Basic education for grades 1-6
Introduction
Pupils have the right to receive instruction in line with the national curriculum on each school day throughout the year. In grades 1 through 6, pupils have their own class teacher who teaches them most of the subjects.
The Basic Education Act defines the subjects for all grades. The subjects’ curricula are national. Based on the national curriculum, cities and municipalities create their own curricula specific to their municipality. The national curriculum provides a detailed account of the objectives and content of teaching.
In each grade, subjects are taught and studied in accordance with the number and distribution of lesson hours and objectives stated in the national curriculum. Assessment is done per subject for each school year.
You can best learn about your child’s schooling and competence by discussing them with the teacher.
Vantaa's basic education curriculum (in Finnish) >
Number of weekly lesson hours for pupils on average
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Grades 1–2: 20 lessons
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3rd grade: 22 lessons
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4th grade: 24 lessons
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Grades 5–6: 25 lessons
The studied subjects in grades 1–6 are:
- Mother tongue and literature .(Finnish language and literature or Finnish as a second language and literature)
- Second national language (Swedish language, starts in the 6th grade)
- Foreign languages
- Mathematics
- Environmental studies
- Religion or ethics
- History (5. and 6. grades)
- Social studies (4. and 6. grades)
- Music
- Visual arts
- Crafts
- Physical education
- Home economics (possibility to choose from the 4th grade)
You register for the studies of a different religion and your own mother tongue when you enrol in a school.
Optional subjects
Schools also offer optional subjects that can be either specialisation studies in the above-mentioned subjects, packages consisting of several different subjects, or applied studies.
Multidisciplinary learning modules
In addition to optional subjects, studies include at least one multidisciplinary learning module per school year.
Planning and implementing multidisciplinary learning modules require cooperation between subjects and utilisation of the school’s other activities. They consist of themes that pupils find interesting and that can be used in collaboration across subjects and teachers. In their study, means of observation, concepts, and methods typical of the various subjects are used.
Learning assessment
Assessment is a whole that consists of more than giving grades and reports. Providing constructive and guiding feedback helps pupils understand about their own learning and identify their strengths. In addition to continuous, guiding feedback, pupils receive two intermediate reports (one of which is an assessment discussion) and a school year report at the end of the school year.