Since the beginning of the 1990s, Swedish parents have had the possibility of choosing schools for their children based on publicly funded school vouchers. At the same time, free schools started to develop, competing for the pupils. Even though the free schools are a part of the educational system, obligated to follow the same rules as the public schools, they describe themselves as different, something outside the system yet inside the system. The aim of the paper is to analyse and discuss the different strategies of integration into and differentiation within the educational system. Economic theory on competition and differentiation strategies is used to analyse the content of the three largest free school companies’ websites. The free schools mainly integrate into the legal aspects of the educational system and differentiate themselves from other schools by making claims about qualitative superiority. Different free schools position themselves differently relative to the educational system.

Since the beginning of the 1990‘s, Swedish parents have had the possibility of choosing schools for their children freely by taking publicly funded school vouchers to the chosen school. At the same time free schools started to develop, competing for the pupils and the school vouchers. Even though the free schools are a part of the school system, obligated to follow the same laws and curricula as the public schools, they describe themselves as something else, something “outside the system inside the system”.

The aim of the paper is to identify, analyze and discuss the different strategies of inclusion/exclusion in the educational system that are used in the self-descriptions of the free schools. The paper is theoretically and methodologically informed by Luhmann’s (2002)⁠ social theory, which allows to study how social systems (the free schools) describe – and establish – themselves in relation to other systems and society. To describe and analyze the different ways of differentiation, economical theory is used. Porter’s (1980)

generic strategies for reaching competitive advantage and Mintzberg’s (1996)⁠ strategies for differentiation are used as analytical framework.

The data for the study is based on official information that can be found on the three largest free schools‘ websites including introductions, welcoming words, presentation of the staff, teacher recruitment sites, statistics etc etc.

The data is analyzed using semantic-analysis (Andersen 2003)⁠ which allows to study and discuss how meaning is made inside social systems and how they construct and relate to their environment .

It will be discussed and compared how the different free schools describe themselves on the one hand as legitimate and worthy parts of the Swedish educational system at the same time as they – for reasons of competition and marketing – differentiate themselves from other players.

The introduction of the free schools have been a major reform in Sweden which impact has not yet been studied intensively. Educational research has had more focus on the marketisation of the school system, than the free schools in their own right. This study is to be understood as a first step in a forthcoming larger study about free schools in Sweden and their impact on the educational system and society.

References

Andersen, Niels Åkerstrøm. 2003. Discursive Analytical Strategies - Understanding Foucault, Koselleck, Laclau, Luhmann. Bristol: The Policy Press.

Luhmann, Niklas. 2002. Einführung in die Systemtheorie. Herausgegeben von Dirk Baecker. Heidelberg: Carl Auer.

Mintzberg, Henry, Joseph Lampel, James Brian Quinn, und Sumantra Ghoshal. 1996. The Strategy Process: Concepts, Contexts, Cases. Harlow: Pearson Education.

Porter, Michael E. 1980. Competetive Strategy - Thechniques for Analyzing Industries and Competitors. New York: Free Press.

The aim of this paper is to examine which different kinds of classroom order there can be found in different countries. Schooling on the one hand is a global phenomenon and the classroom is usually seen as an integrated part of it. School systems on the other hand are nationally different. Therefore it is interesting to investigate whether, and to what extent, differences can be found in the classroom orders in different countries or if they are similar.

The concept of disciplinary order formulated in Michel Foucault's book "Discipline and Punish" is the main theoretical framework of this study. Based on this concept an ideal type of "disciplinary classroom order" is formulated. This ideal type is the analytical starting point for describing different types of classroom order.

The study is based on participant classroom observations, following German upper secondary school teachers and Swedish compulsory school teachers during their work week and in their classrooms.

In the German examples, the classroom is the centre for teaching and learning activities at school; teachers and pupils are exclusively inside the classroom where the activities take place. The German classrooms are quite closed and the pupils are mainly static on their places whereas there is much movement in and out of the classroom as well as inside the classroom in the Swedish examples. This means that there are at least two different types of disciplinary classroom order to be found in the Swedish examples whereas only one in the German.

One difficulty that teachers in teacher education are faced with is the relative distance between the place of teaching, the teacher education classroom, and the subject taught, being a teacher in a classroom. The question is therefore how to involve experiences of teaching into the teacher education classroom in a way that is both practical inside the given frames and worthwhile for all participants, both students who already have experiences of teaching and those who do not.

Films and other mass media productions can be sources for such (vicarious) experiences, which can bring pictures of practice to the theoretical teacher education classroom with relatively small effort.

This paper will start at that point and address two issues: 1) a theoretical framework to examine the knowledge theoretical premises and possibilities of using mass media productions in educational purpose. This theoretical framework is based on the works of Alfred Schütz about ideal types as concept for social understanding and Niklas Luhmann's thoughts on mass media's role in society. 2) The paper will show which aspects of being a teacher and teaching are especially suitable to discuss using films. Using some examples, the paper will point out which themes that are usually addressed in films and why and how they can be adapted for educational purposes.

Since the beginning of the 1990's, Swedish parents have had the possibility of choosing schools for their children freely by taking publicly funded school vouchers to the chosen school. At the same time free schools started to develop, competing for the pupils and the school vouchers. Even though the free schools are a part of the school system, obligated to follow the same laws and curricula as the public schools, they describe themselves as something else, something “outside the system inside the system”.The aim of the paper is to identify, analyse and discuss the different communicative strategies of inclusion/exclusion in the educational system that are used in the self-descriptions of the free schools. The paper is theoretically and methodologically informed by Luhmann’s social theory, which allows to study how social systems (the free schools)describe – and establish – themselves in relation to other systems and society.The data for the study is based on official information that can be found on the three largest free schools‘ websites including introductions, welcoming words, presentation of the staff,teacher recruitment sites, statistics etc etc.The data is analysed using Luhmann inspired semantic-analysis which allows to study and discuss how meaning is made inside social systems. It will be discussed and compared how the different free schools describe themselves on the one hand as legitimate and worthy parts of the Swedish educational system at the same time as they – for reasons of competition and marketing – describe themselves as different from the public schools.

This paper is part of a larger ongoing study which is conducted in a mid-sized Swedish municipality where the students results lie behind the national average and lower than theirsocio-economic background would implicate. This makes the municipality in question quiteunique and the general question is, what makes this municipality so special, what are thereasons behind the deviant results? Earlier attempts to identify and eliminate causes have notyet been successful, maybe because they have been aiming at areas of development in a toogeneral way, such as leadership, study environments or student health.The study which is presented in this paper has the aim to identify more specific andcomplimentary areas of development and improvement to the above mentioned.This will be done by using an inductive research strategy with teachers as informants whohave moved to the municipality during the last two years with prior teaching experiencesfrom other municipalities. (School education is organized by the municipalities in Sweden.The local “school systems” can differ quite a lot, structurally and pedagogically.) Theseteachers are due to their professional history capable of comparing different municipalities,they contribute to the research with inductive comparisons. The study will be able to add apractitioners perspective to school development and improvement work. Structural andorganizational aspects are completed by practical ones. The research is conducted usingletter writing, interviews and focus groups. The paper will include a discussion ofmethodological and data collection challenges and how they could be addressed.

The aim of this paper is to describe which types of order can be found in observations in Swedish and German classrooms and to discuss what effects these implicate for the work of teachers. Schooling on the one hand is a global phenomenon and the classroom is usually seen as an integrated part of it. School systems on the other hand are nationally different. Therefore it is interesting to investigate whether, and to what extent, differences can be found in the classroom orders in different countries.

The concept of disciplinary order as formulated in Michel Foucault's book "Discipline and Punish" is the main theoretical framework of this study. Based on this concept an ideal type of "disciplinary classroom order" is formulated. This ideal type is the analytical starting point for constructing and describing different types of classroom order based on classroom observations. The study is based on participant classroom observations, following German upper secondary school teachers and Swedish compulsory school teachers during their work week and in their classrooms.

The results of these studies show that there can be found two different, and in many ways opposing, types of classroom order in the Swedish examples, whereas only one in the German.

In the German examples, the classroom is the unquestioned centre for teaching and learning activities at school; teachers and pupils are exclusively inside the classroom where teacher centred whole-class lessons are carried out. During the lessons the German classrooms are quite closed and the pupils are static on their places. In the Swedish classroom observations this type of order can be found as well, but there it alternates with another almost opposite type of order where pupils are studying individually with the teacher as supervisor or mentor. The classroom is one of many places for these activities and is therefore much more open for teachers and pupils during the lessons.

It will be discussed what possibilities and risks are carried along by either focusing on one type or shifting between different types of classroom order and what demands are put on the teacher in those different environments.

The aim of this study is to investigate discipline in German and Swedish classrooms and describe its cultural contexts. In countries with compulsory education, it must be assumed that not all students voluntarily attend classes. The mandatory presence of students combined with the ban on corporal punishment in schools means that classroom interaction has to be organized according to certain manners and rules which are understood here as discipline, meaning the organization and control of individuals and their actions over space and time. This study assumes similarities in the fundamental disciplinary mechanisms, although different contexts will create different concrete manifestations of the phenomenon.

Since the observation of cultural contexts is not as self-evident and direct as the observation of classroom interactions of teachers and students, the theoretical considerations here include a detailed discussion of methodology for observing culture. Starting with Alfred Schütz’ concept of ideal types and Niklas Luhmann’s theory on mass media, it is argued that culture can be observed through the products of mass media. The empirical data for this study therefore consists of classroom observations in Germany and Sweden as well as the examination of German and Swedish films and television series.

Comparing and combining the results from classroom and film/tv observations using the construction of different ideal types allowed conclusions to be made about correlations between disciplinary order and whether a teacher is considered “good” or “bad”. This review of the various types of order is the basis for the description of cultural contexts.

Keywords: classroom discipline, Sweden, Germany, film and television.

Themes from the call for papers that might fit:

(1) Innovative Research Methods

(2) Curriculum

Schools' legitimation as institutions can no longer be explained by the distribution of knowledge, but by the way knowledge is distributed. Aspects of classroom management and discipline is more and more getting into focus of educational research and teacher education. In many countries two ways of organizing teachers' work exist: class teacher on the one hand and subject teachers on the other. Even though this is a common phenomenon, the existing research literature on the subject is very limited.

In this paper it will be analysed and discussed to what extent class teachers' and subject teachers' classroom management and communication strategies differ. This paper's empirical data consists of classroom observations following two class teachers and two subject teachers in southern Germany. All teachers work at lower secondary types of schools where either subject teachers or class teachers dominate.

The two types of teachers have different educational and historic backgrounds, e. g. subject teachers have a long tradition of academic education, stemming from a grammar school tradition. Class teachers only recently became part of universitary education and go back to an elementary school tradition.

The amount of empirical data in this study is limited and must therefore be seen as exploratory and as starting point for further, more extensive research. The analytical approach in this study is based on a model for constructing empirically founded, multidimensional typologies (Kelle & Kluge, 2010)⁠ which answers to the study's mentioned shortcomings in empirical data and theoretical preconceptions. This model implements both inductive and deductive elements and permits theorizing based on relatively limited amount of empirical data. Aspects of subject respectively class teachers' role in the class, their relations to subject, profession and pupils as it appears in everyday classroom work will be analysed. Aim of this paper is to discuss and open for further research about in how far the differences between classroom and subject teachers are significant enough that they can be described as two different professions.

Literature

Kelle, Udo, & Kluge, Susanne. (2010). Vom Einzelfall zum Typus : Fallvergleich und Fallkontrastierung in der qualitativen Sozialforschung. Wiesbaden: VS, Verlag für Sozialwissenschaften.

Schools' legitimation as institutions can no longer be explained by the distribution of knowledge, but by the way knowledge is distributed.Aspects of classroom management and discipline is more and more getting into focus of educational research and teacher education. In many countries two ways of organizing teachers' work exist: class teacher on the one hand and subject teachers on the other. Even though this is a common phenomenon, the existing research literature on the subject is very limited.

In this paper it will be analysed and discussedto what extentclass teachers' and subject teachers' classroom management and communication strategies differ. This paper's empirical data consists of classroom observations following two class teachers and two subject teachers in southern Germany. All teachers work at lower secondary types of schools where either subject teachers or class teachers dominate. The two professions have different educational and historic backgrounds, e. g. subject teachers have a long tradition of academic education, stemming from a grammar school tradition. Class teachers only recently became part ofuniversitary education and go back to an elementary school tradition.

The amount of empirical data in this study is limited and must therefore be seen as exploratory and as starting point for further, more extensive research.The analytical approach in this study is based on a model forconstructing empirically founded, multidimensional typologies which answers to the study's mentioned shortcomings in empirical data and theoretical preconceptions(Kelle & Kluge, 2010)⁠. This model implements both inductive and deductive elements and permits theorizing based on relatively limited amount of empirical data. Aspects of subject respectively class teachers' role in the class, their relations to subject, profession and pupils as it appears in everyday classroom work will be analyzed.

In this study, aspects of space and time in German and Swedish classrooms are observed and compared to characterize differences and similarities in classrooms and lessons in different contexts. The organization and control of individuals and their actions in relation to time and space are analysed using categories derived from Discipline and Punish utilizing a model of empirically informed typification analysis. The empirical data consist of field studies conducted by participant observation in German and Swedish classrooms. The type of classroom found in Germany is characterized by fixed boundaries and frameworks. The lessons are uniform, and class time is structured so as to minimize the number of interruptions between different activities. Boundaries are less clear in the type of classroom found in the Swedish material, where the classroom is just one of many places for teaching and learning. The lessons and schedules are less uniformly structured, and a lot of time is spent discussing the plans for instruction.

Curriculum making operates at the institutional, programmatic and classroom level (Doyle, 1992a 1992b). The institutional level, represented by curriculum policy at the interface between schooling, culture and society is typified by what is valued by society and desirable in socio-cultural terms. Day and Bryce (2013) argue that the curriculum policy vision (rationale) statements represent Institutional level curriculum making. The programmatic level is contained within documents and materials for use by schools to orient classroom activities. Day and Bryce (2013) further suggest that these documents represent the policy image. Curriculum making at this level transforms the institutional curriculum into school subjects which are framed by a set of arguments that rationalise the selection and arrangement of content and the translation of content for school and classroom use (Doyle, 1992b). This paper critically examines the extent to which Scottish and Swedish Science curriculum documentation supports meaningful curriculum making.

Two competing visions of scientific literacy (SL) can be identified within most science curricular documents. Vision I SL, looks inward and relates to the discipline of science itself, e.g. its products and processes. Vision II SL looks outward at situations in which science has a role and relates to the situations in which science demonstrably plays a role in human affairs. These two visions of SL are used as a framework for analysing the Scottish and Swedish science curricula.

A textual discourse analysis of Scottish and Swedish Science curricular policy documents relating to the primary and lower secondary school phase of education was performed. First, all relevant science curriculum documents relating to the Scottish and Swedish curriculum were identified and shared. Second, the authors read and analysed the orientation of the science curricula. Third, the authors read and identified the common and contrasting features of each country’s science curriculum and established the extent to which vision each curriculum attended.

Analysis indicates structural similarities between the two countries science curricula in terms of breadth and range of content areas covered. They differ in terms of content detail; specificity of language and explicit orientation. They also differ substantially in the emergent voices and room for teacher autonomy. The Swedish science curriculum is more specific in its use of language with the Scottish being more vague. Both countries curricula have a clear orientation statement but the Scottish curriculum is orientated towards developing students as scientifically literate citizens with skills, competencies and knowledge whereas the Swedish curriculum is oriented towards students’ accumulation of scientific knowledge. The Scottish curriculum emphasizes scientific literacy more strongly than the Swedish, whereas both orientate mainly towards a Vision I SL.

References.

Day, S. P., and Bryce, T.G.K, (2013) Curriculum for Excellence Science: Vision or Confusion? Scottish Educational Review, 45 (1), 53-66.

Doyle, W. (1992a). Curriculum and pedagogy. In P.W. Jackson (Ed.), Handbook of research on curriculum. New York: Macmillan.

Doyle, W. (1992b). Constructing curriculum in the classroom. In F.K. Oser, A. Dick, & J. Patry (Eds), Effective and responsible teaching: The new syntheses. San Francisco: Jossey-Bass Publisher.

A new, revised curriculum for the Swedish preschool came into effect in July 2019. According to the National Agency of Education, it differs from its predecessor by putting a greater emphasis on care and teaching. This paper studies how the child is conceptualized in relation to learning and care in the new curriculum. Informed by a posthumanist approach and childhood studies, it scrutinizes how the child is positioned as a being and/or becoming child, an entangled and/or separate child, and, an active and/or passive child. Furthermore, it explores how the child appears in relation to human and non-human agents. The dominant, recurring conceptualization of the child is the child as becoming and passive. Learning and caring processes mainly come across as unidirectional -from adult to child –and future orientated. Although the preschool child is connected to a social context, the child predominantly appears as separate from others rather than entangled

Teachers' profession can be said to consist of at least two aspects, teaching and leading. Teaching summarizes subject matters and didactic knowledge, leading is the social part of teachers' work, for example arranging a learning environment, rules, discipline and teacher-pupil-interaction. Teachers are, of course, the formal leaders, managers, in schools and classrooms. They are put in this position by formal law and social customary. At the same time, teachers do have a choice how they exercise their part as a leader depending on personal preferences, their own education and, again, legal and social boundaries.. What is considered as good respectively bad leadership for a teacher is changeable.

Teachers and schools are a common theme for film and television. The dramatic focus lies on the social aspects of school and classroom life, the relation between teachers and pupils for example, subject matters are rarely depicted. This means teachers are mainly portrayed in their role as leaders.

Mass media, such as television and films, give direction to discourses in society. Analyzing them can give a clue to what matters concern at a certain time period and in a certain society. In Sweden the film Torment (Hets) written by Ingmar Bergman in 1944 has been influencing public discourse about school and teaching since then.

In this paper we are going to analyze how teachers' leadership is depicted in this film. Using directed material as empirical data allows us to ask “Who is the good teacher and who is the bad – or evil – teacher?”

In our discussion we will look at how the formal manager role that teachers get by law and social customary leaves space for different kinds of teachers' leadership. Will bigger juridical authority for teachers prevent evil teaching, or is the opposite more plausible? But even common ideas of morality will have to be considered and discussed; why is a certain type of leader connected with the role of the good hero and the other one is the evil villain? Is this the only way the different styles of leadership can be looked at?

Politicians, policymakers and educators across Europe recognise that Science, as a product of human endeavour, is deeply enmeshed within all aspects of the modern world. Increasingly, they view science as an important priority within educational and economic terms. However, this increased political attention on science has intensified recently considering the results of large scale transnational assessments of student attainment such as the OECD’s Programme for International Student Assessment (PISA) where poorer than expected results, particularly in mathematics (numeracy) and science have sparked curricular reforms. Scotland and Sweden have recently undergone extensive educational reforms where the Science curriculum has also undergone reform.

Deng (2011), citing Doyle (1992a; 1992b) suggests that curriculum making operates at three levels, the institutional, programmatic, and classroom, where each level is associated with distinct kinds of curriculum discourses. The institutional level is represented by curriculum policy at the interface between schooling, culture and society and is typified by what is desirable in socio-cultural terms and by what society deems valuable. The programmatic level is contained within curriculum documents and materials used by schools to orient classroom activities. It has suggested by Day and Bryce (2013) that the curriculum policy vision (or rationale) represents the Institutional level of curriculum making and that the documents which exemplify and outline the syllabus represent the policy image. Curriculum making at this level transforms the institutional curriculum into school subjects. As Doyle (1992b) suggests, school subjects are framed by a set of arguments that rationalise the selection and arrangement of content, in terms of knowledge, skills and dispositions and the translation of the content for school and classroom use. The programmatic curriculum embodies a theory of content that aligns with the institutional expectations and teaching activities. The classroom curriculum is characterised by the interaction of teachers with their students. However, classroom curriculum making necessarily involves teachers translating the programmatic curriculum into instructional events through a process of elaboration with the intention to make the content meaningful to students and connects with their experiences, capacities and interests.

Scientific literacy is widely accepted as the central goal of science education for the 21^st century and is a major aspect of the PISA Science assessment. Indeed, Roberts (2011) has argued that scientific literacy has had a strong impact on the discourse about curriculum policy, curriculum development, and assessment in contemporary school science education. This notwithstanding, what has been debated within the science education discourse is what should constitute the content for teaching and learning for the development of scientific literacy. Curriculum policy, Roberts (2011) argues, expresses the purpose for learning. Roberts (2007) characterises the current science education landscape as being mired in a struggle between two broad “visions” of the purposes for learning school science where on the one hand there is the discipline of science itself, the products, processes, and characteristics of the scientific enterprise (which he names Vision I). On the other, there are those situations in which science demonstrably plays a role in human affairs, including, but not limited to scientific thinking and activity (which he names Vision II). Using the Vision I - Vision II broad distinction, makes it possible to discuss and analyse competing meanings of scientific literacy without becoming embroiled in the debate as to how scientific literacy is defined.

This paper aims to examine the extent to which the Scottish and Swedish Science curriculum share common features, reflect the stated aims of the curriculum, and orientate, focus and attend to the development of students as scientifically literate citizens by focusing on the institutional and programmatic level of curriculum making as outlined within major curricular documents from both countries.

Method

A textually oriented discourse analysis of the Scottish and Swedish Science curricular policy documents relating to the primary and lower secondary school phase of education was performed. First, all the relevant science curriculum documents relating to the Scottish Broad General Education phase and the Swedish Compulsory phase of the science curriculum where identified and shared. All documents where read and analysed in English, with the Swedish curricular documents having been published in English and cross checked with the Swedish version for translational issues. Second, the authors read, identified and analysed the science documents to assess how these documents orient the science curricula. Third, the authors identified the common and contrasting features of each countries science curriculum to establish the extent to which each curriculum attended to the orienting vision for the curriculum. Fourth, the texts where analysed to establish the dominant voice projected by each curriculum document, i.e. that of the policy maker, the teacher, the student.

Expected Outcomes

Analysis indicates that at the programmatic level of curriculum-making there are structural similarities between the Scottish and Swedish science curricula in terms of breadth and range of content areas. The main differences being in content detail, specificity of language and explicit orientation. Both science curricula have a clear orientation statement but the Scottish documents explicitly oriented the curriculum towards developing pupils as scientifically literate citizens with skills, competencies and knowledge whereas the Swedish curriculum is oriented more towards pupils’ accumulation of scientific knowledge. In fact, the Swedish science curriculum do not use the term scientific literacy explicitly at all. Both the Scottish and Swedish science curriculum are oriented towards a Vision I-like Scientific Literacy curriculum with elements of Vision II suggesting that at the programmatic level, each focuses heavily on science content knowledge and investigation and inquiry skills than on socio-scientific discussion. In terms of language specificity, the Swedish curriculum is more specific in its use of language, with the Scottish curriculum being more vague despite being more explicit in terms of content and advice to teachers than the Swedish curriculum. The predominant voice speaking within the Scottish Science Experiences and Outcomes is that of the pupil, with the use of terms such as “I can” “I have participated in”, whereas the Swedish Science curriculum documents are more neutral. The Swedish Science curriculum is less prescriptive, in terms of content and only indicates what the expectations for pupil attainment at different levels ought to be, with no indication of advocated pedagogy. By contrast, the Scottish Science principles and practice document – with the policy makers’ voice – details 12 developmental priorities for science teachers to focus on. The Science benchmarks sets out what pupils need to know and can do, at each level, to progress their learning within the curriculum.

References

Day, S. P., and Bryce, T.G.K, (2013) Curriculum for Excellence Science: Vision or Confusion? Scottish Educational Review, Doyle, W. (1992a). Curriculum and pedagogy. In P.W. Jackson (Ed.), Handbook of research on curriculum. New York: Macmillan. Doyle, W. (1992b). Constructing curriculum in the classroom. In F.K. Oser, A. Dick, & J. Patry (Eds), Effective and responsible teaching: The new syntheses. San Francisco: Jossey-Bass Publisher. Roberts, D. A. (2007) Scientific literacy/Science literacy. In S. K. Abell & N. G. Lederman (Eds.), Handbook of research on science education. Mahwah, NJ: Lawrence Erlbaum Associates. Roberts, D.A. (2011). Competing Visions of Scientific Literacy: The Influence of a Science Curriculum Policy Image. In C, Linder, L Östman, D.A. Roberts, P-O Wickman, G, Erickson, A MacKinnon (Eds.), Exploring the Landscape of Scientific Literacy. London: Routledge.