Countering Learner ‘Instrumentalism’ through Creative Mediation

Abstract

One of the most significant features of the educational reforms introduced since 1989 has been the emphasis on raising achievement levels. One of the dangers of this emphasis is that teachers and learners become instrumental in their approach to teaching and learning. Research on the creative mediation of policy shows that primary teachers appropriate reforms and adapt them to ensure a high level of learner involvement in learning. This pilot study of three year 5 and 6 classes focuses on the creative teaching strategies used to maintain learner involvement in the wake of all the reforms of the 1990s. In particular, the study uses learner perspectives as a major part of the data set.Our tentative conclusions are that the clarification of learning objectives with the learners and the reconstruction of appropriate creative learning contexts has had an effect in countering learner instrumentalism. These approaches were effective in developing learners' awareness of the learning process and enabled them to articulate perspectives concerning those processes. However, we did not find much evidence of teachers incorporating these learner perspectives into their curriculum and pedagogic programmes.2

Pedagogy and possibility thinking in the early years

“…It also reflects earlier findings in the field, which highlighted that innovation, originality, ownership and control were associated with creativity in primary classrooms (Woods and Jeffrey, 1996, Jeffrey, 2003, Jeffrey and Woods, 2003. The QCA framework includes the core element of imagination -imagining what might be -or possibility thinking (Craft, 2002), which this study seeks to expand further.…”

“…Research exploring the creativity of teachers has firmly established the presence of four core components in the art of creative teaching, including: innovation, ownership, control and relevance (Jeffrey, 2003(Jeffrey, , 2005Woods, 1995Woods, , 2002. Additionally, curiosity, connection making, autonomy and originality have been documented as key features of the pedagogy and ethos found in the classrooms of highly creative professionals (Grainger, Barnes and Scoffham, 2006).…”

Young Children’s Recognition of the Intentionality of Teaching

“…It is also possible that changes in the understanding of teaching make a difference for the child’s ability to learn from it. There are already some positive indications of this possibility because older preschoolers learn more when they are told that they are going to be taught (Jeffrey, 2003; Taylor, Esbensen, & Bennett, 1994) and when teachers appear certain about their own knowledge (Sabbagh & Baldwin, 2001). In exploring this issue, it will also be important to consider individual differences in children’s understanding of teaching and how they benefit from different learning situations.…”

The paradoxes of student learning preferences

“…(Jen) Collectively, the General Science data suggest that two things are central. One is that teachers want to develop constructivist pedagogy and be supportive towards the principles of self-reliance and self-determination that are eminently central to Ethnography and Education 151 creativity in learning in everyday classrooms (Jeffrey 2003;Jeffrey and Woods 2003). The other is that the science students actually mostly tended to reject their experiences of learning in the education so developed because they 'felt it infantilised them' (John) and provided 'an unrewarding learning experience (where) really nothing of real importance or new was learned' (Joan).…”