The symposium is interested in the empirically observable tensions between the interaction order (Goffman 1983) necessary for the accomplishment of teaching practice and demanding subject-related tasks that potentially challenge an established order. Although the classroom interaction order is aligned with the organisational purpose of enabling (subject-related) learning, it also seems to function independently and even potentially in tension with challenging tasks: “it has a life on its own and makes demands on its own behalf” (Vanderstraeten 2001, p. 273). This tension is also noticeable if we look at teaching and learning practices from different research traditions and perspectives. Looking at a classroom from the perspective of the classroom order or either with a viewpoint of the generic quality of instruction (e.g., Praetorius et al. 2018), one may assess a particular lesson as efficient and well-managed. In contrast, the same lesson might appear profoundly deficient and inefficient from a didactical, content-based point of view (Breidenstein & Tyagunova 2020; Schlesinger et al. 2018). Findings from research on classroom management show that demanding and challenging tasks also pose greater difficulties for classroom management: “In response to these threats to order, teachers often simplify task demands or lower the risk for mistakes” (Doyle 2006, p. 111). Practices of classroom management and practices of learning operate thus in different logics and may be in tension with each other. 

As a fundamental theoretical and methodological perspective, the symposium suggests to link classroom research to the international ‘practice turn’ (Schatzki et al. 2001). Theories of practice conceptualize social practices as an independent object of study and draw attention to the inherent logic, momentum, and stability of social practices. Furthermore, theories of practice are situated beyond structural or action theory and understand human actors more as participants than originators of practices. Practice theories are used in a variety of ways, particularly in qualitative teaching research, to examine school teaching as a context of related practices (Breidenstein 2021). However, standardized professionalization research also examines “core practices” of teaching (Grossman 2018). Taking the idea of specific logics and alignments of teaching and learning practices that may ‘interfere’ in various ways as a starting point, the symposium will discuss the relationship between the interaction order and subject-related teaching and learning. This may also be fruitful for the comparison of different subject related subject-specific didactic perspectives (Ligozat et al. 2015). The following questions can be addressed:

-        How do different organisational frameworks of teaching influence subject-related learning processes?

-        Which modes of dealing with the subject matter can be distinguished in the observed classroom interaction? 

-        How is subject-related school knowledge constituted in the ongoing interaction, considering various social and material dimensions of teaching and learning?

-        How can we identify specific and general conditions and qualities of subject-related learning in the (video-based) observation of classroom interaction? 

-        How can we recognise processes of understanding or comprehension within classroom interaction?

In the part I of the symposium, we will discuss different theoretical and methodological frameworks for the comparison of teaching and learning practices between different subjects and educational contexts. The two projects from the Scandinavian QUINT context and the German INTERFACH project have in common that they aim at exploring the quality of teaching and learning by video recording and analysing the classroom interaction itself (see https://www.uv.uio.no/quint/; www.interfach.de). Research questions and methods differ in detail but may be brought into a productive dialogue.

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