An empirical study on primary school satisfaction and attitudes towards adult education in Finnish context
Polák, Filip (2024-06-26)
F. Polák
26.06.2024
© 2024, Filip Polák. Tämä Kohde on tekijänoikeuden ja/tai lähioikeuksien suojaama. Voit käyttää Kohdetta käyttöösi sovellettavan tekijänoikeutta ja lähioikeuksia koskevan lainsäädännön sallimilla tavoilla. Muunlaista käyttöä varten tarvitset oikeudenhaltijoiden luvan.
Julkaisun pysyvä osoite on
https://urn.fi/URN:NBN:fi:oulu-202406264951
https://urn.fi/URN:NBN:fi:oulu-202406264951
Tiivistelmä
During the final decades of the 20th century, there has been an upsurge in promoting learning beyond formal education. With the rapid changes the need to adapt started to become a part of people’s lives and careers. Nowadays, the change is nowhere near slowing down. Adult education is a necessary survival process in a world with unpredictable tomorrows and changing job markets.
A positive attitude to adult learning is then a desired feature of our societies. How do we, however, achieve that. Theory (e.g. Cross, 1981) in adult education often assumes that giving pupils a positive learning experience in primary education is key to building positive attitudes towards adult education. However, little to no research has explored this relationship. This thesis explores it in a Finnish context. This is a unique position, due to Finland’s boasting of focus on wellbeing and positive school experience. According to Eurostat, Finland does record participation rates in adult education that are among the highest in EU.
The theoretical framework of this thesis is split into two halves. Firstly, adult education and its many cognate terms is explored, and the considered predictors of participation. A justification for measuring attitudes rather than participation in our data is included in this section. Secondly, the concept of school satisfaction is defined. Both include the description of our measuring instrument for quantifying these concepts on Likert scales. The data is collected via an online survey. Quantitative methods are used to analyze the data gathered from our sample of adults in Finnish context (N = 76).
The findings of this thesis found a weak to moderate positive relationship between primary school satisfaction and enjoyment of learning activities in adulthood. However, no statistically significant relationship was found between factors of primary school satisfaction and adults’ perceived intrinsic value, or perceived importance of adult education. The main predictor of enjoyment of learning activities in adulthood was found to be positive teacher-student relationships from primary school.
A positive attitude to adult learning is then a desired feature of our societies. How do we, however, achieve that. Theory (e.g. Cross, 1981) in adult education often assumes that giving pupils a positive learning experience in primary education is key to building positive attitudes towards adult education. However, little to no research has explored this relationship. This thesis explores it in a Finnish context. This is a unique position, due to Finland’s boasting of focus on wellbeing and positive school experience. According to Eurostat, Finland does record participation rates in adult education that are among the highest in EU.
The theoretical framework of this thesis is split into two halves. Firstly, adult education and its many cognate terms is explored, and the considered predictors of participation. A justification for measuring attitudes rather than participation in our data is included in this section. Secondly, the concept of school satisfaction is defined. Both include the description of our measuring instrument for quantifying these concepts on Likert scales. The data is collected via an online survey. Quantitative methods are used to analyze the data gathered from our sample of adults in Finnish context (N = 76).
The findings of this thesis found a weak to moderate positive relationship between primary school satisfaction and enjoyment of learning activities in adulthood. However, no statistically significant relationship was found between factors of primary school satisfaction and adults’ perceived intrinsic value, or perceived importance of adult education. The main predictor of enjoyment of learning activities in adulthood was found to be positive teacher-student relationships from primary school.
Kokoelmat
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