ABSTRACT

This study illuminates how the everyday activity of teachers raises profound economic, cultural, ethical, political and research issues, and provides a new and fruitful way of examining the practice of teaching. The first part of the book offers a detailed description of sensitively recorded school situations, arising from work carried out in a number of British primary schools. From the analysis of their research the authors constructed a theoretical perspective for looking at schooling in the form of sixteen ‘dilemmas’; the second half of the book is concerned with this perspective, and shows how the dilemmas constitute a language for looking at everyday schooling and relating it to more general political, social and cultural issues. The book thus spans the gap in educational thinking between work with a firm empirical base and specifically theoretical studies.

part 1|36 pages

Controversies and Context

chapter 1|5 pages

Public Issues and Schooling Controversies

chapter 2|9 pages

Theoretical Context

chapter 3|7 pages

A Brief History and Overview of the Book

part 2|70 pages

The Schools

chapter 4|35 pages

Port Primary

chapter 5|27 pages

Scenes from the Other Schools

part 3|69 pages

Towards a Theory and Language of Schooling

chapter 7|31 pages

The Dilemma Language

part 4|52 pages

Interpretations of the Schools

chapter 8|23 pages

Patterns of Resolution

chapter 9|22 pages

Patterns of Resolution and Social Change

An Exploration

part 5|47 pages

Engaging in Critical Inquiry

chapter 10|25 pages

Critical Inquiry

Teachers, Schooling Professionals and Citizens as Critical Inquirers