Malena Lidar - Academia.edu (original) (raw)
Papers by Malena Lidar
Nordic Studies in Science Education, 2018
The release of major reforms makes teachers reconsider how they teach. In Sweden, a new curriculu... more The release of major reforms makes teachers reconsider how they teach. In Sweden, a new curriculum along with grading and national tests were introduced in Year 6 science education in 2012/2013. Af ...
Different policies for what contents teaching should include and how it should be conducted shape... more Different policies for what contents teaching should include and how it should be conducted shapes different presuppositions for teaching and for what the pupils have opportunity learn. In Science ...
The influence on teaching and assessment practices from national tests and grading in Science in ... more The influence on teaching and assessment practices from national tests and grading in Science in Y6 In this paper we survey different approaches to teaching in Swedish Science Education. This means the purpose is to map and investigate patterns in teachers' views of what constitutes "good" Science Education in the middle years of compulsory school in Sweden, in a context where these views are potentially at stake. The background for our interest in studying approaches to teaching is that a new curriculum has been established and applies in Sweden from 2011. New to this curriculum is that standardized control of student achievements are introduced in more subjects and at lower ages than before. National tests in Physics, Chemistry and Biology became mandatory in Y6 in 2013 along with marking of pupils from and including Y6. Notably for teachers in Y6 is that they could be educated and working either in a Y4-6-classteacher system, or in a Y6-9-subject specialist teacher system. Standardized testing has been proven in many cases to create norms about what types of teaching and what types of teacher are considered to be accurate (e.g. Au 2009, Stobart 2008). Some researchers argue that standardized testing tends to narrow teachers instructional practice, both concerning content and methods, while others mean that, depending for instance on how the tests are designed, tests could also increase teachers teaching repertoires in different ways (Au 2009). What the main contents of teaching in different subjects should be is a question that is and ought to be problematized. Different policies for what contents teaching should include and how it should be conducted shapes different presuppositions for teaching and for what the pupils have opportunity learn (cf. Fensham, 2009). Analysing Science syllabuses and Science
This paper reports on an empirical exploration of the constitution of power and knowledge in scie... more This paper reports on an empirical exploration of the constitution of power and knowledge in science and technology classrooms. A deepened examination of the teaching of science and technology is p ...
Research in Science Education, 2017
In Sweden, a new curriculum and new methods of assessment (grading of students and national tests... more In Sweden, a new curriculum and new methods of assessment (grading of students and national tests) in science education were introduced in grade 6 in 2012/2013. We have investigated what implications these reforms have for teachers' teaching and assessment practices in order to explore the question of how teachers transform their teaching habits in relation to policy reforms. Interviews with 16 teachers teaching science in grade 6 (Y6), over 3 years after the reforms were introduced, were analysed. Building on the ideas of John Dewey, we consider teachers' talk about their everyday practice as expressions of their habits of teaching. Habits of teaching are related both to individual experiences as well as institutional traditions in and about teaching. A categorisation of educational philosophies was used to teachers' habits of teaching to a collective level and to show how habits can be transformed and developed over time in specific sociocultural contexts. The teachers were categorised as using essentialist and/or progressivist educational philosophy. In the responses to the introduction of grading and national testing, the teachers took three approaches: Their habits being reinforced, revised or unchanged in relation to the reforms. Although the responses were different, a striking similarity was that all teachers justified their responses with wanting to do what is best for students. However, how to show care for students differed, from delivering scientific knowledge in alignment with an essentialist educational philosophy, to preparing students to do well on tests, to supporting their development as individuals, which is in alignment with a progressivist educational philosophy.
Nordic Studies in Science Education, 2019
In this paper we survey different teaching traditions in Swedish Science Education. The purpose i... more In this paper we survey different teaching traditions in Swedish Science Education. The purpose is to map and investigate patterns in teachers’ views of what constitutes “good” Science education in the middle years of compulsory school in Sweden. This is done with the background of a new curriculum with national testing and grading being introduced, which could potentially alter teachers’ views of what is relevant content. A web-based questionnaire to teachers all throughout Sweden (response rate 43%, N=796) was used. The results show that groups can be formed with teachers emphasizing different teaching objectives including emphasis on; scientific facts and concept, laboratory work, everyday knowledge, and political and moral questions, even though the groups had a lot of similarities. The teachers indicate that they changed their instruction to a considerable extent after the three parallel reforms carried out 2011-13.
International Journal of Science Education, 2018
This is a repository copy of Expressions of agency within complex policy structures: science teac... more This is a repository copy of Expressions of agency within complex policy structures: science teachers' experiences of education policy reforms in Sweden.
This paper is a contribution to the discussion of what function assessment of students has in eve... more This paper is a contribution to the discussion of what function assessment of students has in everyday practice. What consequences do increased control of students’ knowledge have in teachers choices of teaching contents and methods, and thereby for what students are given the opportunity to learn.An increasingly test-driven educational culture is now reality in many parts of the world (Broadfoot & Black 2004). There is also an ongoing discussion about the effects of national tests and research show that there are certainly both positive and negative outcomes from these sorts of testing (eg. Cimbricz 2002). Wales has for example abandoned the national testing system that England and Wales were a part of (Collins, Reiss & Stobart 2010). Implementation of national tests is found to have different consequences for teachers teaching and assessment practice and there is a need for investigating and nuance what these consequences are (Boesen 2006, Maier 2009). National tests in biology, physics and chemistry in year 9 in Swedish comprehensive school was introduced in spring 2009. The purpose of these tests are to raise the standards, make more students reach the goals by strengthen the follow-up of student knowledge, serve exemplary for teachers teaching and at the same time create a more equal and fair assessment and grading of students. This is described as necessary since Swedish students’ results are cut back in national assessments and they achieve lower scores relatively to students in other comparable countries (eg. TIMSS).The aim of the study presented is to investigate if and in which way the introduction of national tests in science education influences teachers’ opinions of what is "good" science education and how this effects the teachers’ instructions and assessment in their teaching practice. This study is part of a bigger project. In one part of the project a survey identifying different teaching traditions among Swedish science education teachers has been performed (Lidar et al, unpublished). From the results of the survey, teachers from four different teaching traditions have been selected for interviews.The theoretical framework is built foremost from Douglas Robert’s categorisation of science education content into curriculum emphasis (1982). Curriculum emphasis is defined as a coherent set of messages about science rather that within science and those messages are said to accompany the teaching of science subject matter. Roberts in Canada and Leif Ostman in Sweden found seven different curriculum emphasis in textbooks, in-service training literature and syllabuses; correct explanation, structure of science, solid foundation, scientific skill development, self as explainer, everyday coping and science, technology and decisions (Roberts & Ostman 1998). The results will also be analysed and discussed in relation to scientific literacy, starting in Roberts’ (2007) concepts, vision I and vision II. The most obvious distinction between Vision I and Vision II has to do with how the character of socio-scientific issues and problem is conceptualized and experienced in education.The empirical material consists of telephone interviews with 30 teachers categorized within the survey study into four different teaching traditions. Each interview lasted approximately 45 minutes. The analyses from the interviews aim at identifying what is considered to be important knowledge in the teachers’ teaching, ways of using assessment in teaching and foremost how the national tests have influenced the teachers’ assessment and choice of subject matter in everyday practice. In a first step we identified the teachers’ utterances within the different categories of curriculum emphasis. In order to refine and qualify these categories we made further analyses within these categories, focusing on statements describing actual actions in the classroom. The interviews were semi-structured to both enable the teachers to prepare before the interviews and for us as researchers to be able to ask other questions depending on how the respondents answered (Kvale & Brinkman 2009).The study show systematic differences in teachers’ answers about teaching and assessment practices, in relation to the implementation of national tests. The interviews confirm the correlations from the survey study regarding the categorisation of teachers as belonging to different teaching traditions. The results also show important nuances within the teaching traditions. Most of the teachers stresses that the national test is only one of many ways off assessing the students, it is important not to forget what the student perform over a longer period of time. Though the results from the study show that the teachers can be categorised into different teaching traditions based on their expressions about different aims and goals with their teaching. Still most of the teachers express that they do not need to change their teaching a lot, they already teach in line…
The ambition with this presentation is to create possibilities for studying and make comparisons ... more The ambition with this presentation is to create possibilities for studying and make comparisons of teaching between subjects and teaching traditions within different cultural settings. This is important because didactic competence depends on the existence of alternatives, in this case, alternative ways of teaching, or alternative manners of teaching. Alternatives make choices necessary and visible and the need for justification arise. In order to fulfil these ambitions we will present a way of analysing teachers’ manners of teaching. This method for analysis contains two steps: analyses of epistemological moves and analyses of curriculum emphases. The theoretical background for the analyses is pragmatism, the work of late Wittgenstein and discourse theory. By identifying different manners of teaching possibilities are created to discuss what counts as teaching, teaching science in this case. Using analyses of epistemological moves and curriculum emphases for identifying different manners of teaching have several advantages. Firstly, the epistemological dimension is part of all teaching. This makes comparisons between teaching in different subjects possible. Secondly, analyses of curriculum emphases have been used in order to create knowledge about educational discourses and its historical transformation within different subjects. Thereby it becomes possible to highlight the potential connections between manners of teaching and educational discourses which are important when making comparisons between different manners of teaching within different cultural settings. Thirdly, by using epistemological moves analysis as the basic analytic tool, the problem of theoretical overdetermination is avoided, i.e. that categories are forced upon the empirical material.
This paper explores the constitution of power and knowledge in science and technology classrooms.... more This paper explores the constitution of power and knowledge in science and technology classrooms. A deepened examination of the teaching of science and technology is partly motivated by these subje ...
National tests in biology, physics and chemistry: potential influence on teachers’ teaching pract... more National tests in biology, physics and chemistry: potential influence on teachers’ teaching practices National tests in biology, physics and chemistry are now introduced in year 9 in Swedish comprehensive school. These tests aim at supporting teaching, learning and development of school practice in direction towards the goals in national curriculum. The introduction of national tests is used by the government in order to raise the standards, make more students reach the goals by strengthening the follow-up of student knowledge and at the same time create a more equal and fair assessment and grading of students. This is described as necessary since Swedish students’ results are cut back in national measurements and they achieve lower scores relatively to students in other comparable countries (e.g. TIMSS). We propose a project that will investigate if and in which way the introduction of national tests in science education influence teachers’ opinions of what is ‘good’ education in science and how this effects teachers’ instruction and assessment of students. This paper will be devided in two parts. The first part present an outline for a research project and the second part present the results of a pilot study with the aim to study how two focus groups of teachers have experienced the try-outs of national tests in 2009. The outlined project would firstly conduct a survey identifying different teaching traditions, or selective traditions, among the Swedish teachers. This is done by constructing a questionnaire which aims at identifying teachers teaching practice according to teaching goals, choice of content and methods used in the classroom. Secondly, elected teachers from different teaching traditions will be interviewed and observed when teaching. Analyses from the material will be made with the concept of ‘curriculum emphases’ to identify what is considered to be important knowledge. Analyses of the actual national tests will be carried out using the same tools. The results of the investigations will be discussed in relation to research on ‘scientific literacy’, which relates to socioscientific issues. This project will make it possible to identify potential systematic differences in teachers’ opinions and practice between teachers belonging to different teaching traditions regarding the effects of national tests. In the pilot study carried out during autumn 2009, groups of teachers in two different schools were given the task to discuss their experiences from performing try-out national tests in physics, chemistry or biology. They were asked questions about if and how they imagined theirs and others teaching would be affected by the introduction of national tests and if the content of instruction would change as a consequence. Preliminary results show that the group of teachers that preformed the chemistry test, identified everyday knowledge as privileged. These teachers used textbooks in their teaching, which according to them do not use this emphasis, they expressed the students were insufficiently prepared. The teachers made the prediction that the textbooks will probably change as a consequence. The teachers who have carried out the physics test expressed that the test helped them to see what had been missing in their teaching, according to both content and teaching methods. They also state that the national tests might function as a model when constructing questions concerning higher order thinking (MVG). The preliminary results from the pilot study will provide a background to find relevant and precise questions to a future survey, give insight into different positions teachers may take on and point to which changes are possible.
Vad man kan lara sig av att studera elevers samtal om/i naturvetenskap : Nagra resultat fran sex ... more Vad man kan lara sig av att studera elevers samtal om/i naturvetenskap : Nagra resultat fran sex ars forskning i LarNoT-projektet
Research questions, objectives and theoretical frameworkWhat the main contents of teaching in dif... more Research questions, objectives and theoretical frameworkWhat the main contents of teaching in different subjects should be is a question that could and ought to be problematized. Different policies for what contents teaching should include and how it should be conducted shapes different presuppositions for teaching and for what the pupils have opportunity learn (cf. Fensham, 2009). That every pupil should be scientific literate to be able to take part in society have in many countries become a prominent goal in Science Education (Roberts, 2007). At the same time, there are goals in Science Education stating that pupils should be prepared for future studies in science, something that is relevant only for a minority of the pupils (Roberts, 1988). The difference between these goals for a teacher in Science Education could either be to put emphasis on the contents of the traditional academic subjects physics, chemistry and biology (to give the pupils a solid foundation for future education) or to focus more on the role of science in questions of ethical, social and political character in connection to questions about for example air pollution or global warming. These different purposes in science education create tensions concerning the subjects character (Ryder & Banner, 2011). Even though teachers are working to meet the same goals in the Science syllabuses, emphasis can be made differently, forming different manners of teaching (Munby & Roberts, 1998) that can be connected to different teaching traditions (Lundqvist, Almqvist & Ostman, in press).The purpose of this study is to survey different manners of teaching practiced in Swedish Science Education in upper secondary schools and to qualify what features are characteristic in these manners, connected to teaching traditions. Teachers develop different manners of teaching that characterise their actions in the classroom (Munby & Roberts, 1998). The concept “manner of teaching” describes teachers’ actions in relation to epistemology since teachers are in a position to show privileged knowledge and values within the practice. The concept of curriculum emphases (Roberts, 1982) was invented to identify and describe the regularity within the epistemological dimension in teaching. Analysing Science syllabuses and Science textbooks, Roberts (in North America) and Ostman (in Sweden) found different patterns concerning curriculum emphases in Science Education: correct explanation, structure of science, solid foundation, scientific skill development, self as explainer, everyday coping and science, technology and decisions (Roberts 1982, Ostman, 1996). The curriculum emphases can in turn be connected to Roberts’ (2007) two main visions (I & II) in western societies of how science education should be formed in order to make the pupils scientific literate. Vision I is describes as science reproducing its own products of concepts, laws, theories and methods. In Vision II it is accentuated that education must include facts of the subject but it must also include knowledge and skills that make the pupils able to use scientific knowledge in practical, existential, moral and political contexts (e.g. Zeidler, 2003,Wickman et al., forthcoming). MethodologyThis investigation is done by constructing a questionnaire which aims at elucidating teachers teaching practice according to teaching goals, choice of content and methods used in the classroom including the assessment of students. The alternatives in the questionnaire have been elaborated emanating from the concept of curriculum emphases. In the questionnaire, the teachers were asked to rate several alternative goals, contents, methods, and form of assessment in a five point Likert scale from “not important” to “very important”. The questionnaire was sent to ~1000 teachers teaching grades 6-9 all over Sweden.The answers to the questions concerning teachers’ goals and contents in teaching were analysed in order to see if it was possible to find patterns in the collected materials. Factor analysis was used in order to estimate the patterns among the indicators of the teacher’ goals and contents in teaching. Descriptive analyses of what qualifies the different factors in how the respondents combine alternatives for goals, contents and mode of operation were performed. Furthermore we look in to other aspects e.g. gender, teaching experience and assessment principles to see how these vary within the different manners of teaching.Expected outcomesThe data was suitable for factor analysis (Kaiser’s MSA=0,81). The factor analysis resulted in four distinctive clusters; emphasizing goals and contents concerning 1) scientific methods and ways of reasoning, 2) application of societal, political, moral and existential questions, 3) to prepare pupils for future studies, the future every day and working life, and 4) facts and contents of science. Furthermore, the analysis show that there are statistic significant differences regarding goals…
Interchange, 2015
Teaching, learning and motivation are the major concerns for educators. In this article we approa... more Teaching, learning and motivation are the major concerns for educators. In this article we approach these issues from a Foucauldian power and governance perspective in order to understand that attention is drawn to certain knowledge and values and not others that would be equally possible in a teaching practice. The approach suggests that the relationship between teachers' governance and students' freedom to govern themselves is something that is construed simultaneously in the teaching and learning of specific subject content. This interconnection is illustrated by two teaching sequences, one from science education and one from physical education. By comparing the two teaching sequences it is possible to identify differences and/or similarities between how the relationship between governance and self-governance is staged and thereby which companion meanings are offered. The desirable actions manifested in the teaching practices include which subject knowledge the students should learn, how students ought to act and the kind of people they ought to be. It is shown that self-governance leads to normative patterns in which the good student is constituted as a responsible, self-disciplined, active, thinking and judging individual. This can be seen as an expression of intensified student participation connected to the increasing individualisation in late liberal society, where people in their daily lives are forced to take sides, reflect, participate and make choices.
All students in year nine in the Swedish compulsory school take a national test in biology, physi... more All students in year nine in the Swedish compulsory school take a national test in biology, physics or chemistry. The ambition of these tests, which were given for the first time as late as in the spring semester 2009 is to measure the Swedish students’ knowledge in science, but also to provide an aid in teachers’ development of their teaching in order to support equal and fair assessment and grading. The purpose of this paper is to analyze and discuss the content of the national tests in biology, physics and chemistry. The paper highlights and discusses similarities and differences between the three subject tests carried out 2009-2012. The study presented in the paper has clarified five categories of content.The analysis shows that a student, to pass the tests, need to show evidence that he or she can answer correctly on questions about (a) scientific concepts, models theories, (b) the scientific ways of thinking about the world and (c) the scientific method. For higher grades, however, the students need to be able to give correct answers on questions about (d) the use of science in relation to everyday problems and also (e) the use of science in relation to political and moral issues. In the paper we discuss what the privileging of content measured can lead to in teachers’ planning of teaching and for the assessment of students’ knowledge, but also in relation to prerequisites for students’ participation in decision making where scientific knowledge is a central part of the problem at hand.
Nordic Studies in Science Education, 2018
The release of major reforms makes teachers reconsider how they teach. In Sweden, a new curriculu... more The release of major reforms makes teachers reconsider how they teach. In Sweden, a new curriculum along with grading and national tests were introduced in Year 6 science education in 2012/2013. Af ...
Different policies for what contents teaching should include and how it should be conducted shape... more Different policies for what contents teaching should include and how it should be conducted shapes different presuppositions for teaching and for what the pupils have opportunity learn. In Science ...
The influence on teaching and assessment practices from national tests and grading in Science in ... more The influence on teaching and assessment practices from national tests and grading in Science in Y6 In this paper we survey different approaches to teaching in Swedish Science Education. This means the purpose is to map and investigate patterns in teachers' views of what constitutes "good" Science Education in the middle years of compulsory school in Sweden, in a context where these views are potentially at stake. The background for our interest in studying approaches to teaching is that a new curriculum has been established and applies in Sweden from 2011. New to this curriculum is that standardized control of student achievements are introduced in more subjects and at lower ages than before. National tests in Physics, Chemistry and Biology became mandatory in Y6 in 2013 along with marking of pupils from and including Y6. Notably for teachers in Y6 is that they could be educated and working either in a Y4-6-classteacher system, or in a Y6-9-subject specialist teacher system. Standardized testing has been proven in many cases to create norms about what types of teaching and what types of teacher are considered to be accurate (e.g. Au 2009, Stobart 2008). Some researchers argue that standardized testing tends to narrow teachers instructional practice, both concerning content and methods, while others mean that, depending for instance on how the tests are designed, tests could also increase teachers teaching repertoires in different ways (Au 2009). What the main contents of teaching in different subjects should be is a question that is and ought to be problematized. Different policies for what contents teaching should include and how it should be conducted shapes different presuppositions for teaching and for what the pupils have opportunity learn (cf. Fensham, 2009). Analysing Science syllabuses and Science
This paper reports on an empirical exploration of the constitution of power and knowledge in scie... more This paper reports on an empirical exploration of the constitution of power and knowledge in science and technology classrooms. A deepened examination of the teaching of science and technology is p ...
Research in Science Education, 2017
In Sweden, a new curriculum and new methods of assessment (grading of students and national tests... more In Sweden, a new curriculum and new methods of assessment (grading of students and national tests) in science education were introduced in grade 6 in 2012/2013. We have investigated what implications these reforms have for teachers' teaching and assessment practices in order to explore the question of how teachers transform their teaching habits in relation to policy reforms. Interviews with 16 teachers teaching science in grade 6 (Y6), over 3 years after the reforms were introduced, were analysed. Building on the ideas of John Dewey, we consider teachers' talk about their everyday practice as expressions of their habits of teaching. Habits of teaching are related both to individual experiences as well as institutional traditions in and about teaching. A categorisation of educational philosophies was used to teachers' habits of teaching to a collective level and to show how habits can be transformed and developed over time in specific sociocultural contexts. The teachers were categorised as using essentialist and/or progressivist educational philosophy. In the responses to the introduction of grading and national testing, the teachers took three approaches: Their habits being reinforced, revised or unchanged in relation to the reforms. Although the responses were different, a striking similarity was that all teachers justified their responses with wanting to do what is best for students. However, how to show care for students differed, from delivering scientific knowledge in alignment with an essentialist educational philosophy, to preparing students to do well on tests, to supporting their development as individuals, which is in alignment with a progressivist educational philosophy.
Nordic Studies in Science Education, 2019
In this paper we survey different teaching traditions in Swedish Science Education. The purpose i... more In this paper we survey different teaching traditions in Swedish Science Education. The purpose is to map and investigate patterns in teachers’ views of what constitutes “good” Science education in the middle years of compulsory school in Sweden. This is done with the background of a new curriculum with national testing and grading being introduced, which could potentially alter teachers’ views of what is relevant content. A web-based questionnaire to teachers all throughout Sweden (response rate 43%, N=796) was used. The results show that groups can be formed with teachers emphasizing different teaching objectives including emphasis on; scientific facts and concept, laboratory work, everyday knowledge, and political and moral questions, even though the groups had a lot of similarities. The teachers indicate that they changed their instruction to a considerable extent after the three parallel reforms carried out 2011-13.
International Journal of Science Education, 2018
This is a repository copy of Expressions of agency within complex policy structures: science teac... more This is a repository copy of Expressions of agency within complex policy structures: science teachers' experiences of education policy reforms in Sweden.
This paper is a contribution to the discussion of what function assessment of students has in eve... more This paper is a contribution to the discussion of what function assessment of students has in everyday practice. What consequences do increased control of students’ knowledge have in teachers choices of teaching contents and methods, and thereby for what students are given the opportunity to learn.An increasingly test-driven educational culture is now reality in many parts of the world (Broadfoot & Black 2004). There is also an ongoing discussion about the effects of national tests and research show that there are certainly both positive and negative outcomes from these sorts of testing (eg. Cimbricz 2002). Wales has for example abandoned the national testing system that England and Wales were a part of (Collins, Reiss & Stobart 2010). Implementation of national tests is found to have different consequences for teachers teaching and assessment practice and there is a need for investigating and nuance what these consequences are (Boesen 2006, Maier 2009). National tests in biology, physics and chemistry in year 9 in Swedish comprehensive school was introduced in spring 2009. The purpose of these tests are to raise the standards, make more students reach the goals by strengthen the follow-up of student knowledge, serve exemplary for teachers teaching and at the same time create a more equal and fair assessment and grading of students. This is described as necessary since Swedish students’ results are cut back in national assessments and they achieve lower scores relatively to students in other comparable countries (eg. TIMSS).The aim of the study presented is to investigate if and in which way the introduction of national tests in science education influences teachers’ opinions of what is "good" science education and how this effects the teachers’ instructions and assessment in their teaching practice. This study is part of a bigger project. In one part of the project a survey identifying different teaching traditions among Swedish science education teachers has been performed (Lidar et al, unpublished). From the results of the survey, teachers from four different teaching traditions have been selected for interviews.The theoretical framework is built foremost from Douglas Robert’s categorisation of science education content into curriculum emphasis (1982). Curriculum emphasis is defined as a coherent set of messages about science rather that within science and those messages are said to accompany the teaching of science subject matter. Roberts in Canada and Leif Ostman in Sweden found seven different curriculum emphasis in textbooks, in-service training literature and syllabuses; correct explanation, structure of science, solid foundation, scientific skill development, self as explainer, everyday coping and science, technology and decisions (Roberts & Ostman 1998). The results will also be analysed and discussed in relation to scientific literacy, starting in Roberts’ (2007) concepts, vision I and vision II. The most obvious distinction between Vision I and Vision II has to do with how the character of socio-scientific issues and problem is conceptualized and experienced in education.The empirical material consists of telephone interviews with 30 teachers categorized within the survey study into four different teaching traditions. Each interview lasted approximately 45 minutes. The analyses from the interviews aim at identifying what is considered to be important knowledge in the teachers’ teaching, ways of using assessment in teaching and foremost how the national tests have influenced the teachers’ assessment and choice of subject matter in everyday practice. In a first step we identified the teachers’ utterances within the different categories of curriculum emphasis. In order to refine and qualify these categories we made further analyses within these categories, focusing on statements describing actual actions in the classroom. The interviews were semi-structured to both enable the teachers to prepare before the interviews and for us as researchers to be able to ask other questions depending on how the respondents answered (Kvale & Brinkman 2009).The study show systematic differences in teachers’ answers about teaching and assessment practices, in relation to the implementation of national tests. The interviews confirm the correlations from the survey study regarding the categorisation of teachers as belonging to different teaching traditions. The results also show important nuances within the teaching traditions. Most of the teachers stresses that the national test is only one of many ways off assessing the students, it is important not to forget what the student perform over a longer period of time. Though the results from the study show that the teachers can be categorised into different teaching traditions based on their expressions about different aims and goals with their teaching. Still most of the teachers express that they do not need to change their teaching a lot, they already teach in line…
The ambition with this presentation is to create possibilities for studying and make comparisons ... more The ambition with this presentation is to create possibilities for studying and make comparisons of teaching between subjects and teaching traditions within different cultural settings. This is important because didactic competence depends on the existence of alternatives, in this case, alternative ways of teaching, or alternative manners of teaching. Alternatives make choices necessary and visible and the need for justification arise. In order to fulfil these ambitions we will present a way of analysing teachers’ manners of teaching. This method for analysis contains two steps: analyses of epistemological moves and analyses of curriculum emphases. The theoretical background for the analyses is pragmatism, the work of late Wittgenstein and discourse theory. By identifying different manners of teaching possibilities are created to discuss what counts as teaching, teaching science in this case. Using analyses of epistemological moves and curriculum emphases for identifying different manners of teaching have several advantages. Firstly, the epistemological dimension is part of all teaching. This makes comparisons between teaching in different subjects possible. Secondly, analyses of curriculum emphases have been used in order to create knowledge about educational discourses and its historical transformation within different subjects. Thereby it becomes possible to highlight the potential connections between manners of teaching and educational discourses which are important when making comparisons between different manners of teaching within different cultural settings. Thirdly, by using epistemological moves analysis as the basic analytic tool, the problem of theoretical overdetermination is avoided, i.e. that categories are forced upon the empirical material.
This paper explores the constitution of power and knowledge in science and technology classrooms.... more This paper explores the constitution of power and knowledge in science and technology classrooms. A deepened examination of the teaching of science and technology is partly motivated by these subje ...
National tests in biology, physics and chemistry: potential influence on teachers’ teaching pract... more National tests in biology, physics and chemistry: potential influence on teachers’ teaching practices National tests in biology, physics and chemistry are now introduced in year 9 in Swedish comprehensive school. These tests aim at supporting teaching, learning and development of school practice in direction towards the goals in national curriculum. The introduction of national tests is used by the government in order to raise the standards, make more students reach the goals by strengthening the follow-up of student knowledge and at the same time create a more equal and fair assessment and grading of students. This is described as necessary since Swedish students’ results are cut back in national measurements and they achieve lower scores relatively to students in other comparable countries (e.g. TIMSS). We propose a project that will investigate if and in which way the introduction of national tests in science education influence teachers’ opinions of what is ‘good’ education in science and how this effects teachers’ instruction and assessment of students. This paper will be devided in two parts. The first part present an outline for a research project and the second part present the results of a pilot study with the aim to study how two focus groups of teachers have experienced the try-outs of national tests in 2009. The outlined project would firstly conduct a survey identifying different teaching traditions, or selective traditions, among the Swedish teachers. This is done by constructing a questionnaire which aims at identifying teachers teaching practice according to teaching goals, choice of content and methods used in the classroom. Secondly, elected teachers from different teaching traditions will be interviewed and observed when teaching. Analyses from the material will be made with the concept of ‘curriculum emphases’ to identify what is considered to be important knowledge. Analyses of the actual national tests will be carried out using the same tools. The results of the investigations will be discussed in relation to research on ‘scientific literacy’, which relates to socioscientific issues. This project will make it possible to identify potential systematic differences in teachers’ opinions and practice between teachers belonging to different teaching traditions regarding the effects of national tests. In the pilot study carried out during autumn 2009, groups of teachers in two different schools were given the task to discuss their experiences from performing try-out national tests in physics, chemistry or biology. They were asked questions about if and how they imagined theirs and others teaching would be affected by the introduction of national tests and if the content of instruction would change as a consequence. Preliminary results show that the group of teachers that preformed the chemistry test, identified everyday knowledge as privileged. These teachers used textbooks in their teaching, which according to them do not use this emphasis, they expressed the students were insufficiently prepared. The teachers made the prediction that the textbooks will probably change as a consequence. The teachers who have carried out the physics test expressed that the test helped them to see what had been missing in their teaching, according to both content and teaching methods. They also state that the national tests might function as a model when constructing questions concerning higher order thinking (MVG). The preliminary results from the pilot study will provide a background to find relevant and precise questions to a future survey, give insight into different positions teachers may take on and point to which changes are possible.
Vad man kan lara sig av att studera elevers samtal om/i naturvetenskap : Nagra resultat fran sex ... more Vad man kan lara sig av att studera elevers samtal om/i naturvetenskap : Nagra resultat fran sex ars forskning i LarNoT-projektet
Research questions, objectives and theoretical frameworkWhat the main contents of teaching in dif... more Research questions, objectives and theoretical frameworkWhat the main contents of teaching in different subjects should be is a question that could and ought to be problematized. Different policies for what contents teaching should include and how it should be conducted shapes different presuppositions for teaching and for what the pupils have opportunity learn (cf. Fensham, 2009). That every pupil should be scientific literate to be able to take part in society have in many countries become a prominent goal in Science Education (Roberts, 2007). At the same time, there are goals in Science Education stating that pupils should be prepared for future studies in science, something that is relevant only for a minority of the pupils (Roberts, 1988). The difference between these goals for a teacher in Science Education could either be to put emphasis on the contents of the traditional academic subjects physics, chemistry and biology (to give the pupils a solid foundation for future education) or to focus more on the role of science in questions of ethical, social and political character in connection to questions about for example air pollution or global warming. These different purposes in science education create tensions concerning the subjects character (Ryder & Banner, 2011). Even though teachers are working to meet the same goals in the Science syllabuses, emphasis can be made differently, forming different manners of teaching (Munby & Roberts, 1998) that can be connected to different teaching traditions (Lundqvist, Almqvist & Ostman, in press).The purpose of this study is to survey different manners of teaching practiced in Swedish Science Education in upper secondary schools and to qualify what features are characteristic in these manners, connected to teaching traditions. Teachers develop different manners of teaching that characterise their actions in the classroom (Munby & Roberts, 1998). The concept “manner of teaching” describes teachers’ actions in relation to epistemology since teachers are in a position to show privileged knowledge and values within the practice. The concept of curriculum emphases (Roberts, 1982) was invented to identify and describe the regularity within the epistemological dimension in teaching. Analysing Science syllabuses and Science textbooks, Roberts (in North America) and Ostman (in Sweden) found different patterns concerning curriculum emphases in Science Education: correct explanation, structure of science, solid foundation, scientific skill development, self as explainer, everyday coping and science, technology and decisions (Roberts 1982, Ostman, 1996). The curriculum emphases can in turn be connected to Roberts’ (2007) two main visions (I & II) in western societies of how science education should be formed in order to make the pupils scientific literate. Vision I is describes as science reproducing its own products of concepts, laws, theories and methods. In Vision II it is accentuated that education must include facts of the subject but it must also include knowledge and skills that make the pupils able to use scientific knowledge in practical, existential, moral and political contexts (e.g. Zeidler, 2003,Wickman et al., forthcoming). MethodologyThis investigation is done by constructing a questionnaire which aims at elucidating teachers teaching practice according to teaching goals, choice of content and methods used in the classroom including the assessment of students. The alternatives in the questionnaire have been elaborated emanating from the concept of curriculum emphases. In the questionnaire, the teachers were asked to rate several alternative goals, contents, methods, and form of assessment in a five point Likert scale from “not important” to “very important”. The questionnaire was sent to ~1000 teachers teaching grades 6-9 all over Sweden.The answers to the questions concerning teachers’ goals and contents in teaching were analysed in order to see if it was possible to find patterns in the collected materials. Factor analysis was used in order to estimate the patterns among the indicators of the teacher’ goals and contents in teaching. Descriptive analyses of what qualifies the different factors in how the respondents combine alternatives for goals, contents and mode of operation were performed. Furthermore we look in to other aspects e.g. gender, teaching experience and assessment principles to see how these vary within the different manners of teaching.Expected outcomesThe data was suitable for factor analysis (Kaiser’s MSA=0,81). The factor analysis resulted in four distinctive clusters; emphasizing goals and contents concerning 1) scientific methods and ways of reasoning, 2) application of societal, political, moral and existential questions, 3) to prepare pupils for future studies, the future every day and working life, and 4) facts and contents of science. Furthermore, the analysis show that there are statistic significant differences regarding goals…
Interchange, 2015
Teaching, learning and motivation are the major concerns for educators. In this article we approa... more Teaching, learning and motivation are the major concerns for educators. In this article we approach these issues from a Foucauldian power and governance perspective in order to understand that attention is drawn to certain knowledge and values and not others that would be equally possible in a teaching practice. The approach suggests that the relationship between teachers' governance and students' freedom to govern themselves is something that is construed simultaneously in the teaching and learning of specific subject content. This interconnection is illustrated by two teaching sequences, one from science education and one from physical education. By comparing the two teaching sequences it is possible to identify differences and/or similarities between how the relationship between governance and self-governance is staged and thereby which companion meanings are offered. The desirable actions manifested in the teaching practices include which subject knowledge the students should learn, how students ought to act and the kind of people they ought to be. It is shown that self-governance leads to normative patterns in which the good student is constituted as a responsible, self-disciplined, active, thinking and judging individual. This can be seen as an expression of intensified student participation connected to the increasing individualisation in late liberal society, where people in their daily lives are forced to take sides, reflect, participate and make choices.
All students in year nine in the Swedish compulsory school take a national test in biology, physi... more All students in year nine in the Swedish compulsory school take a national test in biology, physics or chemistry. The ambition of these tests, which were given for the first time as late as in the spring semester 2009 is to measure the Swedish students’ knowledge in science, but also to provide an aid in teachers’ development of their teaching in order to support equal and fair assessment and grading. The purpose of this paper is to analyze and discuss the content of the national tests in biology, physics and chemistry. The paper highlights and discusses similarities and differences between the three subject tests carried out 2009-2012. The study presented in the paper has clarified five categories of content.The analysis shows that a student, to pass the tests, need to show evidence that he or she can answer correctly on questions about (a) scientific concepts, models theories, (b) the scientific ways of thinking about the world and (c) the scientific method. For higher grades, however, the students need to be able to give correct answers on questions about (d) the use of science in relation to everyday problems and also (e) the use of science in relation to political and moral issues. In the paper we discuss what the privileging of content measured can lead to in teachers’ planning of teaching and for the assessment of students’ knowledge, but also in relation to prerequisites for students’ participation in decision making where scientific knowledge is a central part of the problem at hand.