For the last decades, individualization has increasingly been emphasized in Swedish curricula of preschools, pre-school-classes, compulsory schools and leisure-time centres, for example expressed in demands on individual development plans (Vallberg Roth & Månsson, 2008). Individualization is closely associated with an internationally widespread culture of assessment and performance in education which has a profound impact on teachers´ work and identities(Ball, 2003). Leisure-time pedagogues, teachers who mainly work in a leisure-time centres, running educational group activities for children outside school hours, have so far not been expected to document assessments of the children. They do, however, in close co-operation with parents, have to consider how well the activities of the leisure time centres suit the needs of the individual child.
In the early 1990s, the work of leisure-time pedagogues changed in several ways: the centres became localised to the schools and many leisure-time pedagogues began working in teams with teachers during school-days. The number of children in the leisure-time groups increased markedly when the demands of after school-care rose at a time of economic retrenchment. In 1998 all childcare was incorporated into the school system and the national curriculum became modified to cover the work of leisure-time centres as well. The transition towards cooperation between teachers and leisure-time pedagogues was not, however, an easy process. Especially the leisure-time pedagogues had difficulties expressing and making their tasks clear and concrete, as well as in creating a distinct professional role within the school (Hansen 1999, Calander 1999, Andersson & Söderström 2002).
Since 2006 individual development plans (IDPs) have become mandatory in the Swedish compulsory school system (Swedish National Agency for Education, 2005). An important question relates to the role of leisure-time pedagogues in the work with IDPs and the assessment connected with this, since they meet the children both in the compulsory school and in the leisure-time centre. Assessment not only addresses the child. Quality assessment and quality audits have also become crucial for the whole Swedish school system including childcare. Every municipal leisure-time centre must present a report, assessing how effectively the centre has worked towards the goals of the Education Act and towards the values stated in the curriculum (Swedish National Agency for Education 2007).
Building on professional theory and Pierre Bourdieu´s theoretical framework, this paper aims to increase the understanding of how the leisure-time pedagogues encounter and handle the demands of more formalised assessments. Is this development mainly understood as a professional promise or threat, and how may this be explained?
