In this case study, theoretically rooted in peer-assisted learning (PAL), ten female high school students, acting as peer teachers, taught hip hop dance in a voluntary physical education course. The data, derived from questionnaires and interviews with the peer teachers, were analysed using content analysis. The results showed that the peer…

Purpose: The purpose of this paper is to describe a symbolic-interpretative research on the leadership culture and its subcultures in one unified comprehensive school in Finland. Design/methodology/approach: The research is a phenomenological, qualitative case study. Its methodology is based on triangulation. Findings: The leadership culture of…

Dinkes, Cataldi, and Lin-Kelly (2007) claims that 78% of public schools reported one or more violent incidents during the 2005/2006 school year. School shootings are a rare but real threat on school campuses. Shootings at private schools are even less frequent with only a few recorded examples in the United States. This case study examines how a…

Media educators and researchers call for learner-centred, bottom-up pedagogical approaches, which take into account learners' own cultures, knowledge and experiences. Nevertheless, there seem to be gaps between traditional, authoritarian school culture and the interactive, creative media culture that is a significant part of youngsters' lives…

Researching can be viewed as a way of analysing issues of schooling by linking theoretical knowledge with perceptions of educational reality already during teacher education. Not only does practicing teaching provide a context for analysing instruction, learning, school culture, diversity, or any other issue related to schooling, also researching…

In the 1990s, educational policy in Finland shifted to decentralization and the granting of more local control to municipalities and schools, with the intent of encouraging more active, locally relevant learning. Within national guidelines, schools develop their own curricula and do their own budgeting. Case studies examine how three different…

Over half of Finnish elementary schools are small schools employing 1-3 teachers. This paper examines the implementation of new national curriculum policies in two small elementary schools. The new policies, adopted in 1994, stress autonomous control of learning and encourage each individual school, in collaboration with the community, to draw up…