Session Information
09 SES 08 A, Findings from International Comparative Achievement Studies and their National Extensions: Issues in Equity and Inequality
Paper Session
Contribution
The Swedish school system is today characterized by increased assessment and documentation of students’ learning and study results. One reason for the extended assessment and documentation practice is that the performance of Swedish students on national and international tests and surveys has declined, particularly in relation to the results of other nations (Gonzales et al 2008; OECD 2010).
This study explores one contemporary predominant assessment practice, the Individual Education Plan (IEP). This plan, which is worked out twice a year at the parent-teacher conference, aims to describe both the status of the students' acquired knowledge and the modalities for future learning.
In this study I scrutinize how the students' mathematical knowledge and learning are constructed in and through the Individual Education Plans (IEP). The Bernsteinian theories of how power relations are produced and reproduced in and through the education system are the main theoretical framework for the study (Bernstein 1990, 1996). ‘Pedagogic discourses’, how the choice of learning content (curriculum) and forms of teaching (pedagogy) operates in the teaching practices, is one of the important theoretical notions. Another perspective in the analysis is how teaching and learning are represented in relation to horizontal and vertical discourses (Bernstein 1999).
The more specific aim of the study is to scrutinize the Individual Education Plans (IEPs) in relation to how they produce and reproduce both 'valid' mathematical knowledge (curriculum) and the forms of valid mathematical transmission/teaching (pedagogy). In addition, the study aims to scrutinize whther different mathematical content and modes of learning are emphasized for girls and boys
Questions:
• What mathematical content is presented as central and essential and are there skills and knowledge in the syllabus that are absent in the Individual Education Plans?
• How is the mathematical learning constructed in and through the Individual Education Plans?
• Are there any differences between girls and boys in the assessment practice, and if so, what sort of differences?
Method
Expected Outcomes
References
References Bernstein, Basil. (1990). Class, codes and control, vol. 4: The structuring of pedagogic discourse. London: Routledge. Bernstein, Basil. (1996). Pedagogy, symbolic control and identity: theory, research, critique. London: Taylor and Francis. Bernstein, Basil (1999). Vertical and Horizontal discourses: an essay. British Journal of Sociology of Education, 20(2), 157-173 Gonzales, P., Williams, T., Jocelyn, L., Roey, S., Kastberg, D., and Brenwald, S. (2008). Highlights From TIMSS 2007:Mathematics and Science Achievement of U.S. Fourth- and Eighth-Grade Students in an International Context (NCES 2009–001 Revised). National Center for Education Statistics, Institute of Education Sciences, U.S. Department of Education. Washington, DC. OECD (2010), PISA 2009 Results: What Students Know and Can Do – Student Performance in Reading, Mathematics and Science(Volume I)http://dx.doi.org/10.1787/9789264091450-en
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