"Teach like Finland": A Review

Education is a word that triggers much controversy amongst South Africans, as the country displays an overwhelming disparity of learning systems. While the structures behind our schools are solid in theory, there are countless pupils in rural areas who face teacher-less days, while the private school children are spoilt for choice. This inequality leads to a much lower overall pass rate, and a general lack of positive educational experiences for many students. Timothy D. Walker’s Teach Like Finland: 33 Simple Strategies for Joyful Classrooms gives readers a fresh perspective regarding the importance of a more holistic, and arguably more effective, way of teaching children.

The overarching message in the book highlights the fact that Finnish schools aim to guarantee the health and wellbeing of pupils at school, so that should those factors be lacking at home, their education would not be jeopardized. This struck a chord in me as I considered our education system in South Africa. My home province, KwaZulu Natal, is just one example that reflects the case of the nation – I attended an all-girls private school while just down the hill were derelict and empty government schools. In those schools, the home lives of pupils are not always conducive to learning, as understandably more pressing issues tend to dominate their thinking.

Something I really appreciated about Teach Like Finland is that Walker obviously intends it as not only an appraisal of successful teaching approaches, but as a global guide to schools to follow and learn from. His target audience, the teachers and schooling systems of America, clearly have a lot to learn from Finland. Although Walker has targeted American schools, I believe that the strategies of the Finnish schools would be just as beneficial in South African schools. One of the guiding principles of Finnish schools is to prioritize happiness as a primary goal in classrooms, something which may seem abstract, but is proven to increase productivity and social-emotional intelligence. The schools have myriad clubs and associations in which children are able to gain complementary knowledge to their curriculum, as well as explore their other talents. Walker emphasizes the benefits of having 45-minute classes, with 15 minute “brain breaks” in between, allowing children to stay focussed. Teachers are expected to develop strong teacher-student relationships, in order to encourage their students learning. In my opinion, too much of South African schooling is focussed solely on academic results, and not enough thought is put into the emotional well-being of students.

Teach Like Finland attests to a number of my own views about the global education system, and I thus found it an absorbing and enjoyable read. Walker writes in such a way that is accessible to readers, without any flowery or overly technical phrases. Having spent nearly 17 years in the South African schooling system, I was enlightened by the mindset of the Finnish system. While it may not be possible to utilize their system in South Africa, I believe the Finnish offer valuable insight and strategies into a more successful and holistic manner of teaching.

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I wrote this review of Timothy D. Walker's Teach like Finland: 33 Strategies for Joyful Classrooms as an assignment for the service learning element of my degree.