Thread by @Tom_Richmond

So the #PIRLS2021 survey of #literacy scores around the world is out, and England has ended up in 4th place - up from 8th in the last PIRLS survey in 2016.

Not bad, eh? Ahead of Finland - often lauded as the country to emulate.

Actually, we really need to talk about Finland....

I've lost count of the number of gushing articles about Finland's education system and how 'if only we were more like Finland, everything would be better'.

See here: theguardian.com/education/2016…

And here: theguardian.com/education/2019…

But maybe things aren't so great there after all.

Even before this new PIRLS data on literacy levels in Finland came along, problems were already evident. Just look at PISA.

"Finland has an increasing number of young people who are not literate enough to study and participate in society."

yle.fi/a/3-12561496

Onto today's PIRLS data for Finland, it shows their high overall reading scores are being propped up by girls (average 558), who massively outperform Finnish boys (average 541) - almost double the reading gap in England despite a similar overall performance.

And then look at how the scores from the 2021 PIRLS study differed from 2016.

Any country that managed to keep literacy levels high and steady (like England) did well, particularly with the pandemic, but Finland fell off a cliff.

Only a handful of countries fell faster.

😬

As always, lots to unpack here that no single Twitter thread could possibly capture, but it looks to me like the evidence of Finland's educational struggles is continuing to mount.

🤷‍♂️

cc @C_Hendrick @greg_ashman
@tombennett71 @Samfr @ghellersahlgren @CambPressAssess