NordForsk

Nordic Centre of Excellence: Quality in Nordic Teaching (QUINT)

The QUINT centre’s vision is to investigate teaching quality in the Nordic countries via video recordings taken in Nordic classrooms.

We aim to answer important questions like these:

-In what ways does teaching make a difference in student learning and engagement across subject areas?  
-How does it make a difference in mono-lingual as well as multi-lingual contexts across the Nordic countries?
-How can classroom videos be used as effective resources for preparing teachers’ pre-service and enhancing in-service teachers’ professional development?  
-How can video technology and other digital resources generate new forms of collaborative research between researchers and practitioners?
-Nordic schools – one practice?

Nordic welfare states and their educational systems are often described as homogeneous, but studies indicate that significant differences emerge when researchers observe the actual practices of teachers and interactions between teachers and students in classrooms.

There is a need for systematic and comparative research efforts that dig deeper and more broadly into these patterns. Research should also take into account the changing context and landscape of Nordic schools, such as the digitalization of learning processes and the ever-growing multicultural profiles of schools.

QUINT addresses these issues by bringing together excellent researchers from Denmark, Finland, Iceland, Norway and Sweden. By conducting video studies on both a large and a small scale in classrooms from grades 5–7 and 8–10 and by logging on-line, digital interactions between students and teachers, QUINT’s researchers will produce new insights into the characteristics of high-quality teaching in Nordic classrooms.

Read the full report of the LSP 

The main objective of the three-year project (January 2013-December 2015) was to draw lessons from success stories of individual immigrant students and whole school communities at different levels that have succeeded in developing learning contexts that are equitable and socially just.

Learning spaces refer to school communities as well as other learning environments and practices than schools, which may be important or instrumental for the young immigrants’ participation and success. In the project, students’ success is defined as social as well as academic. By identifying success stories and good practices our aim was to provide guidelines for teaching and school reform based on these strategies. 

Two main aims of the study are to:

1. understand and learn from the experiences of immigrant students who have succeeded academically and socially and
2. explore and understand how social justice is implemented in equitable and successful diverse Nordic school contexts and other learning spaces. 

Publications

Ragnarsdóttir, H. & Kulbrandstad, L. A. (Ritstjórar, 2018). Learning spaces for inclusion and social justice: Success stories from four Nordic countries. Newcastle upon Tyne: Cambridge Scholars Publishing.https://www.cambridgescholars.com/product/978-1-5275-1400-3

Netla's special issue on the Icelandic results of the LSP project (in Icelandic)

Extract 

Learning Spaces for Inclusion and Social Justice: Success Stories from Immigrant Students and School Communities in Four Nordic Countries.

The focus in this special issue will be on the findings of the research project Learning Spaces for Inclusion and Social Justice: Success Stories from Immigrant Students and School Communities in Four Nordic Countries. The main aim of the three-year project (2013–2015) which was conducted in Finland, Iceland, Norway and Sweden was to draw lessons from success stories of individual immigrant students and whole school communities at different levels that have succeeded in developing learning contexts that are equitable and socially just.

Learning spaces refer to school communities as well as other learning environments and practices than schools, which may be important or instrumental for the young immigrants’ participation and success.

In the project, students’ success is defined as social as well as academic. By identifying success stories and good practices our aim was to provide guidelines for teaching and school reform based on these strategies.

Two main aims of the study are to 1) understand and learn from the experiences of immigrant students who have succeeded academically and socially and 2) explore and understand how social justice is implemented in equitable and successful diverse Nordic school contexts and other learning spaces.

The project integrates the following four subthemes and main research areas:

A. Students: Experiences and aspirations of immigrant students 

B. Teachers’ professional development, pedagogy and teaching practices: Teachers as agents and facilitators of inclusion

C. Leadership, collaboration and school cultures: Promotion of democratic participation and collaboration of students, teachers, and parents; and

D. Policies and curricula: Main criteria relating to equity, inclusion and social justice in educational policy, national curriculum guidelines, school policy and curricula.

(Hanna Ragnarsdottir, 2015)

Book

Edda Óskarsdóttir, Hanna Ragnarsdóttir og Samúel Lefever. (Ritstjórar, 2019). Raddir margbreytileikans: Sögur úr skólastarfi. Reykjavík: Háskóli Íslands, Menntavísindastofnun

https://www.boksala.is/product/raddir-margbreytileikans-sogur-ur/https://www.boksala.is/product/raddir-margbreytileikans-sogur-ur/