Tekijät

• International Association for the Evaluation of Educational Achievement (IEA)
• Kupari, Pekka (University of Jyväskylä. Finnish Institute for Educational Research)
• Suoninen, Annikka (University of Jyväskylä. Finnish Institute for Educational Research)
• Törmäkangas, Kari (University of Jyväskylä. Finnish Institute for Educational Research)

Asiasanat

citizen participation, citizenship, democracy, education, educational personnel, political action, political awareness, political interest, political participation, schoolchildren, schoolteachers, social systems, teaching

Sisällön kuvaus

The study on young people's civic competencies, participation and attitudes was conducted in Finnish schools in 2009 as part of a larger ICCS 2009 study. It investigated the civic skills and knowledge of young people as well as their disposition to active citizenship. The study had three parts: one for students, teachers and schools each. This dataset contains responses to the questionnaire for the teachers, investigating their occupational background and views on the teaching of civics. The FSD participated in the funding of the study.

The respondents were first asked general questions related to teaching, such as confidence in using different teaching methods and their other work tasks in addition to teaching.

The schools the respondents worked in were surveyed with questions covering how well teachers of the school participated in different activities (conflict-resolving between students, cooperation in planning teaching etc.), to what extent different people influenced school decision-making, how student opinions were taken into account in deciding about such things as study material, timetables and school rules, and how often different problems, such as vandalism and sexual harassment, occurred in the school. The respondents' participation in different activities with their students was charted as well as the respondents' participation in the activities of different organisations and groups in their leisure time. Views were probed on what proportion of the students behaved well and abided by the school rules, participated in the conversation in different ways during class and got along with and respected each other. The extent to which the respondents used exam performances and other assessments for different purposes was also charted.

The next section focused on the teaching of civics in the respondents' schools. Opinions were charted on the most important goals of civic education and who should have the greatest responsibility for civic education in the school. Those respondents who taught history, social studies, geography, health education, home economics or religion were asked additional questions about teaching methods, the planning and evaluation of teaching, confidence in teaching various topics and ways to better civic education in the school.

The final section comprised national questions, which covered the importance of different topics in civic education, what constituted a good citizen, what students learnt in the school (e.g. cooperating with others, the importance of voting), and opinions on student participation.

Background variables included the respondent's gender, age group, subjects taught, the percentage of classes taught to 8th graders in 2009, the number of years as a teacher in the current school and in total, and the number of schools in which taught 8th graders at the time of the survey.