

What Makes Finnish Kids So Smart? - mqt
http://online.wsj.com/public/article/SB120425355065601997-7Bp8YFw7Yy1n9bdKtVyP7KBAcJA_20080330.html

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metoo
I am a Finn and I agree on introversion. In our culture hard working in
solitude is respected and showing your feelings is suppressed; both good for
classroom study. In sports this culture shows too: we do generally very bad in
team sports.

The whole society is based on leveling differences. The week ones drop out and
the good ones are held back but on the average everything looks good. It is
also very rare to be self-employed. If you want to accomplish something out of
ordinary you have to leave the country; think of Linus Torvalds for example.

About history: Finland has been part of Sweden and Russian and we are still
been constantly reminded about it. For example, our current president Tarja
Halonen refuses answer questions about democracy in Russia. I think the whole
country needs a psychotherapy about the Russia issue.

You should think a Finn as passive-aggressive, risk-avoiding, self-loathing,
highly educated native with inferiority complex. Those qualities with the lack
of courage to speak up makes us the ultimate slave race.

~~~
gruseom
You remind me of a joke I heard, and I'm curious to know if it's a common one.
It goes something like this: _A Finnish farmer answers a loud knock at his
door to find a detachment of Russian soldiers. The officer informs him that
Russia is taking over this land and demands on penalty of death to know which
side the farmer chooses to belong to, Finland or Russia. The farmer replies,
"It has always been my heartfelt wish to once again be part of mother Russia.
But at my age, I couldn't take another Russian winter."_

I wonder if you would detect the "passive-aggressive" temperament you mention
in this joke? It could be described that way, though it strikes me more as a
kind of shrewdness, based in long experience of managing much more powerful
neighbors. (I didn't know that Finland had gotten it from both sides.)

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asdflkj
The real answer is: introversion. I have a few Finnish friends, and not only
are they all introverts, but all their Finnish acquaintances seem to be, too.
Finnish social customs reflect this. It would be interesting to figure out
why. Finland does have a somewhat strange history.

This article strikes me as politically correct cargo-cultism. The features of
Finnish schools that it talks about wouldn't work in just any society.

~~~
shiranaihito
Hi.

I'm a Finn and I don't think introversion has much to do with why our
educational system works as well as it does.

Us being introvert doesn't translate to all children sitting quietly in
classrooms, absorbing information. There are .. problematic kids too.

I'd say it's more about the good foundation, as the article seems to imply.
The curriculum is pretty solid too.

Finnish social customs are certainly way too uptight though.

~~~
pg
Do you think Finnish social customs are the explanation of this phenomenon?
I.e. that it's not cool to be stupid the way it is in large swaths of the US?

~~~
shiranaihito
Finland seems to have just as many loud stupid people as I'd imagine can be
found in America. In schools, it's the same sort of thing - nerds vs jocks,
etc.

Being stupid is certainly not cool, but not exactly frowned upon in the
retard-circles either :p

Our social customs are a problem because somehow the whole nation feels like
it's not "normal" to strike up a casual conversation with someone you don't
already know.

I think that's part of why we seem so introvert. When we get to know others,
we can then behave like normal people :)

It's just that getting there is needlessly difficult.

~~~
whacked_new
As you seem to have studied Japanese, how does this compare to Japanese
culture? I see many East Asian cultural elements among several points in this
thread. Also, how unique is this to Finland? I've heard the Swiss also share
this "introvert" quality. And the Germans?

~~~
shiranaihito
Have you studied Japanese?

As far as I know, Finnish and Japanese people and societies share quite a few
traits.

Some degree of introversion seems to be common to both, but based on two trips
to Tokyo, I'd say that the Japanese are still considerably more relaxed than
Finns are.

I can't comment on Switzerland or Germany, and I don't know much about the
Japanese educational system, other than that they don't seem to be teaching
English too well :p

I'm afraid that I'd need a more specific question to be able to offer some
insight.

~~~
whacked_new
I ask because I have no first hand knowledge about Europe. I was told that
among the Europeans, the Germans are most similar to Japanese. I can't think
of an English equivalent now, but both people are said to "follow the book
strictly."

There are many things to ask; I just wondered if you had a general impression
about the comparison. You said they share quite a few traits -- for example?

~~~
shiranaihito
There are some similarities between Finland and Japan that I've noticed or
heard of.

Both countries have a relatively high suicide-rate.

Both societies frown upon someone who changes jobs frequently, and being
unemployed is considered shameful and terrible in general.

The way we travel in public transports seems to be the same too. Everyone just
sits there in silence :)

On a happier note, our languages often sound surprisingly similar.

\- For example there are words in the Finnish language that happen to sound
like words in the Japanese language.

The meanings are different of course, but at least to me, saying the word
"sato" sounds exactly the same in both languages. In Finnish it means "crop"
(as in what you reap), and in Japanese it means "village".

There are probably quite a few others like that.

I've been told that Finns most resemble the people in Hokkaido, the northmost
area in Japan where the climate is supposedly like (southern?) Finland.

Germany? Maybe they're as methodological in Japan?

I studied German for about 5 years at school (voluntarily even), but nowadays
I can probably make it through more sentences in Japanese without breaking
any.

As far as I remember, we didn't hear much about their culture..

They had a fun way of wishing good luck though: "Hals- und Beinbruch!", which
means something like "Neck- and leg-fractures!", as in "Break a leg!" :)

Well, you guys do belong in the same family of languages after all..

In Finland we just settle for saying "Onnea!" as in "Luck!".

~~~
whacked_new
Thanks.

The high suicide rate is an interesting fact. Checking on
[http://www.who.int/mental_health/prevention/suicide/suicider...](http://www.who.int/mental_health/prevention/suicide/suiciderates/en/)
Finland and Japan are indeed right next to each other. But on
[http://www.nationmaster.com/graph/cri_mur_percap-crime-
murde...](http://www.nationmaster.com/graph/cri_mur_percap-crime-murders-per-
capita) Finland's murder rate is closer to USA (#30 vs #24) than Japan's #60.

The parallels between Germans and Japanese were indeed about being
methodological. I am unsure how this idea really holds though, as the
education systems are, AFAIK, very different. There's still much to find
out...

~~~
shiranaihito
Even though the murder rate may seem high, often those are cases where some
guy decides to kill his family, and then himself.

This kind of thing happens almost exclusively in the Finnish countryside.

It's strange, but it's better than lunatics killing random people on the
streets.

I'd say that random killings are extremely rare, maybe unlike America, and
that this is still a relatively safe place.

But lately we've had our share of totally incomprehensible violence too..

------
mqt
"Movies and TV shows have Finnish subtitles instead of dubbing. One college
student says she became a fast reader as a child because she was hooked on the
1990s show 'Beverly Hills, 90210.'"

Interesting. I remember when I began using IRC at the age of 10. The rate that
I read at increased considerably within several months. It's unfortunate that
many kids today watch TV without subtitles and SMS each other unintelligibly.
If they're on the internet, they're probably looking at pictures of cats on
Digg.

How the hell are kids supposed to learn how to read these days?

~~~
tac-tics
The answer is simple:

<http://www.roflcat.com/images/cats/270915355_c8b9ae48e6.jpg>

Edumacation

Learn me a book

------
gahahaha
I think the comments so far in this discussion are misguided in attributing
the good school performance of Finnish pupils to some character trait of
Finns. That's like saying blacks in America do worse in school because of
black culture.

Finland has a great educational system. It's that simple. And that hard too.
It takes decades to create a good educational system, and you can't do it with
handing out more money or new laws.

~~~
shiranaihito
I agree.

Anyway, our educational system is pretty much uniformly great all the way to
the end of upper-secondary school.

After that though, there are only a handful of good universities to attend.

It seems that among colleges etc, there are lots of really good choices in
America.

For example I went to a polytechnic, "majored" in IT, and learned next to
nothing about programming there.

Now I'm relatively far from being a Real Programmer (tm), but trying to slowly
make my way towards being one.

------
Alex3917
The Finnish school system sounds very much like the ideal learning environment
that Alfie Kohn describes in Punished by Rewards.

~~~
curi
There are severe limitations on how far Alfie Kohn and his following will
follow the implications of his ideas. They have gone so far as to ban
discussion of certain ideas, basically because parents were too uncomfortable
about being asked to do that much better.

~~~
Alex3917
I'm really interested in this. Do you have any links, or else could you
post/email_me a synopsis of what's going on.

~~~
curi
There are ideas called "Taking Children Seriously" (TCS) and the UP
(Unconditional Parenting is a book by Alfie Kohn) forum was closed down to
avoid those ideas and the yahoogroup explicitly bans any discussion of TCS --
even when a newbie shows up and asks what TCS is and how it differs from UP,
they won't get an answer. The only reason the TCS label is relevant is because
that's the way in which they explicitly target which ideas are banned. If I
post anonymously and without mentioning the TCS label I would still be
unwelcome if I posted exploring certain lines of thought, which are what's
actually unwanted.

They want a "supportive atmosphere" which means little criticism (of ideas).
This is not unusual. Pretty much no one is philosophically serious about
parenting or education, today.

Feel free to email me at curi@curi.us for more details or reply here.

Edit: sigh, Alfie had the major relevant thread on his forum deleted from
archive.org, all I seem to have are some partial quotes in AIM logs.

~~~
curi
Heh I tricked archive.org and got the first page of the thread i wanted and
found:

"Part of the problem here, some argue, is a lack of clarity or transparency in
those posts, such that people whose views closely correspond to TCS generally
don’t identify themselves as such." -- Alfie Kohn

He wanted TCS people to wear identifying stars, if you know what I mean.

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misterbwong
I'm not discounting the Finnish school system or anything but I would take any
results based on standardized tests with a grain of salt. Many tests of this
nature have been shown to be biased or skewed to the benefit or detriment of
certain people. The IQ test is a prime example...

~~~
maximilian
I just had a look through some of the questions of the test and it seems very
fair to me. Simple scientific sorts of questions that have good clear
questions with answers that can be very definitely said.

I would chock it up to finland being a more homogenous society. Many of those
small european countries have top notch education systems, but they are small
and everybody is well off. I personally think that the US needs to find its
best way to educate, not somebody else's.

They also have free college. I'm jealous.

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mynameishere
The Finnish scores are not very high when compared to, eg, Minnesota.

