Theme: Designing for love of learning

Learning and education are faced with a world that is quick to reinvent itself. A bachelor’s degree in a university, in general, takes 3-4 four years to complete. In that timeframe, the amount of information available in the world will have doubled 3-4 times over. In the span of a few years, new industries will have blossomed while old ones have been snuffed out of existence. The pace of change is genuinely breathtaking. How do we respond to this? Will we bend and break under the indomitable challenge of the times? Do we choose to cover our eyes and ears and hope that whatever we are doing now is going to be enough?

No! We will plant our feet firmly on the ground and stare the beast of perpetual change straight in the eyeball!

Betonimiehenkuja 5
Espoo, Uusimaa, 02150
Finland

Aape Pohjavirta

Aape Pohjavirta is founder at Funzi, a mobile service ecosystem for the emerging markets, and Inclusion, an open source software project for mobile learning. He sits on the advisory boards of several research projects and technology programs and coaches entrepreneurs at the Aalto University Startup Sauna, DTBi and other institutions. Aape has worked in the mobile industry since 1997 in various management positions and has gained international success in product and technology development. He is an Apple Achiever and an international patent inventor for a mobile media app.

Hannamiina Tanninen

The first time Hannamiina ever visited China was on the Aalto on Tracks student project, which took 80 students by train across Siberia to Shanghai World Expo. In 2010 Hannamiina moved to Hong Kong to pursue a degree in economics and China business. After graduation Hannamiina went to Taipei where she is currently living, working as an assistant Asia correspondent and studying Chinese. Before moving to Hong Kong, Hannamiina worked as a parliamentary assistant for the Minister of Education and Science and represented students in multiple Ministry of Education and Culture working groups.

Inga Rikandi

Doctor of Music Inga Rikandi is a teacher, researcher, musician, trainer, improvisation artist, producer, writer, dog trainer and an acrobat. She will tell us in her speech why she loves learning more than knowing. She analyzes why we need to be in a state of learning more often, how improvisation connects to teaching as well as learning and what we can learn from the best teachers.

Irina Pravet

Born in Romania, raised in Canada and now living in Finland, Irina Pravet has been translating herself across cultures and languages for as long as she can remember. She does not believe in the existence of a fixed set of ‘language learning talents’, instead she believes that we all have the ability to succeed in learning a new language by being strategic, having fun and playing with our natural strengths. Currently Irina is a Finnish language & transitions abroad coach at www.languagecatalyst.com.

Joona Pohjonen

Joona Pohjonen is a 22-year-old student of Automation and Systems Engineering at Aalto University and an entrepreneur at Pohjonen Group. Despite his young age Joona already has years of working experience in the field of software development, automation and robotics. Joona has been awarded for his research in machine vision and he has represented Finland in several international science and technology related competitions.

Laura Heinonen

Laura Heinonen (B.Ed.) is an experienced developer of education and study communities. In 2011-2013 Heinonen was in charge of the Kyky project, which aimed at enhancing Finnish university students’ study and learning skills by fostering dialogue between student associations and universities. Today she is a wellbeing expert in a social work organization and argues for the importance of group interaction in creating study motivation, wellbeing and happiness.

Lauri Järvilehto

Lauri Järvilehto, PhD, is a founder and consultant at Filosofian Akatemia, a research and business coaching company in Helsinki. Lauri believes that the revolution of learning is near and urges everyone to join the movement right now. At TEDxOtaniemiED Lauri will tell us how we can make learning fun and why it is so important for us to place the element of fun in the core of designing education.

Lotta Uusitalo-Malmivaara

Lotta Uusitalo-Malmivaara is a docent and university lecturer of Special education at the University of Helsinki. She teaches future special educators and studies the applications of psychology in school environments with particular emphasis on the concept of happiness and strength-based teaching.

Petteri Kallio

Petteri Kallio (PhD) is a geneticist, entrepreneur and learning junkie. Petteri’s background includes a decade worth of sales and marketing experience but currently he is working in the fields of adult and management education. Petteri gets excited about brain function, digitalization and the revolution of work and working environments.

Sari Kontra

Sari Kontra (M.Ed.) is a 27-year-old class teacher who will rather take her students outdoors to the monkey bar than stay and teach in a traditional class room environment. Kontra believes that by incorporating physical activity and new forms of functionality into our teaching, we can tackle many of today’s challenges in the field of education.

Teemu Leinonen

Teemu Leinonen, PhD, is an associate professor of New Media Design and Learning at the Aalto University School of Arts, Design and Architecture. Teemu has more than a decade of experience in the field of research and development of web-based learning and since 1998 he has been in charge of Media Lab Helsinki, a research group of Learning Environments.