ABSTRACT
As Tyack and Tobin pointed out, the basic “grammar” of schooling, the regular structures and rules that organize the work of instruction, has remained remarkably stable over the decades. At every level and subject, teachers have been expected to monitor and control students, assign tasks to them, and ensure that they accomplish them. Periodically, innovators have challenged the accepted model of schooling, proposing that individualized instruction replace batch processing, or that specialized subjects be merged into core courses, or that the textbook-centered approach be replaced by a more experiential style of teaching. However, most of these challenges to the accepted grammar of schooling have soon faded or become marginalized. Why?
