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The terms “technical” and “technology” are widely used by educators, workplace practitioners, and the general public. Seldom, however, is there a written explanation of a technologist’s or technician’s attributes (Hansen, 1994; Ropohl, 1997). What do technicians know and do? Also absent from public consciousness is a sense of what constitutes the design or problem-solving process which precedes any technological act. By comparison, media depictions of technology as computers, electronics, and tools are widespread and the public appetite for these depictions is extensive. In teacher education and in schooling itself the subject through which technical skills and knowledge are imparted suffers from confusion about definition as well. What is technical thinking? What is technical aptitude? Why is it that technology teachers can recognize this ability when it is observed in students but they, and educators generally, have difficulty documenting the essence of it in writing? To expose what it means to be a technologist, the investigators in this research project examine what students in Finland’s schools learn in their study and practice of technology. Why, you might ask, would the authors attempt to better understand what it means to have a technical orientation or technical ability by studying school children, in this case Finnish children? The answer has two parts. First, from a research perspective, children’s responses to adult inquiries are often more informative and authentic than those of adults. Secondly, teachers of technology have had to think about their field, especially how to teach it. In doing so, they have to know about the substance of their subject. By comparison, practicing technicians and technologists may not have been required to think through what they know and do, much less express it. The case of Finland’s children and schools is especially timely. This country of five million people has a reputation for cherishing inventiveness and aesthetics. The essence of the creative and rational process of technology and design in Finland is found in the connection between nature and people. Our

Defining and Measuring Technical Thinking: Students' Technical Abilities in Finnish Comprehensive Schools