Session Information
19 SES 05 B, Parallel Paper Session 5B
Paper Session
Contribution
How are pedagogical identities formed in mother tongue education through the framing of writing assignments? Based on an ethnographic field work of two years in four different educational programs in upper secondary school in Sweden, we use Basil Bernstein's concept of pedagogic identity in order to understand why the teaching is framed the way it is, and what pedagogical identities are produced during lessons in the subject Swedish in the various classrooms.
In the mid 1990’s the Swedish upper secondary school system was reformed with the purpose to prepare all students - both on vocational and academic programs - for life-long learning and to cope with a future unpredictable labour market. All upper secondary education programs were therefore made to last for three years and eight core subjects were introduced. The mother tongue subject, in this case Swedish, was made the most extensive one. The mother tongue subject is considered to be the key subject in developing students' identities and their literacy skills - and the ability to read, speak and write are considered to be crucial skills in future working life and when exerting citizenship.
Bernstein (1971, 1977, 1990, 1996/2000) was interested in the distribution of educational knowledge among social classes (Wheelahan, 2007) and he wanted to shed light upon the role of the educational system in social reproduction. During more than four decades Bernstein elaborated various concepts to understand the reproduction - also called symbolic control - among others the concept of pedagogical identities. Four different identities were identified (Bernstein, 2000:67-77): the conservative, the neo-conservative, the neo-liberal and the therapeutic. Different pedagogic identities are reflected in the four different programs we have studied, with consequences for the framing of teaching and learning, i.e. the control over classroom activities like writing assignments.
Method
Expected Outcomes
References
Asplund Carlsson, M. (2012). Svenska som demokratiämne och social reproduktion. In: Ongstad, S. (ed). Nordiskt morsmåldidaktikk. Forskning, felt og fag. Oslo: Novus forlag Bernstein, B. (1971). Class, codes and control, vol.1. Theoretical studies towards a a sociology of language. London: Routledge and Keagan Paul Bernstein, B. (1977). Class, codes and control, vol.3. Towards a theory of Educational Transmission. London: Routledge and Keagan Paul Bernstein, B. (1990). Class, codes and control, vol. 4. The structuring of pedagogic discourse. London: Routledge Bernstein,B. (1996/2000). Pedagogy, symbolic control and identity: theory, research, critique. Rowman & Littlefiels Publishers Christie, F. & Macken-Horarik, M.( 2007). Building verticality in subject English. In: Christie, F. & Martin, J.R (ed.). Language, knowledge and pedagogy. Functional Lingustics and sociological perspectives. London: Continuum Fangen .K. (2005). Deltagande observation. Malmö: Liber Hammersley, M. & Atkinson, P. (2007) Ethnography: principles in practise. London and New York: Routledge Trondman, M. (2008). Bypass surgery: rerouting theory to ethnographic study. In: Walford, G. (ed.) How to do educational ethnography. London: the Tufnell Press Wheelhan, L. (2007). How competency based training locks the working class out of powerful knowledge: a modified Bernsteinian analysis. British Journal of Sociology of Education, 28(5): 637-651.
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