Teach them life skills!

According to Finnish workplace employers, student coordinators and other workers teachers in vocational education should focus on teaching life skills and skills the future employees need in work life, work life competences. Finnish vocational education aims to fulfill the need for skills in working life, hence it´s development education attentively together with education providers and working life representatives. Working life representatives express their opinions on the future trained workforce needs, while the education administration actively supports work on anticipating skill needs.

Critical thinking is skill that we all need to survive in this changing world. Todays and futures students need to be able to make clear, reasoned and well thought out judgements.

Teachers create learning opportunities for students. It is very important that the learning enviroment is surrounded positive and permissive atmosphere. To be able to practice critical thinking students need trust and belief in themselves. Teachers can make students understand the importance of having a positive attitude towards life and viewing all situations as learning opportunities. It must be emphasized that having developed reasoning skills and critical ability is what makes on successful in life.

Students with good basic trust are more likely to think optimistic. Basic trust is build in early interaction with a child and their care giver. It is an implicit trust that what is optimal will happen and a person believes whatever happens will ultimately be fine. It is the confidence that reality is ultimate good, and all that exists, are by their very nature trustworthy. Basic trust gives an implicit orientation toward all circumstances and that allows students to relax and see situations as learning opportunities.

As well as teachers creates optimistic learning atmosphere, they have huge impact on developing a basic trust if it´s needed. Basic trust can be developed in trustfull and respectfull relationship. Teachers can reflect security, build trust and create permissive learning atmosphere where students can relax, learn to act and be in securely attached in ways that are needed in life. The more teachers create basic trust, optimism in students lives, the more process of transforming and realizing and becoming flows more smoothly. Building the basic trust can lead students to feel that they are good, valuable, worthwhile and lovable. Quite powerful!

As well as basic trust can be developed, optimistic thinking is learnable. Teachers can develope optimism in students bahaviour by their own example. Motivate and spread optimism!

We know that the mind can be trained into new habits of thoughts and that those who learn optimism can obtain all of the benefits associated with that attribution style. In order to cultivate an optimistic thinking habit, a person must work to change their pessimistic explanatory style to a more optimistic one.

Critical thinking is a process of skillfully conceptualizing, analyzing, evaluating and applying information gathered from, or generated by, experience, communication or reasoning (criticalthinking.org). The student with a good basic trust and optimistic thinking has disposition towards critical thinking. Student who have a high critical thinking ability and are encouraged to learn, to make mistakes create new skills and knowledge. They are more prepared to the life and their professions. Today it is important that we teach more life skills, increase basic trust and optimistic thinking. The optimistic thinking will encourage students to see learning task and work lives challenges now and in the future in a positive light.

Experiencing basic trust and optimistic thinking does not imply that students don´t struggle with their circumstances. But it means they don´t have to struggle internally with themselves. It means accepting and allowing, learning that life is manageable and workable. They can relax and just let it be, learn.

Written by Annele Heikkilä
Photos Lia Heikkilä