The context of the problem

In 2007, the new National Guidelines for the Curriculum were introduced in Italy to promote the learners’ competences, according to the EU Recommendations (2006). This Reform was intended as a ‘copernican revolution’, in the sense that the teachers are required to focus more on the learners’ development of flexible and transferable knowledge, according to given standards, rather than on the content and procedures to be taught. However, the process of recontextualisation of the Reform creates more conflicts and tensions than expected, since it impacts on the specificities of different conditions of practice (Sriprakash 2011).

Theoretical framework:

The socio-cultural approach (Datnow, Hubbard and Mehan 2003; Edwards 2010; McDermott e Varenne 2006) is useful to understand the complex interplay between structural constraints, the situated cultures of the schools, each with its history and resources, and the teachers’ professional agency. According to the model, the relationship between institutional contexts and human actions is mutually constitutive: human activity is always situated and the consequences of human actions establish new contexts for subsequent endeavours. This perspective connects professionals’ agency both to a single community of practice and to the more encompassing socio-political dimension. Therefore, the analysis focalises on the conditions that promote or hinder the development of teachers’ agency.

In this proposal, the relevant questions are:

- how do institutional constraints impact on teachers’ intended changes in their practice?

- how does professional culture shape the teachers’ interpretation of the reform mandate?

- how do the teachers develop a situated perspective to integrate their professional concerns and the institutional mandates?

Normative Documents Indicazioni nazionali per il curricolo per la scuola dell’infanzia e per il primo ciclo di istruzione, D.M. 3 Agosto 2007, n. 68, [National Guidelines for Pre-primary and for Primary and Middle Schools], Recommendation 2006/962/EC of the European Parliament and of the Council of 18 December 2006 on key competences for lifelong learning [Official Journal L 394 of 30.12.2006]. References Datnow, A, Hubbard, L & Mehan, H 2002, Extending Educational Reform. From one school to many, RouledgeFalmer, London. Edwards, A 2010, Being an Expert Professional Practitioner: the relational turn in expertise. Springer, Dordrecht. McDermott, R & Varenne, H 2006, ‘Reconstructing culture in educational research’, in G Spindler & L Hammond (eds.), Innovations in educational ethnography. Theory, methods, and results, Erlbaum, Mahwah NJ. Sriprakash A 2011, ‘The contributions of Bernstein’s sociology to education development research’ , British Journal of Sociology of Education, 32:4, 521-539.