Teachers have a big role to play in raising the future working life experts’ and specialists’ awareness and enthusiasm on sustainability. Päivi Tiiva, who teaches forest engineers at TAMK, has completed several EduSTA open badges. They gave her many insights and small pedagogical awakenings, which she has already taken into her own teaching.
Tiiva is studying to become a vocational teacher while working. Previously, she has worked as a forest and nature expert at the Finnish Forest Centre and as a researcher at the University of Eastern Finland, where she also taught shorter courses. Her interest and enthusiasm for teaching have sparked while working as a teacher. Sustainability thinking is an integral part of forestry studies, and forest serves also as a teaching and learning environment.
“Teachers’ sustainability badges are a great idea”
Tiiva first heard about EduSTA’s sustainability related digital open badges at the TAMK Day in February 2024. She was inspired by the presentation of Senior Lecturer and Project Lead Eveliina Asikainen.
“I thought it was a great idea. I heard that I could do a five-credit set of electives in which I could complete a set of competences related to teacher’s role in enhancing sustainability. I did them last summer. Together with a group of fellow forestry teachers we are also planning to complete a common digital open badge.”
The set Tiiva completed consisted of several micro-badges: Future Thinking Catalysator, Conscious Change Agent, Complexity Embracer, Systems Thinking Promoter, and Knowledgeable Problem Articulator. The implementation was arranged in Moodle e-learning platform and tutoring sessions were also available.
According to her, the complexity of the micro-badges varied.
“With some I immediately realized that I teach this stuff anyway and that it gives me good new ideas. Some required more reflection. I chose micro-badges that I already had some material for. The implementation was process oriented. I first familiarised myself with the requirements and how to demonstrate my competence. Then I left it to further processing for a while. I wrote some scattered ideas on paper and only then typed them up and sent them for assessment.”
Little awakenings came along the way
The process has obviously worked, as Tiiva completed several micro-badges.
I realised that actually I am already teaching this way: that this is, after all, for example understanding complexity. At many points I noticed that I viewed from a slightly different perspective what I already know, how I teach and what I teach. I had not thought before that I could be a conscious change agent, because I am telling students about these things. There were many little awakenings.
Tiiva was largely able to combine and use the knowledge she had acquired previously, although there were also new topics in the materials.
“I read the materials on micro-badges; what something means and what it involves. The content was not necessarily revealed by the name of the open badge alone. Often, I realized that I already had something to say about this. It was really a positive experience that, wow, you can think about this in terms of what I already do.”
She says that he will certainly come back to her own answers.
“Those gave me new perspectives which I have now used in my teaching. I’ll go back and see what I thought from this perspective and see if I can take something back to the courses. I still need to attach the digital open badges in a visible place, in my email or elsewhere.”
“Sustainability skills must be introduced into the teaching of all teachers”
In Päivi’s opinion, the Sustainable Future Educator micro-badges are well suited for building the sustainability knowledge and understanding of a teacher or a student teacher.
This is a general sustainability perspective and is not linked to one’s own teaching area or specific expertise. You can intertwine your own topic and reflect on it from a general sustainability perspective. My guess is that this will serve everyone and needs to be brought into all teaching. Sustainability is such a universal subject, and it belongs in the teaching of all teachers, whatever the subject.
The sustainability system is reflected in the teaching of forest engineers in many ways.
“The closest is how to extract raw materials from the forest in a sustainable way that does not harm the climate, biodiversity, water bodies and the recreational use of forest nature.”
Digital open badges open your own thinking
The EduSTA pilot is coming to an end, but if sustainability related digital open badges were still available in the future, Tiiva would strongly recommend them.
“This is a really good way of doing it, because it was so nicely chopped up. It was indeed very rewarding to get a micro-badge. I immediately started thinking about what I was going to do next and choosing the ones I already had ideas for. I’m glad there was plenty to choose from and that the open badges were the right size. You could do them at your own pace and were told what topics to think about, so it was easy to approach the subject. The system was clear and feedback from the assessors was good. I could do more in the same way in the future.”
The digital open badges give you a view of how much competence you already have. They also enlarge your own thinking.
“I am happy that I completed the badges and got the credits. Above all, it made me think about these issues from different angles, and the materials were captivating and visual. The links were interesting. Inevitably, you would not search for or find information on, for example, the future triangle, which was new to me. I will probably use something like that in my teaching,” Tiiva says.
One of the leaders of the student teacher pilot, lecturer Kirsi Purhonen, is pleased to hear about Päivi’s experience. She reports that a total of 7 student teachers completed the EduSTA project’s entire meta-badge of sustainability skills during spring and autumn 2024. Purhonen also finds room for improvement based on the results from the pilot:
“The use of guidance and tutoring was quite low. In the future, there could be more guidance and joint reflection. During the reflection together, the issue is likely to open better than when doing it alone. Individuals who already had the competences did a good job of demonstrating them. Nevertheless, we can do even better: those who do not have or do not identify their own competences need more discussion on the content and especially delimitation and structuring discussion, so that existing competences are fragmented and focused on the themes of the digital open badge in question.”