Education and Social Change

Len Barton, Stephen Walker

• Publisher: Routledge
• Year: 2017
• ISBN:
  9781315413198
• Edition: 1
• Topic: Pedagogía
• Subtopic: Educación general

This book, first published in 1985, argues that changes in the education system are closely bound up with wider social and political changes. It considers items within education such as developments in teacher assessment policy and changes in the control of education policy; and external items such as new directions in the management of the economy, of class relations and of the political system. Throughout, the book reflects a mood of growing frustration and anxiety shared by many teachers and educationalists which, the book argues, stems from a feeling that the education system is not being run as it should be. This title will be of interest to students of education and sociology.

PART I

TEACHERS AND SOCIAL CHANGE

A MORE DISTANT DRUMMER: TEACHER DEVELOPMENT AS THE DEVELOPMENT OF SELF

Jennifer Nias

As every pupil knows, teachers are not people. Yet people become teachers. Evidently therefore teaching as a profession robs men and women of their individuality, even their identity. Much research into both adult and teacher development and most teacher education has been tacitly posited on this belief. This paper suggests that the separation of person from occupation is theoretically as well as practically unsound, since both personal and teacher behaviour are determined by the individual’s concept of him/herself. Apparent changes in the group of teachers who are the subject of this study can be tentatively explained as a continuing search for a match between their view of themselves as people and as workers.

PERSONAL DEVELOPMENT AND PROFESSIONAL DEVELOPMENT

To put the notion of personal identity in the forefront of an understanding of teachers implies a need to examine theories of both adult and professional change, and the links that have been made between them. Adult development has been conceptualized in a number of ways. The first is as a process of maturation. According to writers such as Allport and Gessell neither training, education nor experience affects the age at which particular behaviours will be exhibited. While there are some teacher attributes, for instance the physiological effects of ageing, to which theories of maturation might apply, they do not appear to have much explanatory force in the context of teacher development and hence will not be considered further in this paper. A related notion is that of Willie and Howey (1981) who, according to Smyth (1983), argue that certain themes (search for intimacy, interaction with life’s work, quest for meaning) run through adult development and constantly recur as adults mature.

A third approach implies for the adult learner a much more active role in his/her own development. Theorists such as Piaget and Kohlberg and their successors (e.g. Hunt, 1975; Loevinger, 1976; Gilligan, 1982) point to a sequence of hierarchical, invariant stages of development in the cognitive and conceptual systems of human beings. Each stage is held to signal qualitative changes in cognitive structures resulting from the learner’s need to accommodate to environmental dissonance. Each progressively fits the individual more and more adequately for life in a complex society, since, it is claimed, at the higher stages he/ she will function more comprehensively and empathically. A similar stance is suggested by the developmental tone of some American advisory programmes (notably Bussis et al, 1976) even though their growth reflects a philosophical rather than a psychological impetus.

Closely resembling these ideas are those life-cycle theorists (e.g. Erikson, 1950; Havinghurst, 1953; Huberman, 1974) who have examined the stages of psycho-social growth in humans. Movement from one stage to another results from successful resolution of the successive tasks or crises faced by each man or woman in the normal course of life. Like the cognitive-developmental theorists these writers assume that development is through an invariant sequence of hierarchical stages, that it is interactional and that each stage is qualitatively better than previous ones. Life-age theorists (e.g. Sheehy, 1976; Levinson, 1978) on the other hand examine the roles and coping behaviours faced or adopted by the majority of adults at particular ages. Like the life-cycle theorists, they argue that these behaviours are evoked by environmental concerns, but they do not take an evaluative stance towards them nor claim that they signal or result from qualitative psychosocial changes in the individual.

Recently there have been attempts to apply some of these theories to teacher education. Among others, McNergney and Carrier (1981), Oja (1981), Sprinthall and Sprinthall (1983) have reported programmes, based on cognitive-developmental theories, which were designed to promote the ego, moral and conceptual developmental of teachers and student teachers. Others (e.g. Knowles, 1978; Howey and Garner, 1982; Smyth, 1983) cite research into adult learning in support of differing views on staff development programmes. A very useful, critical review of these attempts is Feiman and Floden (1980).

There have also been developmental studies of the professional socialization of teachers. Coulter and Taft (1973) see the teacher’s ‘social assimilation’ proceeding from satisfaction through identification and acculturation. Raggett (1975) speaks of initiation, internalization and evolution (a relatively stable state of occupational acceptance which will change only slowly over the years). Katz (1972) uses similar terminology. These papers tacitly view the individual as a relatively passive recipient of an established occupational culture and none of them satisfactorily explains movement between stages.

A more fruitful approach takes cognizance of possible interactions between the personal and professional lives of teachers, particularly since teachers themselves make the distinction between teacher-as-person and teacher-as-teacher (Nias, 1984b). Sutton and Peters (1983) go further than this, arguing that it is sometimes necessary to think of the teacher-as-person-as-teacher (when, for example, career aspirations are affected by ill-health, or domestic responsibilities) and sometimes of the teacher-as-teacher-as-person (for instance, in explaining the home lives of many teachers. See, in particular, Spencer Hall, 1982). Fessler, Burke and Christensen (1983) have developed a hypothetical ‘career cycle model’ from an extensive review by Christensen, Burke and Fessler (1983) of American studies of teachers’ concerns, ambitions, perceptions and capabilities at different points in their careers. Its components are: pre-service, induction, competency-building, enthusiastic and growing, career frustration, stable and stagnant, career wind-down, career exit. Many of these studies were initiated by Ryan (1979) and most, though they speak of ‘stages’, derive from the life-age tradition. They are generally of student teachers or of teachers with up to five years’ experience. Only two (Peterson, 1979; Newman et al, 1980) focus on retired teachers or on those nearing the end of their careers. Each uses different criteria to characterize development; make these criteria explicit. indeed, some do not Thus, though the labels attached to different ‘stages of career development’ are often similar, it is hard to judge what distinguishes one ‘stage’ from another, to make comparisons between them or to see what causes movement between ‘stages’. Evidence for the later career development of teachers is particularly lacking in differentiation and is often presented in terms which are open to subjective interpretation. The ‘career cycle model’ which is derived from these studies is therefore appropriately tentative. Moreover, it is not conceived by its authors as a linear model, but as one in which individuals will move in and out of particular phases in response to personal and/or organizational influences. Likely examples of these influences are listed and the authors present several ‘typical scenarios’ as examples of the interaction between personal situation, organizational context and career development.

For all their weaknesses, these pioneer attempts to present the dynamic interaction between teachers’ lives and careers are a move in a promising direction. A similar impetus underlies recent biographical studies (e.g. Ingvarson, 1980; Woods, 1981; Ebbutt, 1982; Holly, 1983; Sikes, 1983a and b and Smith and Kleine, 1983). These have begun to probe the possible origins of teacher identities, careers and behaviours, and to suggest ways in which teacher-as-person may interact with teacher-as-teacher. Only Smith and Kleine use longitudinal evidence. Otherwise, these studies fall into two overlapping categories. Most are descriptive, presenting biographical facts which appear to have, or have had, an effect upon the way in which teachers behave and/or define themselves and their careers. In addition, a few (notably Woods and Smith and Kleine) have elicited from the evidence theoretical insights into the nature and extent of the reciprocality between self and situation which is displayed in their subjects’ lives.

Fuller (1969), replicated in the UK with PGCE students by Taylor (1975), uses a different approach of considerable potential. Taking an implicitly Maslowian perspective, she studies the personal concerns of teachers-at-work. She does not suggest that these concerns are related to individual life-changes, but her research emphasizes the importance of considering what needs are met through their work for teachers-as-persons (see also Nias, 1981b). In later studies (Fuller, Parsons and Watkins 1974; Fuller and Brown, 1975), she refined her early conceptualization (non-concern, concern with self, concern with pupils) into concern with self, with task and with impact. The first stage is one of survival. It is characterized by anxiety about one’s adequacy and survival as a teacher, about class control and the evaluative opinions of both pupils and supervisors. The second stage is one of mastery; teachers are trying to perform well. It is marked by concern over features of the teaching situation (e.g. too many pupils, time pressures, lack of resources). In the third stage, the teacher may either become resistant to change in his/her routines or become concerned about the impact of his/her actions upon pupils. Impact concerns relate to the social and learning needs of individuals, discipline methods and classroom climate, the choice and teaching of particular curricula.

The fact that Fuller’s formulation was, for the most part, taken up by researchers in search of ‘stages of career development’ has tended to distract attention from her emphasis upon the teacher-as-person. There have, however, been a number of recent studies which have recognized that professional development is inseparable from personal education (Taylor, 1980) or re-emphasized the resistance of the individual to the socialization pressures of the school and the profession (Lacey, 1977; Woods, 1981; Tabachnik et al, 1983; Nias, 1984a).

We can now see that three lines of argument begin to converge. The first derives from work on adult learning and development: adults develop (although there is no consensus as to exactly how, why or when), teachers are adults, therefore teachers develop. The second springs from research into professional socialization and the lives of teachers: teachers alter, as teachers (although, again, there is little precise knowledge about the nature or reasons for these changes). The third also stems from studies of teachers: teaching is a personal activity. Therefore changes in teachers need to be conceptualized not just as adult or teacher development but as changes in the person. Developmental studies, whether personal or professional, will be incomplete unless they can capture the individual’s sense of ‘personhood’ and examine it as it changes. This is, of course, a formidable undertaking and one which, from a symbolic interactionist viewpoint, would require prior consideration of concepts as complex and slippery as ego and alter, identity and self-image, ‘real’ and ‘ideal’, ‘substantial’ and ‘situational’, multiple and context-specific selves. Elsewhere (Nias, 1984b) I have claimed that many people choose teaching because they believe that, as teachers, they can propagate or live consistently with the values, beliefs and attitudes which are incorporated into their ‘substantial’ (as opposed to ‘situational’) selves. Thus the individual’s sense of personal identity is intimately bound up with his/her work and for this reason is protected from institutional pressures by the use of various social strategies. Here, I accept the distinction between ‘situational’ and ‘substantial’ selves which I elaborated in that paper and treat the ‘substantial’ selves revealed by my interviewees as if they were ‘real’.

My argument is a modification of Fuller’s notion of personal concerns. I suggest that the personal concerns of teachers are those preoccupations and interests which relate to the definition and maintenance of their ‘substantial’ selves, that apparent changes in these concerns reflect a long drawn out search for congruence between their view of themselves as persons and as teachers and that in default of such a match, they pursue sequential or parallel careers. These developments are accompanied and supported by changes in significant others.

Most of the teachers in my enquiry had made a conscious career choice. In addition, they tended to see themselves as both persistent and successful. Their main preoccupation was therefore to survive, in the eyes of pupils and validating superiors, their early encounters with teaching in a manner which was consistent with these aspects of their self-image. Survival did not however mean self-identification as a teacher. Before this was possible individuals apparently needed to satisfy themselves that they could become, somewhere within the profession, ‘the sort of teacher I would like to be’. A period of search, often involving movement, followed that of survival. It had the same main aim – confirmation that the decision to teach was the right one – but its purpose was to achieve a match between the deeply held values and attitudes of the ‘substantial’ self and the behaviour expected by significant others of the ‘situational’ self. Those who achieved this match were able to consolidate their sense of identification with teaching by becoming successful at it, a process in which the reaction of pupils was highly significant. Proving one’s mastery of the task was normally accompanied or followed by a search for personal growth within it. In particular, the conditions of primary teaching did not always satisfy the individual’s sense of him/herself as someone with intellectual interests and the need for self-expression. Finally (in the time-span covered by my data) a few teachers began consciously to consider their impact upon the educational system as well as on their pupils. They saw themselves as leaders and looked to significant others who would validate them in this view of themselves. Meanwhile, others had left teaching to pursue different careers (notably parenthood) or, constrained by personal circumstances, had become ‘privatized’ workers within it. In each case their concern was for the preservation of their sense of personal identity which, contrary to their expe...

Table of contents

• Cover
• Half Title
• Title Page
• Copyright Page
• Table of Contents
• Acknowledgements
• Introduction Education and Social Change: Len Barton and Stephen Walker
• PART ONE: TEACHERS AND SOCIAL CHANGE
• PART TWO: SCHOOLS AND SOCIAL CHANGE
• Author Index
• Subject Index