The first word that came to mind was "freedom"

vaih­to-opet­ta­ja Miki

In mid-Sep­tem­ber, I star­ted an in­terns­hip in Fin­land, whe­re I have al­ways wan­ted to vi­sit. I would like to wri­te my thoughts and fee­lings about that ex­pe­rien­ce and the dif­fe­ren­ces I no­ti­ced com­pa­red to Ja­pan.

The first word that came to mind was ”free­dom”. I felt that the school had a qui­te re­la­xed and gre­at at­mosp­he­re through the school sys­tem, the way stu­dents and te­ac­hers be­ha­ve and many en­joyab­le events. In Ja­pa­ne­se high schools, ti­me­tab­les are ge­ne­ral­ly fi­xed, with no free time bet­ween clas­ses, and all stu­dents go to and le­a­ve school at the same time. The stu­dents choo­se sub­jects ba­sed on their fu­tu­re edu­ca­ti­o­nal paths and they fol­low the same sche­du­le throug­hout the year. The sys­tem here, in which stu­dents think and cre­a­te their own ti­me­tab­le for each se­mes­ter is an im­por­tant op­por­tu­ni­ty for them to think about the sub­jects, fields of in­te­rest, and li­fes­ty­le that they need for them­sel­ves in the fu­tu­re, and I also think that it will lead to their in­de­pen­den­ce. In Ja­pan, it is si­mi­lar to the uni­ver­si­ty sys­tem. As for the re­la­ti­ons­hip bet­ween te­ac­hers and stu­dents, I feel it is a good re­la­ti­ons­hip that is equ­al, and they res­pect each ot­her.

Re­gar­ding clas­ses, I was ama­zed by the ad­van­ced edu­ca­ti­o­nal sys­tem in which each stu­dent was pro­vi­ded with a lap­top and all text­books were in di­gi­tal for­mat. I was also imp­res­sed by how well the stu­dents were ac­cus­to­med to cre­a­ting ma­te­ri­als and ma­king pre­sen­ta­ti­ons. In all sub­jects, the stu­dents’ in­de­pen­dent ac­ti­vi­ties are cen­te­red, and I think that the pro­cess of stu­dents thin­king and le­ar­ning on their own is va­lu­ed, rat­her than pas­si­ve les­sons. The first-gra­de team pro­jects were par­ti­cu­lar­ly in­te­res­ting. Whi­le wor­king on va­ri­ous the­mes and tasks in groups, stu­dents le­arn skills such as ha­ving their own opi­ni­ons, com­mu­ni­ca­ting with each ot­her, and even­tu­al­ly pre­sen­ting the group’s opi­ni­ons. I be­lie­ve that such pro­jects cul­ti­va­te skills and te­ach stu­dents how to stu­dy. The­re­fo­re, I was able to know that schools are not just a pla­ce to re­cei­ve know­led­ge, but a pla­ce to find what you want to le­arn and how to le­arn it.

It has been my dre­am to do an in­terns­hip at a school in Fin­land. I am very gra­te­ful for the op­por­tu­ni­ty to have such a won­der­ful time and I would be hap­py if I could tell even a litt­le bit about Ja­pan.