany, and Finland.
We had a good group and went to a lot of events in our spare time. We had lunch together every day in different places and went out to dinner and drinks. We had very good group. We have a WhatsApp group now and exchange email addresses.
The teachers and all the staff here have been very professional and friendly. The school meets the modern technical requirements, the premises are brilliant, airy, accommodating. It’s easy to find, easy to get around. You get a lot of help from the reception should anything be unclear. Communication has been very good before and during the course.
On the nights out and excursions, Janna commented:
I enjoyed the extracurricular activities and outings. Having travelled quite a bit by myself, I don’t necessarily need a tour guide, but Brian – our walking tour guide – was a brilliant and captivating orator! I also thoroughly enjoyed Lora O’Brien’s lecture and Rab Fulton’s Celtic storytelling. And of course, Galway being Galway, there is music everywhere!
Janna stayed on for another week after completing her course to travel around Ireland with her partner.
