European Educational Research Journal, Volume 6, Number 2, 2007 doi: 10.2304/eerj.2007.6.2.106
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EDITORIAL
Didactics – learning and teaching in Europe
BRIAN HUDSON & BERNARD SCHNEUWLY
The place of didactics, learning and teaching has been the subject of discussion within the European Educational Research Association (EERA) for several years. Significant steps were taken in 2006 at the conference in Geneva to advance this work through the organisation of an Invited Plenary Panel and an Opening Symposium as the first steps towards establishing a new EERA Network in this field. These initiatives received strong support and led to the establishment of Network 27 on Didactics – Learning and Teaching. The articles in this special issue of EERJ are based on contributions made by the authors to the Opening Symposium and Plenary Panel at the European Conference on Educational Research (ECER) in Geneva in 2006.
Whilst issues related to teaching, learning and subject content are central to pedagogical practices, associated discussions have tended to be fragmented. This fragmentation can be reinforced by institutional structures, particular policy initiatives, the strength of some discourse communities and the relative weaknesses of others. EERA Network 27 on Didactics – Learning and Teaching has been established with the aim of providing a space for dialogue for integrating such discussions, and this issue of EERJ is intended to provide a record of the starting point and to support the process of widening the debate. We hope this space will attract interest from educational researchers with interests in pedagogical practices, curriculum, student learning and the teaching of specific subject areas.
This issue of EERJ comes at a time of growing interest in teaching and learning at an international level, including particular interest in questions related to associated research and scholarship. Against this background are the long traditions within continental Europe when it comes to such questions. For example, the tradition of Didaktik can be traced back to John Amos Comenius in the seventeenth century though there is little discussion of didactics as such in the English-speaking educational community. Discussions about the nature of didactics, learning and teaching have taken on different characteristics in different national contexts and development has been especially strong in the domain of subject didactics. Furthermore, associated ideas have influenced the development of teacher education significantly in several countries within continental Europe over recent years.
For these reasons we believe that it is timely to create a space for dialogue in order to share perspectives and questions collectively as an EERA community in relation to the advancement of research and scholarship in the field of didactics, learning and teaching. This issue includes articles based on the presentations made at the ECER in Geneva by Stefan Hopmann, Michel Caillot, Yves Chevallard, Brian Hudson, Kirsti Klette and Meinert A. Meyer.
Stefan Hopmann traces the origin of Didaktik back to the ideas of students’ activity (Socrates), in a disciplinary setting (Hugh of Saint Victor), with a certain order of knowledge (Thomas Aquinas) and necessary choice of subject matter (Comenius). In the German context, Didaktik, in its different forms, can be described as systematic reflection about how to organise teaching in a
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way that brings about the individual growth of the student. This means that subject matters can open up different educative meanings for learners; and thus that teaching and learning follow different paths. Didaktik as presented is very different from a curriculum perspective where subject matter and meaning have to be close and also from the French tradition of transposition didactique, which is interested in differences between meanings and subject matter in order to enable the learning of the appropriate meanings of such matter.
Building a new academic field is the focus of the article by Michel Caillot and in particular considers the case of French didactiques. He outlines how French disciplinary didactiques were created and how they have come to be recognised by the academic and instructional systems. Since the creation of Instituts Universitaires de Formation des Maîtres (IUFM) in 1991, they have become completely integrated in French educational research and training systems. The associated development of French didactiques is seen as a major evolution in education that has taken about 40 years. In addition, more recent developments in the French-speaking area on comparative didactics are discussed. This is seen as a new field of research that groups together disciplinary didacticians in a common research programme.
The article by Yves Chevallard is on the topic of readjusting didactics to a changing epistemology. It is based on his talk given at the Plenary Panel in Geneva and provides an overview of the gradual development of the Anthropological Theory of the Didactic (ATD). It stresses important stages in the development of views of teaching and learning, and the establishment of new attitudes towards ‘the didactic’, seen as an anthropological dimension of social life.
Furthermore, it emphasises the logic behind the evolution of a ‘science of the didactic’ that, in adapting to the changing nature of its object of study, currently brings to the fore new ideas, among which the concept of ‘study and research course’ (SRC) is seen to be most promising.
Differences between traditions in relation to teaching and learning provide the focus for the article by Brian Hudson, who compares these and asks what can we learn about teaching and learning? The article aims to highlight the ways in which the study of Didaktik has offered new dimensions to and fresh insights on the notion of reflective practice. In particular, this tradition is seen to offer tools and ways of thinking that help to recognise and hold the complexity of teaching–
studying–learning processes. This provides a relational framework which places the teacher at the heart of teaching–studying–learning processes. Finally, the article aims to highlights ways in which such tools and ways of thinking can help to inform approaches to development in the didactical, pedagogical and technological uses of information and communications technology (ICT) for learning.
The contribution by Kirsti Klette focuses on trends in research on teaching and learning in schools and in particular on the meeting point between didactics and classroom studies. The relation between teaching, instruction and children’s learning is seen to arise whenever models of the teaching–learning process are discussed or whenever problems of learning occur. The primacy of teachers and teaching as the primary subjects of research is seen to have contributed to a rather limited understanding of what goes on in schools and classrooms. Few studies of teachers and teaching have examined the extent to which differences in teacher effectiveness are related to differences in teachers’ subject matter knowledge. Furthermore, discussion of issues related to teaching and learning in general terms has tended to be separate from the content that has been taught. She argues for the need to bridge studies of teaching and learning with studies of the subject involved in order to establish a conversation between didactics and classroom studies.
Finally, the article by Meinert Meyer considers didactics, sense making, and educational experience and in particular focuses on student participation in classrooms. He aims to demonstrate how effective cultivation of educational experience in schools will lead to a new perspective on the process of teaching and learning. There are seen to be no privileged methods of teaching and learning, but that in practice most teachers have in mind some fuzzy ideas of what good instruction is, and furthermore there is seen to be a great variety in how teachers involve their students and how students get involved in what happens in school. This is seen to be why the student’s didactic competence should be used in the instructional process and teachers’ and students’ sensitivity for classroom participation and student involvement should be increased.
Examples of how learners view their educational process, and how sense making can be identified and described, are outlined
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We hope that this issue of EERJ will provide a further stimulus for dialogue on the advancement of research and scholarship in the field of didactics, learning and teaching. If you have been stimulated by any of the issues raised we encourage you to consider making a proposal for a contribution to a future ECER in the near future.
