Case study: Outperforming the rest, Finland refuses to put children to test and university is free

AS WE enter the classroom, a couple of eight-year-old boys are acting out a conversation with hand puppets to their teacher.

The headteacher, our guide for the school tour, explains these puppets are characters from their reading book and they are using them to learn to read. The Year Two class teacher is taking the pupils out in pairs for the activity while the others work in pairs on their books.

It is a bright, airy classroom in a modern building with bright pictures on the walls and a giant pencil suspended over the teacher's desk.

Children here in Finland don't start school until they are seven, yet they outdo many of their contemporaries in other developed nations, including Scotland.

None of these children will sit an exam unless they apply to university when they will undergo an entrance test.

There are no uniforms and youngsters call teachers by their first names, while upset pupils will often sit in a teacher's lap to be comforted.

Another thing unheard of in Scotland is the lack of security; there is no entrance system and no fence around the playground despite a canal running alongside it. Head Laila Nieminen smiles, saying they haven't lost a child yet.

On the other side of Helsinki, in an area popular with immigrants, rabbits are on the loose in Vesala Comprehensive School.

We are in the greenhouse, the heart of this suburban middle school where pupils learn to look after a menagerie of creatures.

Through one glass wall, a physics class is using the school's computer suite to take an interactive lesson and, through another, is the canteen where healthy low-fat meals of meat, fish, salad and boiled potatoes are eaten by both staff and pupils.

No-one in the physics class is distracted by the fleeing bunnies on the other side of the glass - they are used to it. Instead, they are engrossed by their colourful, quiz-style computer lesson. Teacher Juha Juvonen tells us they are learning on their own, answering questions with colourful diagrams, he's just there to help.

None of the pupils is wearing uniforms and almost all walk or cycle to school.

Schools in Finland have small catchment areas so pupils do not travel far, and there is no culture of the school run even for the youngest pupil.

Vesela is a junior secondary for pupils aged 13-15, in a suburb of the Finnish capital which attracts a high migrant population. But the school gains "positive discrimination money" to help with this and is able to employ extra staff to support pupils learning Finnish.

Once they leave they will try to get into a senior secondary using their average classwork scores.They will not sit exams but may opt for a school which specialises in music, science or sport.

Even at senior secondary they will not sit exams, winning a place at university through an entrance exam - once in they won't pay fees as university is free to all, even foreigners.

Ranked at the top of European studies for education, you might think these children had a head-start, but they only started school aged seven.