Reaching for a new culture of learning in schools – District-level work on the curriculum reform in Finland

The study explores Finnish district level developers’ shared sense-making on how the aims of the core curriculum are translated into school level development work in terms of learning culture. In this study, the concept of learning culture combines two perspectives: the positive qualities that promote learning in school, and the neutral aspects that comprise the learning culture. To achieve sustainable change, it is necessary that the developers have a shared understanding of the focus of their work. The data included 12 group interviews from district level steering groups around Finland during the recent national curriculum reform. The results showed that the steering groups viewed the curriculum to require a holistic, agile, inclusive and collaborative learning culture. They identified the need to change five aspects of the learning culture: teachers’ pedagogical thinking and practices, learning content, learning environment, pupils’ agency and school organization. They emphasized the idea of holistic learning content forcing teachers to change their pedagogical practices towards more agile, inclusive and collaborative. The demands on teachers were high and sometimes contradictory.Peer reviewe