Looking For a Good Student – The Ambivalent Link Between Student Behavior and Marginalization

Author(s):

Anne Koskela(presenting / submitting)Maija Lanas(presenting)

Conference:

ECER 2015

Network:

07. Social Justice and Intercultural Education

Format:

Paper

Session Information

07 SES 08 B, Social Justice: Marginalization and Special Education

Paper Session

Time:

2015-09-10

09:00-10:30

Room:

3001. [Main]

Chair:

Dana Moree

Contribution

When student (mis)behavior is discussed, it is commonly seen as taking place in the student and seen as something to be ‘fixed’, ‘corrected’, ‘prevented’ and, to an extent, ‘understood’ by the educator. The research at hand is interested in how specific behaviors become assigned as “bad” and others as “good” in the first place. We take the lead from MacLure, Jones, Holmes and MacRae (2008, 2012) who argue that “the frames that make sense of problem behavior are discursive and not causal: one cannot simply predict that the occurrence of certain […] behaviour will lead to a problematic reputation. It is the discursive interpretation/explanation of behavior that grants meaning and significance to difference.”

Similarly, in this research margin is not seen as a static place or state of existence but as constantly produced through discursive claims for what belongs to the center and what belongs to the margin (Macartney 2012, Messiou 2011, see also Levitas 2004). Various intersections of characteristics, actions, life situations or backgrounds may constitute individuals or groups in the margin. This research is interested in the processes through which such marginalization takes place in formal education through assigning meanings to student behavior as either ‘good’ or ‘bad’.

The context of the research is a seemingly homogeneous area in northern Finland, in an era in which equality was highly prominent in national policies and decision making (1968-1991). We look at assigning meanings to student behavior when students have already been characterized as “problematic” by teachers in school. The research question is:

How do teachers perceive and label the behavior of “problematic” students as “good” or “bad”?

Method

The data consist of archive material of Child Guidance Clinic of Oulu region from 1968 to 1991. We focus on so called ‘teacher statements’ that can be found in client records. The statements are written by teachers and they used specific ready-made forms provided by the Guidance Clinic. The purpose of the statement was to suggest that the child would be examined by experts in the clinic due to various problems in fitting into school. The forms were about 4 pages long and had 16–20 questions asking wide-ranging questions about the students’ skills and abilities but also schooling history, family and background. In this research we analyse the total of 356 statements with one question: How do teachers describe the students’ behavior? We look at the answers given to the three questions in specific: “disruptive behavior”, “positive behavior” and “teacher’s general impression of the student”. Even though the last question does not explicitly inquire about student behavior, teacher replies tend to focus on the same aspects as in the first two questions. The data was analysed in two stages. First, the data was analysed thematically. The descriptions of both “good” and “bad” behavior were categorized in a data-driven manner (see. e.g. Lanas & Kelchtermans 2015). Teacher descriptions of “good” behavior formed 6 categories: 1) eager to help everyone, 2) calm, cheerful and friendly, 3) diligent and careful, 4) Compliant towards the teacher, 5) rule-obedient 6) practically or intellectually clever. Teacher descriptions of “bad” behavior formed seven categories: 1) physical absences, 2) restlessness, 3) expressing various negative feelings, 4) uncompliant towards teacher, 5) rule breaking, 6) lack of participation in schoolwork, 7) lack of sociality. In the second stage, we analysed the content of both ‘good’ behavior and ‘bad’ behavior. What do good or bad behavior comprise? we constructed an image of a ‘good student’ and a ‘disruptive student’ based on the categories.

Expected Outcomes

The results show that teachers’ assessment of student behavior seems to take place largely on intuitive basis. Rather than describing behavior as such, teacher perceptions of ‘good’ behavior and ‘bad’ behavior actually seem to describe the life-situations of the students or student wellbeing: cheerful, diligent, eager, clever… contrasted with negative feelings, absences, lack of participation... Thus it is not student behavior as such that leads to perceiving a student as problematic, neither is it the teacher’s interpretation of the behavior. Instead, it is the assigning of ‘behavior’-meanings to something that is not behavior in the first place. Assigning polarized meanings to behavior as either “good” or “bad” thus links to the process of marginalization in the school. Whereas behavior is something children can influence (at least to an extent) life situations are not. Thus teacher assessment of behavior is, at worst, consistent with blame the victim-approach. The norm of a good student can be seen as a means of using and maintaining power. The research provides an understanding of how marginalization is implicitly carried out in the everyday of school life, as teachers draw borders between good and bad, normal and abnormal.

References

Macartney, B.C. (2012) Teaching through an ethich of belongin, care and obligation as a critical approach to transforming education. International Journal of Inclusive Education 16(2), 171-183. MacLure, M., Jones, L., Holmes, R., and MacRae, C. (2008). Becoming a problem: how and why children acquire a reputation as 'naughty' in the earliest years at school. Economic and Social Research Council. MacLure, Jones, Holmes and MacRae (2012) Becoming a problem: behaviour and reputation in the early years classroom. British Educational Research Journal 38(3), 447–471. Messiou, 2011. Collaborating with children in exploring marginalisation: an approach to inclusive education. International Journal of Inclusive Education. 1-12. iFirst article. Lanas, M. & Kelchtermans, K. (2015). “This has more to do with who I am than with my skills” Student teacher subjectification in Finnish teacher education. Teaching and teacher education 47, 22–29. Levitas R (2004) Let's hear it for Humpty: social exclusion, the third way and cultural capital. Cultural Trends 13(50), 41–56.

Author Information

Anne Koskela (presenting / submitting)

University of Oulu

Faculty of Education

Oulu

Maija Lanas (presenting)