ABSTRACT
This chapter explores the contradictions inherent in the implementation of pedagogical practices aimed at increasing pupils’ autonomy. It is based on observations made during a pedagogical project carried out with two math classes at the end of compulsory secondary school in a large rural school in Switzerland. Through the presentation of empirical material derived from field observations, we present how teachers go about bringing pupils to work autonomously. The text highlights the initial attentions, the socialization objectives expressed, and the didactic approaches favoured: freedom of movement, organization of work, choice, mixing of pupils with unequal levels of performance, withdrawal of teachers and encouragement of collaboration between pupils, emphasis on individual responsibility and mobilization. It then presents how teachers force pupils to work because pupils do not necessarily use the given freedom in the way they are expected to (i.e. in a way that promotes the learning expected by teachers). Thus, there are tensions between a proclaimed empowerment of pupils and a reintroduction of forms of constraint. These contradictions can be interpreted with reference to a dominant conception of autonomy in the school context: seen as the result of individual mobilization, through forms of “confrontation” aimed at bringing pupils to “take responsibility” for their learning, this conception overlooks the resources (cognitive, behavioural, etc.) needed for autonomous learning during classes.
