French secondary schools are now experimenting a major reform. Among the ten crucial points of this 2016 reform, one specific aspect, referred to as “Practical, Interdisciplinary Teachings” (P.IT.), intends to change radically schooling in France. PIT classes are framed to include new ways of approaching the knowledge pupils are supposed to learn. Indeed, teachers of different disciplines who intervene in a specific PIT are supposed to work together, concomitantly in and outside the classroom, so as to be more effective. Besides, the PIT classes are expected to foster collaborative work between pupils; the majority part of the project they engage in in PIT classes will be done in groups, which is quite innovative in the French context. Such a framework brings about a number of questions on how teams and/or individuals cope with it. In our study, we want to focus on the way individuals experience of this reform. By focusing on the manner in which this reform impacts on the individual level, we wish to underscore the dilemma in which teachers are put in terms of class organization and achievements of the objectives of the PIT when they confront a major organizational reform. More specifically we want to highlight how working in that particular setting questions teachers’ practices as individuals are thrusted into new working dynamics they have to adjust in.
We intend to investigate these questions basing on two different theoretical frameworks:
Firstly, a clinical approach from psychanalytical point of view ( Blanchard-Laville, 1999) which seeks to approach teaching and learning phenomena with the help of psychanalytical clinic : the subject is at the center of the analysis process, which is based on the study of the gaps that appear between the subject’s didactical intentions and what he/she truly does during the course. This approach lead us to identify how personal experiences, built from a subjective construction process, put the teaching subject in the middle of a didactic system and guide his/her teaching. We aim to describe and to understand the teaching subject’s hidden motives to make decisions in the secondary school reform, using “already there” (Carnus, 2001) and “relationship in the event” (Brossais, Jourdan, Savournin, 2013) as understanding concepts. (j’aurai gardé les denominations françaises de ces expressions)
Our analysis will be also discussed using Brigitte Albéro’s theorization of “contrivance” concept which refers to the combination of practical means to achieve a given goal. Albéro suggests that the term must be understood not only in reference to the tools and instruments that are mobilized, but also in relation with the complex environment wherein those tools are developed, including the relations between men and objects.
In this perspective, B. Albéro stresses out the need for Humanities and Social Sciences to shed light on the epistemic evolution of those training environments given the importance of technical tools in mediating knowledge now. What is at stakes then, is a conception of the term “contrivance” that will help understand how individuals adjust to the array of tools, methods, ideologies, etc. designed for their practices. She then proposes three main dimensions which are helpful to examine the appropriation of any “contrivance” apparatus (2010). These three dimensions correspond subsequently to (a) the philosophical values, principles and thoughts that shape a given project; (b) the practical means set to enable the realization of the project, and (c). the way individuals experience the project, with all their human properties.
Both approach will help investigate thoroughly the manner in which contriving environment may give way to a number of different attitudes among people sharing the same training environment.