Risto Hotulainen

Myosin IIb controls actin dynamics underlying the dendritic spine maturation.

Precise control of the formation and development of dendritic spines is critical for synaptic plasticity. Consequently, abnormal spine development is linked to various neurological disorders. The actin cytoskeleton is a structural element generating specific changes in dendritic spine morphology. Although mechanisms underlying dendritic filopodia elongation and spine head growth are relatively well understood, it is still not known how spine heads are enlarged and stabilized during dendritic spine maturation. By using rat hippocampal neurons, we demonstrate that the size of the stable actin pool increases during the neuronal maturation process. Simultaneously, the treadmilling rate of the dynamic actin pool increases. We further show that myosin IIb controls dendritic spine actin cytoskeleton by regulating these two different pools of F-actin via distinct mechanisms. The findings indicate that myosin IIb stabilizes the stable F-actin pool through actin cross-linking. Simultaneously, activation of myosin IIb contractility increases the treadmilling rate of the dynamic pool of actin. Collectively, these data show that myosin IIb has a major role in the regulation of actin filament stability in dendritic spines, and elucidate the complex mechanism through which myosin IIb functions in this process. These new insights into the mechanisms underlying dendritic spine maturation further the model of dendritic spine morphogenesis.

Contributions of data mining for psycho‐educational research: what self‐organizing maps tell us about the well‐being of gifted learners

This article explores applications of the Self‐Organizing Maps method (SOM) to psycho‐educational data. The study examines the psychological well‐being, self‐regulatory and motivational styles of pupils at elementary and middle school (N 795). The presentation of the method appears in cases which are related to general education, special needs and giftedness. The aim of this article is to show that SOM provides a unique means with which to visualize, comprehend and interpret psycho‐educational data. The SOM method is a convenient method used to identify and study exceptional subgroups and non‐linear correlations, as well as to examine theoretical assumptions. The results showed that high academic achievement is related to anxiety, as well as to external and internal pressure, in some gifted subgroups. Such a result is obviously socially constructed and for this reason calls for further study.

Scientific Reasoning, School Achievement and Gender: a Multilevel Study of between and within School Effects in Finland

The relationships between reasoning and school achievement were studied taking into account the multilevel nature (school- and class-levels) of the data. We gathered data from 51 classes at seven schools in metropolitan and Eastern Finland (N = 769, 395 males, 15-year-old students). To study scientific reasoning, we used a modified version of Science Reasoning Tasks, tapping control-of-variable schemata. Analyses were conducted by MLwiN2.10 multilevel modelling. The present results showed that the intra-class correlation coefficient (ICC) of schools for scientific reasoning is 7% and that the corresponding ICC of classes is 10%. Whereas the first finding confirms earlier PISA results, the second finding provides new insights into class variation within schools. In practice, class composition seems to be an efficient solution to meeting the differing needs of individual students.

Pre‐school Verbo‐sensory Motor Status as a Predictor of Educational Life‐courses and Self‐perceptions of Young Adults

During a 15‐year longitudinal study, 31 Finnish students (risk group) who had been identified as having deficiencies in reading and writing readiness at pre‐school through the German Breuer–Weuffen Differentiation Test were compared with their peers (n = 62) in order to study long‐term differences that emerged at the starting point of the study. In 1999, the students in the risk group were found to achieve significantly lower final school grades and they also had lower perceptions of their own scholastic competence. In 2005, students in the risk group perceived themselves as less competent than their peers in social acceptance, sense of global self‐worth areas and in the strength‐perceptions related to mathematical thinking, learning skills, and self‐regulation. Path analyses showed that verbo‐sensory motor status measured at pre‐school age had long‐term effects on participants’ educational life‐course and global self‐worth. Possible explanations of the findings and implications for early identification are discussed.

Development of learning to learn skills in primary school

In Finland, schools’ effectiveness in fostering the development of transversal skills is evaluated through large-scale learning to learn (LTL) assessments. This article presents how LTL skills—general cognitive competences and learning-related motivational beliefs—develop during primary school and how they predict pupils’ CPS skills at the end of sixth grade. The six-year follow-up of 608 pupils shows that cognitive competences demonstrated in the beginning of the first grade in a learning preparedness test predict both later cognitive LTL competences and CPS, but their development is not fully determined by earlier individual differences in learning preparedness in the first grade. Motivational beliefs begin to be related to cognitive LTL performance gradually from age 10 on, and they may have a slightly stronger effect on CPS than on cognitive LTL performance. It is concluded that the development of CPS is partly depending on pupils’ initial learning preparedness and the development of their LTL skills.

How Do Finns Know? Educational Monitoring without Inspection and Standard Setting

The Finnish educational system was decentralised in the 1980s and the 1990s. The school inspection system was dissolved and the municipalities as organisers of education were given responsibility for monitoring the effectiveness of education and securing that every child has equal possibilities in proceeding through the 9-year basic education consisting of primary education and lower secondary education. A national model for sample-based curricular and thematic assessments was created to ensure equity of education in different parts of the country. Unlike many other countries, Finland decided not to have a comprehensive standardised testing system, and the goals set in the national Core Curriculum were not considered as standards either. Thus, matriculation examination at the end of academic track of upper secondary education remained as the only high-stakes test, but due to extensive possibilities for subject selection and the normative approach still applied in grading the exams, it only produces a limited amount of information that can be used in monitoring the trends of pupil performance. This chapter gives an overview of educational quality monitoring during basic education in Finland, presenting first a short historical review of how the monitoring system has received its current form. Next, the national sample-based assessment system is described before introducing the local ways of monitoring the equity and functionality of basic education. These include the screening of support needs and the evaluation of the effectiveness of the provided support that has been claimed to be one of the explanations behind Finland’s success in international comparisons. Finally, we will discuss whether quality monitoring without standard setting can work and what standard setting could contribute to the Finnish education system.

Thinking Skills Intervention for Low-Achieving First Graders.

Abstract This paper reports the results of the improving thinking skills (ITS-1) intervention study on the thinking skills of low-achieving first graders. The intervention programme consists of 12 lessons, each lasting for 45 min. Lessons offer enriched-discovery learning activities and tasks to be solved through inductive reasoning. We used a quasi-experimental approach, with pre-, immediate post- and delayed post-tests conducted among intervention and control groups. The following groups were formed from a total of 149 first graders on the basis of the thinking skills measure: low-achieving (<−1 SD) intervention group (LowI) (n = 9) and two control groups, comprising both low-achieving (LowC) (n = 18) and well-performing (≥−1 SD) groups (WellC) (n = 122). Thinking skills, mathematical skills, listening comprehension skills and reading fluency were measured. The results showed that in the beginning of the study, there were differences in thinking skills, mathematical skills, listening comprehension skills and reading fluency between the LowI and WellC groups, but the LowI group was able to reach the level of their well-performing peers at the end of the intervention in all measures. The discussion focuses on the implications of intervention research, educational practice and responsiveness to intervention.

Changes and Stability in Daily Cortisol Values and Their Correlation toAttention Measured In a Prolonged Working Task among Finnish Six-Year-OldDay-Care Children

Recently, there has been growing interest in studying stress reactivity in children which is usually accomplished by detecting atypical daily patterns of salivary cortisol. It is assumed that chronic high or low levels of stress hormones are detrimental to attentional performance, a behaviour strongly suggested to be at the core of learning. In the present study, we firstly examined the stability of daily changes in the stress hormone, cortisol. The levels of cortisol were measured five times per day, during one day in autumn and one day in spring. The second aim of our study was to explore whether attention measured in prolonged working tasks was associated with daily cortisol change. Three day care centres in Metropolitan Helsinki, Finland participated in this study and 59 6-year-old preschool children (24 girls, 35 boys) comprised the study sample. The results revealed that the childrens daily cortisol variation—in particular, from morning to pre-school and from morning to evening show stability—and this stability was detectable over a six-month period. Children who had lower daily variation in cortisol values in both autumn and spring demonstrated poorer attention. We discuss possible explanations for these findings and implications for early identification.

Family and school social capital, school burnout and academic achievement: a multilevel longitudinal analysis among Finnish pupils

Abstract Research on the associations between family and school social capital, school burnout and academic achievement in adolescence is scarce and the results are inconclusive. We examined if family and school social capital at the age of 13 predicts lower school burnout and better academic achievement when graduating at the age of 16. Using data from 4467 Finnish adolescents from 117 schools and 444 classes a three-level multilevel analysis was executed. School social capital, the positive and supportive relationships between students and teachers, predicted lower school burnout and better academic achievement among students. Classmates’ family social capital had also significance for students’ academic achievement. Our results suggest that building school social capital is an important aspect of school health and education policies and practices.

Low schoolwork engagement and schoolwork difficulties predict smoking in adolescence

Abstract Background Low academic achievement has been associated with smoking but factors behind this association are poorly known. Such factors could include schoolwork disengagement and schoolwork difficulties. To assess the extent to which they contribute to the explanation of how health inequalities emerge, we study in a longitudinal design whether these have an independent effect on smoking or whether their effect is mediated through academic achievement. Methods Longitudinal data were collected in the Helsinki metropolitan area, Finland in 2011 and 2014. Participants were seventh-graders (12 − 13 years, N=9497). In the follow-up, 6534 students reported their smoking status in the ninth grade (15 − 16 years). Smoking, schoolwork behavioural engagement, i.e. participation in academic activities, and disengagement, schoolwork difficulties and cognitive competence were self-reported by adolescents. Academic achievement was obtained from the Finnish national application register on upper secondary education. A mediation analysis was executed with bootstrapped confidence intervals. Results Higher schoolwork behavioural engagement and cognitive competence in the seventh grade predicted that adolescents were more likely not to smoke in the ninth grade (all P<0.001) while higher schoolwork disengagement and schoolwork difficulties predicted adolescents’ smoking (all P<0.001). The effects were mediated through academic achievement. Conclusions Students’ behavioural disengagement with schoolwork and schoolwork difficulties are risks for smoking initiation. Their effect is mediated through poor school achievement. As smoking often continues in adulthood and poor school performance typically leads to lower education, schoolwork disengagement and difficulties in adolescence constitute potential pathways to inequalities in health.