Curriculum studies: policies, perspectives and practices

ISBN : 978 - 989 - 8471 - 21 -5 Titl e: Cur ri culu m St udie s: Poli ci es, Pers pect ives and Pra cti ces Carl inda Lei te. An a Mour az & Pr ecio sa F ernan des ( Orgs .) Editi on : CII E - Centro de I nvestigação e Inter venção Educativas [Cen tre for Re search and In terventio n in Ed ucation ] November 2015 Graphi c Desig n: FPCEUP’s Communi cat ion Off ice / Manuel Fr anci sco Cost a Technical Support : FPCEUP’s Co mmunica tio n Of fi ce / Ana Cal das, Jo ão Ar aúj o, Pedro Gomes; CIIE / Ana Pin to, Ri ta Coelh o Trends t hat shape Curr icul um Studi es ................................................................................................................ 8 ! Leite, Carlinda ; Faculty of Psycholog y and Educatio n Sciences o f the University of P orto, Portugal ....................................................... 8 ! Fernandes, Preciosa; Faculty of Psy chology and Education Sciences of the University of Porto, Portugal ............................................. 8 ! Mour az, A na ; Faculty of Psycholo gy and Educ ation Sciences of the University of Porto, Portug al .......................................................... 8 ! POLICIES ............................................................................................................................................. 10 ! Curri cul um Ref orm and Resear ch in Chin a: A soc ial - histor ical per spective ..................................................... 11 ! Hua , Zhang; Han gzhou Norm al University, H angzhou, Ch ina ................................................................................................................ 11 ! The poli ti cs of teacher auton omy in Estonia, Germany, and Fi nland ............................................................... 29 ! Erss, Maria (itaali [email protected] ); Tallinn Univer sity, Estoni a .......................................................................................................................... 29 ! Regio nali zat ion of an Educa tio nal Syst em an d t he Cu rri cul um i ssue - The case of Madeir a (Port ugal) .......... 43 ! Santos, F. A. (faz inhaissant [email protected] ); Universi dade da Madeira, Portugal .................................................................................. 43 ! Curri cul um an d di dakt ik i n 21 st centur y: Stil l divergent or converging? ............................................................ 53 ! Tahirsylaj, Armend (armendtahirsylaj @gmail.com); The Pennsylvani a State Universi ty, United St ates of America .............................. 53 ! Curri cul ar j ust ice: Influences of TEI P program and s chools’ external evaluati on process ............................... 72 ! Sampaio, Marta; Faculty of Psy chology and Education Sciences of the University of Porto, Portugal ................................................... 72 ! Leite, Carlinda; Faculty of Psychology and Education Sci ences of the Univ ersity of Port o, Portugal ..................................................... 72 ! The ref lect ion on cult ural competency i n Est onian nationa l cur ricul a for upper secondar y school ................... 81 ! Mänd, K at ery n (ka te ryn @tl u. ee); Tallinn University, Est onia .................................................................................................................. 81 ! The teach ing of m athem atics an d the ex ternal e valuation of scho ols: A s tudy invo lving tea chers fr om 1 st to 6 th grade ................................................................................................................................................................ . 93 ! Pinto, Marta Isabel d o Amaral Carva lho (marta. pi [email protected] ); Univers idade do Minho, Portugal .............................................. 93 ! Pacheco, José Augusto ( j [email protected] ); Universidade do Minho, Portu gal ............................................................................ 93 ! Curri cul um mak ing in th e Muni ci pal Schoo ls of Pet rópol is : A rena of co nfl icts, resist ance and r econtextual isati on ........................................................................................................................................................................ 104 ! Corrêa, Cíntia Chung Marq ues (ccmch ung@compuland .com.br) ; Unive rsidade Católi ca de P etrópol is, Br azil ................................... 104 ! Ramos, Rosan e Karl (rokar l35@yahoo. com.br); Pon tifíci a Universi dade Católi ca do Rio de Janeiro, Brazil ....................................... 104 ! Federal Universi tie s Restr ucturi ng and Expansion Program ( REUNI) ............................................................ 114 ! Silveira, Ana Paula (a_silvei [email protected] om.br); Uni versidade Estadual de Campinas – UNICAMP, Brazil ................................ 114 ! Integra l Educ ation C urriculum in Bra zil: oppor tunities an d cha llenges ........................................................... 118 ! Bittencourt , Zorai a Aguiar ( zoraiabit tencourt@gmail .com); Universi dade Federal da Front eira Sul (U FFS), Brazi l ............................. 118 ! Moro si ni, Ma rí li a C ost a (ma ri li a.m oro si ni @puc rs .br ); Pontif ícia Uni versidade Católica d o Rio Grande do Sul (PUCRS), Brazil ......... 118 ! The competence approach in the hands of t he Educati on Authorit y .............................................................. 127 ! Rosselló, Maria Rosa (mros a.rosse llo@uib. es); Un iversi tat de les I lles Balears , Spain ................................................................ ....... 127 ! Pinya, Carme ( carme.pinya@uib .es); Uni versitat de les Illes Ba lears, Spa in ....................................................................................... 127 ! ACCOUN TABILITY ............................................................................................................................ 130 ! School eval uati on an d the impr ovement of curr icul ar p rocess es: which rel atio ns? ........................................ 131 ! Figueiredo, Carl a (cfigueir [email protected] ); Facul dade de Psicologi a e de Ciências da Educação da Universi dade do Porto, Port ugal131 ! Leite, Carlinda ( [email protected] ); Faculdade de Psi cologia e de Ci ências da Educação da Uni versidade do Port o, Portugal ..... 131 ! Fernandes, Preciosa ( precio [email protected] ); Facul dade de Psicologia e de Ciências da Educação da Universidade do Porto, Portugal 131 ! Extern al School Eval uati on: Teacher s’ p erspec tiv es – tw o case studies from N orthern Portug al .................. 145 ! Seab ra, F.; Open Univ ersity Portu gal, CI Ed; Uni versit y of Minho, CI Ed, Por tugal ................................................................................ 145 ! Morg ado , J. C. ; Open Uni versit y Port ugal, CIEd; Uni versit y of Minho, CI Ed, Por tugal ......................................................................... 145 ! CHALLENGES I N HIGHER EDUCATION ......................................................................................... 163 ! Ethical development in high er edu cation curricula : A stu dy in p ortugu ese en gineer ing cou rses ................... 164 ! Mont eir o, F áti ma (f at cmon t@g mai l. com ); ISEC - IPC , FPCEUP, P ortugal ............................................................................................. 164 ! Leite, Carlinda ( [email protected] ); FPCEUP, Portugal .................................................................................................................... 164 ! Rocha, Cr istina (croch [email protected] . pt); FPCEUP, Port ugal ..................................................................................................................... 164 ! Profes sors of Admini str atio n and thei r t rai ning: Knowl edge, ski ll s, abil iti es a nd at ti tudes .............................. 175 ! Will, João Manuel de Sousa ( [email protected] ); Universidade Federal do Tocantins, Brazil ................................................... 175 ! Pacheco, José Augusto ( [email protected] ho.pt); Universi dade do Minho, Portugal .......................................................................... 175 ! C urricul um movements in hi gher educat ion: ( The Irani an experi ence) .......................................................... 183 ! Vajargah, Kou rosh Fathi (kouroshf [email protected] om); Shahid Behe shti Univ ersity, Tehran, Iran ........................................................ 183 ! Debat e as a prac ti ces in High er Educat io n cur ricul a ...................................................................................... 191 ! Choque, Ka relia (karel iaqueen@hot mail.c om); FPCEUP, Portugal ...................................................................................................... 191 ! Mour az, A na (a namo ura z@f pce .u p.p t) ; FPCEUP, Portugal ................................................................................................................. 191 ! Crossing t he gap between hi gh school and Hi gher Educati on: The gap year exper ience ............................. 200 ! Araújo, Lí gia (li gialexandra [email protected] ); Faculdade de Psic ologia e de Ciênci as da Educação da Univer sidade do Porto, Portugal ............................................................................................................................................................................................................... 200 ! Mour az, A na (a namo ura z@f pce .up.pt); Faculdade de Psicologi a e de Ciências da Educação da Universidade do Porto, Portugal .. 200 ! “Flipped c lassroom ” as new c hallenge in h igher edu cation: a mu lti case study ................................ ............. 207 ! Rodrigues, D.( deborasv [email protected] ); Faculdade de Psicologia e Ciênci as da Educação da Univers idade do Porto, Port ugal207 ! Mour az, A .( ana mour az @fpc e. up. pt ); Fa cul da de de Psi co lo gia e Ci ênc ia s da Edu caç ão da Un ive rs ida de do Po rt o, Po rtu gal ........... 207 ! Integrat ing t he preventi on of gender - based vi olence i n the c urricul um design and development wit h high school teach ers .......................................................................................................................................................... 221 ! Magal hã es, Ma ri a J os é; FPC EUP, C IEG , UMAR, P ort ug al .................................................................................................................. 221 ! Pontedeira, Cátia; I SMAI, UMAR, Portugal ........................................................................................................................................... 221 ! Guerreir o, Ana; ISMAI, UMAR, Port ugal ............................................................................................................................................... 221 ! Ribeiro, Patrí cia; UMAR, Portu gal ......................................................................................................................................................... 221 ! Polic ies of highe r ed ucati on qu alif ica tion s: t he p eda gogy curricul um in di scussion ....................................... 233 ! Sarturi, Rosane C.(rc sarturi@gmail .com); Univ ersidade Fe deral de Sa nta Maria, Brazil ..................................................................... 233 ! Possebon, Camil a M.(camis.mp@gmail. com); Univer sidade Feder al de Sant a Maria, Braz i l ................................ .............................. 233 ! Veleda, Nico le Z.(ni colezveleda @gmail.com); Uni versidade Federal de Santa Maria, Brazil .............................................................. 233 ! Change: routes and chall enges in hi gher educat ion and t raining in Design ................................................... 245 ! Guerreir o, Maria Caeiro M. (mcguer reiro@ua lg.pt) ; Univ ersidad e do Al garve, Portugal ...................................................................... 2 45 ! The pract icum i n the acquis iti on of profe ssional competenc ies ...................................................................... 248 ! Rosselló, Maria Rosa (mros a.rosse llo@uib. es); Uni versit at de les Il les Ba lears, Spain ................................................................ ....... 248 ! Ferrer, Maria (mari a.ferrer - [email protected] ); Universitat de les Illes Balears, Sp ain ................................................................................. 248 ! Pinya, Carme ( carme.pinya@uib .es); Uni versitat de les Illes Ba lears, Spa in ....................................................................................... 248 ! PRACTICES AND DI SCOU RSES ..................................................................................................... 251 ! Developing Univer sity t eaching i n health - Knowledge and pr actice: Experience as a postgr aduate student 252 ! Gatto J únior, José Re nato (j rjrga tto@gma il.com); EERP - USP, Brazi l .................................................................................................. 252 ! Gonçalves , Marlene Fagundes Carval ho (mgonc alves@eer p.usp.b r); EERP - USP, Brazil .................................................................. 252 ! Fortuna, Cinira Magali ( [email protected] p.br); EERP - USP, Brazil ........................................................................................................ 252 ! Clapis, Maria Jo sé (macl apis@eerp. usp.br ); EERP - USP, Bra zil .......................................................................................................... 252 ! Bueno, Sonia Maria Ville la (smvbueno@eerp. usp.br); EERP - USP, Braz il ........................................................................................... 252 ! The curr icul um of Br azili an publ ic schools: The relevant knowl edge i n the teache rs’ persp ective ................. 260 ! Galian, Cláudia V. A. (cla udiaval entina@usp .br); School of Educ ation, Univer sity of São Paulo, Brazil .............................................. 260 ! Pedagogi cal appro aches to o ral hist ory in school s: The c ase o f t wo hi g h school classr ooms ....................... 273 ! Christod oulou, Nikolet ta (n christ odoulou@gr u.edu), Geor gia Rege nts Uni versit y, Uni ted St ates of Americ a ...................................... 273 ! Educational terminology misusage by prof essors i n nursing undergraduati on: Review ................................ . 290 ! Gatto J únior, José Re nato (j rjrga tto@gmail .com); EERP - USP, Brazi l .................................................................................................. 290 ! Almeida, Edmar Jaime de; EERP - USP, Brazi l ...................................................................................................................................... 290 ! Bueno, Sonia Maria Ville la (smvbueno@eerp. usp.br); EE RP - USP, Bra zil ........................................................................................... 290 ! Introdu ction ..................................................................................................................................................... 291 ! The prof essiona l t eaching practi ces t ransfo rmation with refer ence t o Teless ala TM Metho dol ogy : "A ca se st udy o f autonomy program fr om their educators biographies and narr a tive of life " .................................................... 299 ! Mendo nç a, Ana T ere sa Po ll o ( [email protected] ); Faculdade de Psi cologia e de Ci ências da Educação da Uni versidade do Porto, Port ugal ................................................................................................................................................................ ....................... 299 ! Initial form ation o f teache rs throu gh dista nce ed ucation in Serg ipe: Cu rriculum and un foldme nts ................ 311 ! Souto, Paulo Heimar (hei [email protected] m); Universidade Federal de Sergipe, Brazil ................................................................ . 311 ! Sobral, Maria Nei de (sssobral @gmail.com); Universidade Federal de Sergipe, Brazil ........................................................................ 311 ! Souza, Isabe lla Taty ane de Lima ( isabella. tatyane@hotmai l.com); Universidad e Federal de Sergipe, Brazil .................................... 311 ! Soares, Tat hiana Santos (tat hysoares [email protected] ); Universidade Feder al de Sergipe, Braz il .................................................. 311 ! Experi enced teach ing pract ice: The dis cursi ve move ment b etween curr icul ar proj ects and the supervi sed trai nee program ........................................................................................................................................................... 322 ! Melo , Mari a Ju lia C. (melo.mariajulia @gmail.com ); Universidade Federal de Pernambuco, Brazil ...................................................... 322 ! Almeida, Luci nalva A. A. de (ni na.ataide @gmail.com); Universi dade Federal de Pernambuco, Brazi l ................................................ 322 ! School subj ect communit y i n t imes of d eath of the Su bject ................................ ............................................ 333 ! Costa, Hu go Helen o Camilo (hugogui mel@yahoo. com.br), Stat e Universi ty of Rio de Janei ro – UERJ, Bra zil ................................... 333 ! Lopes, Alice Casimiro (alicecasimirol [email protected] ), State Uni versity of Rio de Janeiro – UERJ, Brazi l ....................................... 333 ! Curri cul um an d cu rri cul um co ntex tual is ati on: Theo ry a nd p ract ic e of st uden t t each ers ................................ . 340 ! Mart in s, Fe li sbe la ( fel is bel a. mar ti ns@ gmai l .com); Faculty of Arts and Humanities of t he University of Porto, CEGOT - Centre of St udies on Geography and Spatial Pl anning, Portug al ....................................................................................................................................... 340 ! The curr icul ar demands of t he Pengui n Revolut ion i n Braz il fight ing for qualit y educat ion ............................ 351 ! Leal, Luis (lui [email protected] ); Universidade do Estado do Rio de Janeiro, Br azil ..................................................................... 351 ! Brazi lian supe rior educ atio n: Th e new curri cul um str uctur e of Fede ral Univer sit ies ...................................... 357 ! Silveira, Ana Paula (a_silvei [email protected] om.br); Uni versidade Estadual de Campinas – UNICAMP, Br azil ................................ 357 ! Group wor k as a fac tor en hanci ng cur ric ulu m in tegr at ion in pr imar y e ducat ion ................................ ............. 361 ! Pereira, Cân dida (candidafilipapereira@hotm ail.com); Instituto Politécnico de Viseu, CI&DE TS, Escola S uperior de Edu cação, Portu gal ............................................................................................................................................................................................................... 361 ! Cardoso, Ana Paula (a.p.car [email protected] ); Instituto Po litécnico de Vise u, CI&DETS , Escola Supe rior de Educa ção, Portugal 361 ! Rocha, João ( [email protected] ); Instituto Politéc nico de Viseu, C I&DETS, Es cola Superior de Educaçã o, Portugal .................... 361 ! Quali ty of t he teac her - student inter action in pr imary school education : From e xperien tial dialog ue to em otiona l education ........................................................................................................................................................ 373 ! Góis, Só nia (s oniagoi [email protected] ); Univers ity of Aveir o, Port ugal ................................................................ .............................................. 373 ! Migu éi s, Mar le ne (mmi gu eis @ua .pt ); Univer sity of Aveir o, Por tugal .................................................................................................... 373 ! Wil l s ci en ce w it ho ut b or de rs p ro gr am br i ng rele van t c han ge s fo r brazi lian cur r ic ul um? ................................ 382 ! Bido, Maria Cl áudia Fogaça ; UNISINOS Univ ersity, Brazil ................................................................................................................... 382 ! Schools ’ Ex tern al Ev aluat ion in the pers pective of the D epartm ent Co ordina tors .......................................... 394 ! Costa, Na tália; Unive rsity of Minho , Port ugal ........................................................................................................................................ 394 ! Sousa, Joana; Universi ty of Minho, Portugal ................................................................................................................................ ......... 394 ! The curr icul ar prac tices of the trainee - te ache rs: An an alysis o f the mo veme nt betw een th e gradu ation cu rriculum and teaching practi ces in the port uguese language area ............................................................................... 401 ! Almeida, Luci nalva Andra de Ataíde de ( nina.atai [email protected] ); UFPE, Brazil .................................................................................. 401 ! Silva, Al exsandro da ( alexs - [email protected] ); UFPE, Brazil ............................................................................................................... 401 ! The communicat ive e ffect of lectur es and communicati ons i n High School ................................................... 410 ! Santos, Andr é F. (andr efreitas santos@outlook .com); Facu l dade de Psicologia e de Ciências da Educação da Univer sidade do Porto, Portugal ................................................................................................................................................................................................ . 410 ! Mour az, A na (a namo ura z@f pce .u p.p t) ; Fac ul dad e d e P si col og ia e de Ci ênc ias d a E duc aç ão da Uni ve rsi da de do Po rto , Por tu gal .. 410 ! Analysi s o f a tea ching seque nce ac cordi ng t o t he t heoret ical and metho dologi cal fou ndati ons o f di ale cti cal medi at ion ................................................................................................ ........................................................ 419 ! Nalle, Juliana G. S. (jul ianagis ele.s@gmai l.com); UNESP Uni versidad e Estadu al Paul ista – FCLAr, Brazi l ....................................... 419 ! Dall’Acq ua, Mari a J. C. (jul iacandal @gmail.c om); UNESP Universi dade Est adual P aulist a - FCLAr, Brazil ........................................ 419 ! Nalle, Claudion ei (na [email protected] r); USP Univers idade d e São Pa ulo - FEA - RP, Brazi l .......................................................................... 419 ! Limits and possibil iti es in the proces s of [ re] construct ion of the pedagogi cal - poli tical projec t of public schools: Curri cul um [ re] ar ti cula ti ons and educa tio nal pol ici es ..................................................................................... 424 ! Dalla Cor te, Mar ilene G. (mari lenedallacorte@gm ail.com); Un iversidade Fe deral de Santa Maria, Braz il ........................................... 424 ! Teixeira, Marina L. S. dos S. ( [email protected] ); Universidade Federal de Santa Maria, Brazi l .................................... 424 ! Barichello, Gabriela (g abizinhabari [email protected] ); Univers idade Federal de Santa Maria, Brazil ............................................. 424 ! Social re presen tati ons of teache rs o n th e in clusi on o f st udent s wi th d isabi li ty ............................................... 434 ! Nalle, Juliana G. S. (jul ianagis ele.s@gma il.com); UNESP Universidad e Estadual Pa ulista - FCLAr, Brazil ........................................ 434 ! Dall'Acq ua, Mari a J. C. (jul iacandal @gmail.c om); UNESP Universi dade Est adual P aulist a - FCLAr, Brazil ................................ ........ 434 ! Nalle, Claudion ei (na [email protected] r); USP Universi dade de São Paul o - FEA - RP, Brazi l .......................................................................... 434 ! THEORETICAL AND METH ODOLOGICAL CURRI CULU M PERSPECTIVES ................................ 442 ! From focu s group to Dj umbai, from r esearcher to messenger – R eflect ions f rom cross - cult ural curri culum studies researc h in Guinea - Biss au .............................................................................................................................. 443 ! Silva, Rui da (rdas ilva.email @gmail.com); Uni versidade do Minho / Cen tro de Est udos Afri canos da Uni versidade do Porto, Portu gal443 ! Curri cul um an d Di dact ics : A mat ter of powe r. The case of th e Uni ver sit y o f Ma deir a .................................... 450 ! Sousa, Jesus Maria ( [email protected] ); Unive rsity of Madeir a, Por tugal ................................................................................................... 450 ! SOCIAL AND PERSONAL CURRICULUM IMPACT ........................................................................ 466 ! Mappi ng t he ci ty – opportunit ies for curr iculum in urban educat ional contexts .............................................. 467 ! Viana, Isa bel C. (i [email protected] nho.pt); Un iversi ty of Minho, Po rtugal ............................................................................................... 467 ! Mach ado , R ic ard o J. (r ma [email protected] ); Un iversi ty of Minho, Po rtugal ......................................................................................... 467 ! Serrano, Ana M. (serrano@ie. uminho.pt); Univers ity of Minho, Portuga l .............................................................................................. 467 ! Prevent ion of gender vio lence in kind ergart en: A l ook f rom c urri culum stud ies ............................................. 477 ! Magal hã es, Ma ri a J . (mj m. umar @gma il .c om) ; UMAR - Projeto Art''The mis, Portug al ......................................................................... 477 ! Teixeira, Ana M. ( [email protected] ); UMAR - Projet o Art'' Themis, Por tugal ................................................................ . 477 ! Dias, A na T. ( [email protected] ); UMAR - Projeto Art'' Themis, Port ugal .................................................................................... 477 ! Silva, Micael a (mclslv @gmail.com); UMAR - Projet o Art'' Themis, Por tugal .......................................................................................... 477 ! Imm igrants’ fa milies in United S tates w ith scho ol - age child ren returned to P ortugal ..................................... 48 3 ! Carvalho, Elisa bete Mari a Costa Azevedo Martins de (emmc. esv@gmail. com); Fac ulty of Psyc hology and Educa tion S ciences of t he Universi ty of Porto, Portug al ................................ .................................................................................................................................. 483 ! Ferreira, El isabet e Maria Soares (el [email protected] ); Faculty of Psy chology and Education Sci ences of the Univ ersity of Port o, Portugal ................................................................................................................................................................................................ . 483 ! Correia, José A lberto (dire ctor@fpce .up.pt ); Faculty of Psychology and Educati on Sciences of t he Universit y of Porto, Portugal ...... 483 ! TECHNOLOG IES ............................................................................................................................... 497 ! Reasse rti ng curr icu lum desi gn t hro ugh v irt ual l earn ing envi ronme nts: Th e c ase of MAPE ........................... 498 ! Sousa, Franci sco (fs [email protected] ), Un iversit y of the Azo res and Research Centre on Chil d Stud ies, Po rtugal .................................. 498 ! The NMC Horiz on Report Europe 2014 scho ols edi tio n as a supranat ional curr icul ar act ............................. 508 ! Fino, C. N. (c [email protected] ), Univers idade da Madeira, Por tugal .......................................................................................................... 508 ! The impl icati ons i n the curri culum of t he school ful l t ime rel ated to t he ongo ing f ormati on of teacher s: The use of new technologi es of informati on and communicati on - NTIC theo ry pract ic e ................................................. 514 ! Oshiro, Katyusc ia (k atyyoshi ro@hotmai l.com); Univer sidade Federal do Mato Grosso d o Sul – UFMS, Br azil ................................... 514 ! Mell o, Lu cr eci a S.( lu cr eci a. mel lo @uol .c om. br) ; Uni ve rs ida de Fe der al do Mat o Gro ss o d o S ul - UFMS, Braz .................................... 514 ! Luz, Anízia A. N. ( [email protected] ); Univer sidade Federal do Mato Grosso do Sul - UFMS, Braz ............................................. 514 ! Agranito - Rodr igues, L. C ( [email protected] ); Univer sidade Federal do Mato Grosso do Sul - UFMS, Braz ............................... 514 ! ‘Digita l imm igrants’ versus ‘digital n atives’: Proble matizin g the s peech of digit al techn ologie s in curr iculum policies in Br azil .............................................................................................................................................. 527 ! Loureiro, Carla C. (carlacrislour [email protected] ), Universi dade do Estado de Santa Catari na – UDESC / Uni versida de Feder al de Santa Catarina – UFSC, Brazi l ................................................................................................................................ ........................................ 527 ! Grimm, Viv iane ( vivi. grimm@gmail. com), Universidade do Estado de Santa Catar ina – UDESC / Inst ituto Federal de San ta Cata rina – IFSC, Braz il ............................................................................................................................................................................................ 527 ! Lunardi Mendes, Geovana M. ( [email protected] ), Universidade do Estado de Santa Catarina – UDESC, Br azil ..................... 527 ! TEACHER EDUCATION .................................................................................................................... 538 ! Curri cul um pr act ice s i n t he forma tio n of hi sto ry teac hers in Ser gipe i n di st ance educa ti on: Perman ences and changes ................................................................ .......................................................................................... 539 ! Souto, Paulo H. (heimar [email protected] ); Universidade Federal de Sergipe, Brazil ................................ ......................................... 539 ! N eto, José B. (j [email protected] ); Universi dade Federal de Pernambuco, Brazil ............................................................................. 539 ! Curri cul ar ref lec ti ons in the USA: Teac hing te acher s t he edTPA ................................................................... 553 ! Todd Alan Price, National Louis Uni versity ............................................................................................................................................ 553 ! Lesson study and curri culum development .................................................................................................... 564 ! Ponte, João Pedro (jpp [email protected] sboa.pt); Instituto de Educação, Universidade de Li sboa, Portugal ............................................... 564 ! Quaresma, Marisa ( [email protected] . pt); Instituto de Educação, Univer sidade de Lisboa, Por tugal ..................................................... 564 ! Mata - Pereira, Joana (jo anamatapereira@campus. ul.pt); Insti tuto de Ed ucação, Univ ersidade de Lisboa, Portugal ........................... 564 ! Baptista, Mónica (mbapti [email protected] sboa.pt) ; Instituto de Educação, Universidade de Lisboa, Portugal ............................................... 564 ! Accompanyi ng pr imary educat ion teac hers in thei r i mprovement . Result s of a resea rch proj ect on t he st udent voice in Cantabri a (Spain) ............................................................................................................................... 575 ! Calvo Salv ador, Adel ina (calv [email protected] ); Universi dad de Cantab ria, Spai n .................................................................................. 575 ! Rodríguez - Hoyos, Carlos (rodri [email protected] ); Universidad de Cantabri a, Spain ....................................................................... 575 ! Curri cul a c ompari son of heal th and soc ial manag ement programs i n Czech Republic , Finl and, Port ugal and Scotl and .......................................................................................................................................................... 586 ! Resende da Silva, Paulo (pfs@uev ora.pt) ; Management Department - Social Sci ence School, Universi ty of Évora, Port ugal ........... 586 ! Guerreir o, Ant ónio (a [email protected] t); Management Department - Soci al Science School, Uni versity of Évora, Portugal ................. 586 ! Mänt yne va, Mi kk o ( mi kko .ma nty nev a@h amk. fi ); School of Entrepr eneurship an d Business. Häme Universi ty of Applied S ciences (HAMK), Finland ................................ ................................................................................................................................................................... 586 ! Huotari, Päivi (paiv i.huot ari@lamk. fi); Lahti University of Applied Sciences, Faculty of Soci al and Health Care, Finland .................... 586 ! Cooper ati on in Scie nce Teachi ng: The st udent s’ con tri but ions, speeches and ar guments ........................... 600 ! Barros, Marina (marina.bar [email protected] ) ; Mas ter S tud ent a t Fac ult y of Ps ych ol ogy a nd Edu cat io n S ci enc es of t he Uni ve rsi ty o f Por to, Portugal ................................................................................................................................................................................................ . 600 ! Fonseca, Miguel (mjrf123@g ma il. com); Physics Student at Universit y of Minho, Portugal .................................................................. 600 ! Ferreira, El isabete (eli [email protected] ), Assistant Professor at Facul ty of Psychology a nd Education Sciences of the Uni versity of Porto, Port ugal ................................................................................................................................................................ ....................... 600 ! Furtado, Joaquim (j [email protected] ), Geography Train ing Teac her at Cape Ver de Educa tion Un iversi ty In stitut e, Cape Verde 600 ! The curr icul um and te acher edu cation fie lds i n Braz il .................................................................................... 607 ! Santos, Luci ola (lu ciolaufmg@yahoo. com.br); Uni versidade Federal de Minas Gerais, Brazil ............................................................. 607 ! The curr icul um in e dupesquisa : When t eachers ideal ize t heir own fo rmation ................................ ................ 619 ! Cunha, Cl audia M. (cmadruga [email protected] ); UP/UFPR, Brazi l ................................................................ ................................... 619 ! Teacher authori ty i n the modern er a: Questioned pedagogical act ................................................................ 630 ! Cortizo, Telma Lima ( telmalcortizo@u ol.com.br ); Fundação Visconde de Cairu (Salvador - BA - Brasil ), Ped agogic al Coordinator at Secretaria Municipal de Ensino (Sal vador - BA - Brasil) , Univers idade do Est ado da Bahi a (PPGEduC/UNEB), Universidade do Porto (FCPEUP), Bra zil ................................................................................................................................................................................... 630 ! Ferreira, El isabete ( eli [email protected] ); Faculty of Psychol ogy and Education Sciences of the University of Porto / Member of CIIE – Centre for Research and I ntervention in Education, Portugal ............................................................................................................... 630 ! Ornellas , Lour des ( ornel [email protected] ), Universidade do Estado da Bah ia (PPGEDuc/UN EB), Br azil ........................................ 630 ! Towards a gender violenc e prevent ion curri culum: Cont ribut ions from t eacher educati on ............................ 639 ! Cordeiro, Joana; UMAR, UBar celona, Spain ......................................................................................................................................... 639 ! Magal hã es, Ma ri a J os é; FPC EUP; C IEG ; UMAR, Port ugal .................................................................................................................. 639 ! Costa, Di ana; UMAR, FPCEUP, P ortugal ............................................................................................................................................. 639 ! Mende s, Ta ti ana ; UMAR , F PCE UP, Po rt uga l ................................................................................................................................ ....... 639 ! Refl ect ive pra cti ce, ski ll s a nd a sses sment in in iti al te acher t rai ning ............................................................... 648 ! Almeida, Síl via de ( silvia. [email protected] om); Faculdade de Ciênc ias Sociais e Humanas - CICS.NOVA, Portugal .................. 648 ! Profes siona lis atio n of tea cher educat ion in Maurit ius: Anal ysin g te acher educat ion curr icu lum development process at the MIE .......................................................................................................................................... 663 ! Sandhaya, Gian ( [email protected] g); Maur it iu s Ins ti tu ti on of Ed uca ti on, Ma uri ta ni a ............................................................. 663 ! Udhin Waai za (w.ud hin@mieonl ine.org ); Maur it iu s Ins ti tu ti on of Ed uca ti on, Mau ri tan ia ...................................................................... 663 ! School management : t heor etic al t rai ning in confr ontat ion wit h pr acti ce ......................................................... 677 ! Mell o, Lu cr éci a Str in ghe tt a ( lucrecia.mello@ uol.com.br ); UFMS/CPTL, B razil ..................................................................................... 677 ! Luz, Anízia Aparecida Nune s ( [email protected] om ); PPGEdu/UFMS, Brazil ................................................................................... 677 ! Oshiro, Katyusc ia ( katyoshi [email protected] ) ; PPGEdu/UFMS, Brazil .................................................................................................... 677 ! Rodrigues, Laís de Cast ro Agra nito ( l [email protected] ); PPGEdu/UFMS, Brazi l ......................................................................... 677 ! The organi zati on of the curri culum th rough pr oject s approac h in Early Childho od Educat ion: Challeng es to teach er training ................................................................................................ ............................................... 688 ! Agranito Rodr igues, Laí s de Cast ro ( laisuf [email protected] ); PPGEdu/UFMS, Brazil ......................................................................... 688 ! Mell o, Lu cr éci a Str in ghe tt a ( lucrecia.mello@ uol.com.br ); UFMS/CPTL, B razil ..................................................................................... 688 ! Luz, Anízia Aparecida Nunes ( [email protected] om); PPGEdu/UFMS, Brazil ................................................................................... 688 ! Os hiro, Katyusci a ( [email protected] ) ; PPGEdu/UFMS, Brazil .................................................................................................... 688 ! Teacher t rain ing and the inter face wi th t he achi evement of th e curr iculu m in Ear ly Chi ldhood Educati on .... 698 ! Agranito Rodr igues. Laí s de Cast ro ( [email protected] ); PPGEdu/UFMS, Brazil ......................................................................... 698 ! Mell o, Lu cr éci a Str in ghe tt a ( lucrecia.mello@ uol.com.br ); ! UFMS/CPTL, B razil ..................................................................................... 698 ! Functio nal kn owledge of Univer sity of Murcia ( Spain) Pedagogy st udents .................................................... 709 ! Torres Soto, Ana; Departamento de Didáctic a y Organización Escolar. Facult ad de Educación. Univ ersidad de Murcia, Spain ........ 709 ! Vallejo Rui z, Mónica; Departamento de Didáctic a y Organiz ación Escol ar. Facul tad de Ed ucaci ón. Universidad de Murcia, Spain ... 709 ! García He rnández, Mª Luis a; Depar tamento de Didá ctica y Organi zación Escolar . Facu ltad d e Educac ión. Un iversi dad de Murcia, S pain ............................................................................................................................................................................................................... 709 ! 8 Trends t hat shape Curr icul um S tudies Leite, Carl ind a ; Facu lty of Psy cholog y and E ducatio n Scie nces o f the Un iversity of P orto, P ortugal Fernandes, Prec iosa ; Faculty of P sycho logy an d Educati on Scienc es of th e Uni versi ty of Po rto, Port ugal Mou ra z, Ana ; Facu lty of Psy cholog y and E ducatio n Scie nces o f the Un iversity of P orto, P ortugal Altho ugh, tradi ti onall y, European countries follow centra liz ed or decent rali zed polic ies regard ing educa tion , according to thei r polit ical syst ems, the European space has been taking form, since t he nineties, by borrowing and lendin g policie s (Stein er - Khamsi & Waldow, 2012) that became internati onal ly importan t and all owed the comparison of PISA results and that ha d an im pact on interna tional a gencies. These movements and chains of influen ce brou ght to the curric ulum are na the hard balance betwee n centraliz ed and de centra lized curric ulum decisions (Kui per et al., 2008; Leite & Fernandes, 2012), especially t ho se related with decision makers and the role performed by teachers and schools concerning such issue. New ways to develop curriculum practice were also brought into light and supported the research that pointed out the urgency to promote teachers’ agency ( Priest ley et al ., 2012) and, simultaneously, emphasized new relationshi ps between curriculum and assessment (Hayward, 2015). The European Conference on Curriculum Stu dies w as t he perf ect arena to ref lect on suc h tr ends. It is bec ause of that tha t this e- book has been or ganized. The book en titled Curric ulum S tudies – Policies, Perspecti ves and Pract ices explores polici es, perspecti ves and pract ices and their articul ati on and gat hers research articl es f rom various countries, all of them focused on curr iculum studies. Authors from Cyprus, Estonia, S pain, Switzerland, Brazi l, Isr ael, Iran, Chin a and Portugal have cont ribu ted to this e - book by deepening the curriculum studies debate. These differ ent artic les show that the researchers m enti oned above all have the desire to contr ibute to a more adequate curr iculum t hat meets the curr ent demands. The 62 a rtic les ar e orga nized in t he fol lowing themes r elate d to curri culum: - Polic ies - Account abil it y - Chall enge s i n Hi gher Edu cati on - Pract ices and disco urses - Theoreti cal and meth odo log ic al cu rr ic ul um per spe ct ive s - Social and pers onal curr icul um i mpact - Technologies - Teacher educati on To sum up, one can conclude by reading the e - book that Curriculum Studies ar e alive and ready to fac e challenges emerging in Europe, as well as other Continents, with the unaccom plished promise to enhance Europe into the most a dvan ced s oci et y when i t come s to kn owl edg e p rod uct i on and i ts us e, a s p ro cla ime d i n Bol og na Pro ces s, an d able to respond t o the democrac y cris is (We β els, 2015). Polici es 15 funda men tal st ructure , and C hinese c ulture as practical use”. L iberalism a dvocate d reform ism, and tried to rea lize enlightenment based on western cult ure. Radicalism beli eved M arxism - Lenini sm, deni ed C onfuciani sm and libera lism, an d adv ocated radica l social t ransfor mati on through class s truggles and social revol utions. One year lat er fol lowi ng the ini ti ati on of 1922 Curri cul um Reform, Science - Metaphysics Debate happened. Some persons participat ed in both m ovements. Among t hem, Hu Shih was the m ain leader for both movem ent s. We can say that Science - Met aph ysi cs Debat e is the theor et ic al fou ndat i on for 1922 Curr i cul um Reform no matt er if the partici pants real ized it. So, understandi ng the nature of Science - Met ap hys ics Deb at e l ai d f oun dat io n f or understanding 1922 Curri culum Refor m an d t he f ol lowi ng c urr icul um r esea rch. 1922 Curriculum Reform . A fter th ree years’ o f pre paration an d d evelop menta l pro cess, on Ja nuary 1, 19 22, Mini st ry of Edu cat io n of Rep ubl ic of Chi na i ss ued School System Refo rm Decree , which sym bolize d the init iatio n of 1922 new school system and new curri culum reform. Fi rstl y, China adopted a school system of 6 years ’ elementary schools, 3 years’ middle schools, and 3 years’ high schools, a lso called “6 -3- 3 school system”, w hich has been lasted for to day a fter an interrupti on and destruction in “Cultural Revolution” in 1966 - 1976. This school system was borrowed from the U nited States and symbolized the establi shment of m odern education system in C hina. Secondl y, China built up the first modern curri cul um system, includin g th e f irst p ackag e o f cu rriculum s tandar ds The O utl ine of New Curriculu m Standards for New School System , relate d textboo ks, new teachin g meth ods an d other implementation system. T his opened up Chinese curricul um fiel d and left perennially valuable legacy for curriculum reform and research in China (H. Zhang 2014) . The basic philosophy for the new school system and curriculum system is the “seven standards”: 1) Adapting to the need of socia l evolut ion or progre ss ; 2) Promoting the spirit o f democratic education ; 3) Seeking the development of individuali ty or personalit y ; 4) Fostering the economic abili ty of citizens ; 5) Emphasizi ng life educatio n ; 6) Making education universal ; 7) Creating enough flexibility to mee t the nee ds of loc al place s (Nationa l Association o f Education , 1925, p.12 7) . What ’ s the ess enc e and sig ni f ic an ce of 1922 Curri culu m Refor m? Fir st l y, it chose educa ti onal en li gh te nme nt as it s main th eme and aim. So, it is an organ ic par t of May Four th Movemen t. Social evolut i on and i ndividual development, democratic education and life education, universal education and curriculum flexibi lit y, and so on, all these ide as emb ody the ess ence of edu cationa l en lightenm ent. The y a re the concr etization of dem ocra cy and science in curriculum f ield . I f in s ocial - political field, the outcome of May F ourth Movement is that salvation and revolution overw helme d en lightenme nt, in educ ational field , the seed of enlighte nment wa s kep t well and grew up throug h the great caus e of c urriculum refor m. 19 22 Curri culu m Refo rm sowe d th e see d of educ ati onal democ racy in Ch ina. Secondl y, it was based on liberali sm, meanwhile absorbed the positi ve elements of radical ism and conservat ism. The main leaders of this curricul um refor m are liberali sts, e.g. Hu Shih, Tao Xingzhi, Huang Yanpei, Zhu Jingnong, to nam e a few. Th e main progress ivists Joh n Dewe y, Paul M onroe , and William Head Kilpatrick d irectly partici pated in t his curri culum refor m and contributed their thoughts and wisdom to it. Because of its nature of demo cracy, science, and personal freedom, 1 922 Curriculum Reform sym bolized the initiat ion of educational democratizati on in China. With progressiv e education movement in North Am erica, new education movem ent in Europe, 1922 Curric ulum Reform and the whole new education movement in R epublic of China formed a magni f ic ent s cen ery o f wor ld ed uca ti ona l de mocr at iz ati on i n ear ly 2 0et h cen tur y. Polici es 16 On the othe r han d, t he i nte ract io n among libera li sm, r adi cal ism, and c onser vat ism i s ve ry we ll in 1922 Curri cul um Refor m. For example, “ fosterin g the ec onom ic ab ility of citize ns ” (standa rd 4) obv iously e mbodie s the influen ce o f radicalism (Chin ese M arxism ), becau se it emphasize s the function o f econ omic b ase. “ Emphasizi ng lif e educat ion ” (standard 5) embodied C onfuci an educatio nal wisdom, and also borrowed the essential thoughts of progressive education i n America. Thirdl y, it promoted the dem ocrat izati on of education and societ y, and cult ural development. D emocrat ic educati on is the midw ife of democr atic society . 1922 Curric ulu m Ref or m had per sona l fr eed om and democ ra ti c soc iet y as it s ultimate aims. Through this curriculum reform, people’s creativity was released and developed. Based on this, cultural developm ent w as a t the peak in the first part of 20eth century. D uring the so cial dem ocratizat ion and cultural developm ent, large numbe rs o f distinguished scholars a nd professionals emerged. They conversely promoted social and cul tural development. Chine se curr icu lum stud ies was given bi rth in 1922 Curr icul um Refor m. During 1922 - 1948, hundreds of cur riculum papers and dozens of curriculum books were published. Curriculum studies gained its initial prosperity. What is the characteristi cs o f curriculum research during 1922 - 1948? Firstly, curricul um resear ch focused on solving problems in cu rriculum re form. It w as p roblem - based. Secondly, positi vely introduci ng foreign curri culum theories and recons tructing them ac cording to the ne ed of curriculum re form. For ex ample, the b ooks of Am erican curricu lum scholars F. G. Bonser, Franklin Bob b itt, an d W illiam Ch arters we re tra nslated into Chin ese. Bas ed o n th ese curriculum theories and the practical need of curriculum reform in China, m any curriculum books composed, published, and read widely. Thirdly, wholeheartedly studying progressi ve though ts o f e ducatio n, in tegrating th em into curric ulum refor m, and form ing Chines e ideal of educatio nal demo cracy . T he repres entativ e books of John Dewey, Paul Monroe, and W il li am Head Kil patr ick were tr ansl ated into Chinese. They were invi ted to China to give long - te rm le ctures and sem inars. T heir th oughts were the im portan t reso urces for C hinese educ ators to form their own curriculum philosophy and carry on curriculum reform and new education m ovement. At that time, both libera lists an d rad icals (e.g. C hen D uxiu ) wh olehea rtedly sang the pra ises o f new ed ucation . Fou rthly, historical consciousness was emp hasized in curricul um field. Because of the wide and deep influence of Confucianism, Chine se cu rri cul um fi el d pai d gr eat attent ions on histor ical st udy from the very be ginning. M any curricul um history books were publ ished duri ng that stage (H. Zhang 2014, 37 - 46). In China , cu rriculum stu dies is a lib eral and dem ocratic ca use. Wh en society ge ts libe ral and dem ocratic, it is prosperous. When society gets cl osed and autocr atic, it declines, even di es. Radica li sm, Ultr a - Lefti sm, and t he Disappear ance of Curriculum Fi eld From Radicalism to Ultra - Leftis m . The founding of People ’s R epublic o f C hina m eans th e doub le victor ies of national salvation and radical ism. On one hand, after dozens of years’ wars (the Northern Expedition, Anti - Japanese W ar, War of Liberation, and so on), China got independent, united, and equal at last. It got independent from one - hundred - year invasi ons of foreign countr ies. It got domestic unity a nd ended dozens - of - year w arlordi sm. It overth rew th e dom ination of landlo rd class a nd bur eaucra t - capitali st class, an d the great m ass of working class got equal rights and social status. Along with these great achievements, the salvation theme and revolution cultur e got more and more popular, and t he task of enli ghtenment was put at margin, even completel y overlook ed. Polici es 17 On the ot her hand, Marxi sm - Leni nism and M ao Zedong Thought gained their absolute dominance in Chinese society. Mao Zedong Thought is the unit y of Marxism - Leninism and China’s revoluti onary practice. As a philosophy, its essence is dialecti cal material ism, which is the connection between Marxist materialis m and dialecti cs, and Chinese practice (revolutionary wars of peasants) and t raditi onal m il itarist dialectics (Li, Z. 2008, 180 - 181). It is mainly for med by “theory of contradicti on” and “theory of practi ce”. The former treats t he world as a “contrad iction - based world”, which is determined by “principal contradictions” and “principal aspects of contradictions”. This theory lays firm foundations for class struggles, social revolutions, and social movemen ts. The latter establish es th e pr iority o f pra ctice and ac tions. Any k nowle dge a nd th eory are in, by, and fo r actio ns an d practice. This theory la ys firm foundations for reconstructi ng the world. As an ideology, M ao Zedo ng Thought is the unity of Marxist revolutionary theory or class - struggle theory and Chinese traditional moralism. S ocialism, proletar iat, collecti vism, and public ownership are revo lutionar y an d m oral. In c ontras t, cap italism, bou rgeois, individ ualism , and private o wner ship are coun terrevo lutiona ry and imm oral. Politica l correctne ss and mor al nobility become a forceful means of social control. “Struggle philosophy of ‘taki ng class st ruggle as the key li nk’, moralism of ‘ fighti ng pri vacy and critici zing revisionism’, and populism of ‘l earning from poor and lower - mid dl e peasan ts ’, form the ba sic charac teristics of Mao Ze dong ’s la ter th ough t.” (Li, Z. 200 8, 2 05 - 206). In order to establi sh the absolute dominant positi on of Mao Zedong Thought, all kinds of liberal ism and conservativis m were criticized and prohibit ed. F or exam ple, both Hu Shih and John Dewey were fiercely criticized. “The last C onfucian” Liang Shuming was al so c rit ici zed. So , radicalis m ines capab ly wen t into ultra - le ftism. The persist interacti on between salvat ion theme or revolutionar y culture and Chinese Marxism made C hinese society getti ng more and more radicalized. The question is: how did thi s radicalizat ion get i ts way? I n Mar x’ s the ory of socia l deve lop ment , the re is a mec han ic seq uenc e: from pri mit iv e soci et y to slav ery socie ty , to feuda l s ociety, to socialist and com mun ist society. This social desig n overlook s individual deve lopme nt and the value of civil soci ety. Bec ause i t emphasizes t he devel opment of t he totali ty of human beings, it overlooks individ ual develop ment. Fo r Ka rl M arx, only in the future “com munis t so ciety”, “the free d evelop men t of each is the condition for the development of all”. (M arx, K. and En gels , F. 19 48). Be cause it em phasize s mo nistic so cial system, it overlooks the value of m ultiple civil society and public spheres. So , Bakuning criticized Marx’s social theory and po inted ou t th at it mus t r esult in “the new priv ileged po litical - scientific class” (Pipes, R. 1990, 1 35. Quote d in Yu Y. 2004, 49). Milova n Djila s direct ly call ed this “ne w class”. “New cl ass is the ruler who has unli mit ed and absolute powers. Because they are not somewhat restr ained by civi l soci eties l ike old r uling cl ass, thei r powers are unlimited and absolute.” (Yu, Y. 2004, 49). In 1918, Lenin defined “proletarian dict atorship” as “rule unrestrict ed by any l aw”. Thereaf ter, Joseph Stal in ful ly exer ted t he ruli ng power of the “new class” and formed hi ghly centralized soci al system of monism. That is Stali nism. New China had Stali nism as i ts model. In early 1 940s, M ao Zed ong rais ed the the ory of “ne w dem ocracy ”, which is a c ompre hens ive social sy stem a nd ideal of the integ rity of capitalis m and socia lism, and a dvoc ates nation al, sci entif ic, and mass culture. After the found ing of Pe ople’s R epub lic o f C hina, M ao Zed ong ga ve up this th eory, sys tema tically and fully bo rrowe d Stali nis m, meanwhi le, cons tant ly critic ized “right ism”. The main const it uents of later Mao Zedong Thought ar e: th e idea o f “po litics in co mma nd”; the the ory of th e str uggle b etwee n b ourge ois a nd p roletar iat, ca pitalism an d socialism; and the theory of co ntinuous revolution under the proletarian d ictator ship. This laid the theoretical found ation fo r “Cultur al Rev oluti on” (1966 - 1976). This theory and the related practice formed ultra - leftism. The enlightenment t heme was thoroughly crit icized and abandoned. The long - term feud alist ide ology took this Polici es 18 opportunit y and systematic ally recov ered itsel f. So, the integrity of feudalism and ultra - leftism form ed th e bas ic nature of “Cult ural Revol ution”. Under the above social - historical background, educational field start ed its tortuous process of development. Because of the al ter nati on of mainstream i deolo gy, 1922 Curricu lum Ref o rm and th e related curriculum ideas and theorie s toward s enlighten men t o r d emoc racy wer e prohibited . M ean while all the New Educa tion Refo rm Moveme nt in the perio d of Repub li c of China was abando ned. The pro gr ess ive educa tor s like Hu Sh ih , Huang Yanpei, Che n Heqin, even John Dewey, William Head Kilpatrick, and Paul M onroe were fiercely critici zed. All the educational i deas like “i ndividual development”, “democrat ic educati on”, “l ife educati on”, “chi ld - center ed education”, and so on, were tr eated as “bourgeoi s pedagogy”, and should be crit icized and rooted out. Kairov ’s Pedagogy . Ho w to cons truct “p roletarian peda gogy” ? The mos t conv enient way was to b orrow the re ady - made peda gog y from the former Sovie t Unio n. The main legi ti mat e pedag ogy is Kairov ’s Pedagogy . It was transla ted in to Ch inese and publish ed in Chin a in 1950, revise d for three times and reprinte d for man y time s. It fu lly embodied Stalini sm and was permitt ed by the resolution of Soviet Union M inist ry of Education. It deeply influenced New Chi na’ s e d ucational theory, pract ice, and policy, and pr ovided t he “model” for “ sociali st pedagogy” . In Ka irov’s Pedagogy , th ere are three “ba sic con cepts”: “ comm unist e ducatio n”, “instru ctional c ontents ”, and “instruction” (Kairov, I. 1953, 1 4 - 15). So called “communist education” , “is to purposeful ly and designedly nurture the yo unger g enera tion, in ord er to help th em p ositively p articipate in the con struction of com munis t society, a nd positiv ely defend Soviet country who has built up this society.” (14). So called “instructiona l co ntents”, “is the system of knowledge, skills, and skillful techniques, which students must master” (15). So called “instructi on”, “is the work des ignedly imple men ted in sch ools. Tha t me ans te ache rs sys tematic ally an d or derly tr ansm it know l edge to stude nts and o rganize s tudents ’ a ctivities, in ord er to help the m cons ciously, p ositively, an d firmly ma ster certa in knowledge, skills, and skillful techniques, and help each of them develop the character suitable for communist education tasks, based on the positive instructional work.” (15). So, in Kairov’s Pedagogy , ed ucation is th e proce ss that teac hers dom inantly tra nsmit kno wledg e, skills and tec hnique s to s tudents a nd deve lop stude nts’ comm unist consciousness, characters, and behaviors. B ecaus e “ instruc tional contents” play most important roles in thi s process, they must be deter mined by gover nments. So curriculum conceptions are thoroughly removed i n Kairov’s Pedagogy . After the suf fic ient learni ng fro m Kairov’ s Pedagogy , New C hina tried to es tablish its o wn peda gogy, whic h is called “revolut ionary pedagogy”. Somebody called it “Mao Zedong Pedagogy” (Dong, B. 2011). This pedagogy has the followin g chara cteristics: it cha nged “m oral ed ucation ” in to “political ed ucation ”, w hich m eans ed ucation mu st serve the main stream ideo logy, a nd p ut “po litical ed ucation ” at th e first pos ition; it e mph asizes the con nection s be tween education and productive labor and the m asses, which is a “labor - orient ed education”; it has M arxist dialectical mate ri al is m as its theoretical found ation, which is actually Mao Zedo ng’s “theory of practice ” and “theory of contradictions”; it has workers with soci alist consci ousness and culture as the ulti mate educational aim. The commonali ties between Kairov’s Pedagogy and C hinese “ revo lutionary ped agogy” are politics - oriented and training - based. Both have communist or socialist consciousness and characters as educati onal aims. Both believe in ma terialism and em phas ize the do minan t role of ed ucation , so they advoca te trainin g - based methodology of education. In the perspective of this kind of pedagogy, “instruct ional contents” are determined by power sectors Polici es 19 who are in charge of ideolo gy. Teachers and st udent s have no power to make curri cul um decisi ons. Educati onal researc hers have no power either . So, curri culum fiel d disappear ed. There is an important difference between Kairov’s Pedagogy and Chinese “revolutionary pedagogy”: the former emphasizes the instructi on of systematic knowledge and skills; the latter is labor - ori ented, and despises the learn ing of sy stema tic knowled ge and skills. So, in th e period of “C ultura l R evolu tion”, Mao Zedon g fiercely critici zed Kairov’s P edagogy , called it “fa lse pe dagog y”, urge d peo ple “no t to ha ve blind faith in it” a nd “to eliminate its pe rniciou s i nfluence” (Dong B ., 2011, 527 - 528). That’s why after “cult ural Revolution”, especially since the recove ry of the national examin ation fo r the entranc e to universities in 1977, Kairov’s Pedagogy has gradually recove red its life in Ch inese ed ucational field, although it disappeared in Russia for dozens of years. In today’s China , Kairov’ s Pedagogy still has strong influence in educational research field and is still one of the ma in found ations for “testing - orient ed education” in practic al field. It still hinders the realizat ion of the ideal of educational democratizati on in China. Pragmati sm, Humani sm, and the Recovery of Cur ricul um Fi eld In 1976, M ao Zedong died and then “Cultural Revoluti on” w as ended. In 1978, Chinese government init iated the reform a nd op ening - up policy. In order to lay firm theoretical foundations for this policy, the government led the Discu ssi on on the Issue of Truth Stan dards , and achieved a great succ ess. The concl usi on is: “pr acti ce is the only standard to test truth”. The government alleged that it is a “Marxist view”. But it actually a pragmatist point. Using practice or the consequence of actions to tes t the effectiveness of proposit ions is the pragmati st vi ew of tr uth, which faces to the futur e, contr ols the relati onsh ip betwee n c auses and effects, changes causes into m eans, and effects into ends. So it is a practical or acting view of truth. Remembering that C hinese most famous liberali st Hu Shih sai d th e same words when he ta lked about John Dewey’ s phil osophy on Jul y 10, 19 21. He said, “Practice is the only touchs tone to tes t truth ”. ( Hu, Shi h, 2001, p.51 ). So the Discussion on the Issue of Truth Stan dards symbolized the recovery of liberalism in China. Deng X iaoping raised two famous “theories”. O ne is “crossing the river by feel ing t he ston es”, wh ich me ans m oving s teadily a nd cau tiously b y testing e ach ste p. This is a s pirit of trial - and - error. We can call it “stone theory”. T he other is “whether a w hite cat or black cat, a good cat catches mice”, which means going beyond the deb ate of the ideologies between “capitali sm” and “socialism”, and finding effecti ve method to develop economy. This is a typical pragmatic atti tude. W e can call it “cat theory”. These two theorie s are th e good exam ples of p ragm atism a nd libera lism in C hina. Radic ali sm al so changed in 1980 s, which was embod ied as th e deb ate on humani sm in Marxi st camp. I n or der to confront the human isti c disasters in “Cultural Revolution” and deeply understand the causes that gave rise to them, Chine se inte ll igen tsi a start ed t o think about the foll owing questions: What i s the essence of humanity? W hat is the relationsh ip betw een h uman ism an d M arxism? Are there any phen omen a of alienations in so cialism? In o rder to answer these questions, K arl Marx’s early works, especially Econ omic and Philosophi c M anuscripts of 1844 , wer e whole heart edl y re ad an d st udie d by Chinese intell ect ual s. The concl usi on i s t hat feudali st ide olog y i n th e name of “socialism ” is the roo t of hu manistic disa sters. Becau se of feudalist ideo logy such as ap otheo sis and personality cult, “hum an beings are no longer human beings, but slaves and sinners groveling at t he feet of gods, or w ild beasts wearing the masks of gods.” (Li, Z. 2008, 211). Human dignity and human values are sacred and inviolable. Individ uals h ave unique values and must not be overlooked and denied in the name of “collectivi sm”. Marxism is Polici es 20 humanism, and hum an beings are t he star ting point of Marxism. Sociali sm also has the phenom ena of ali enations and should be overcome by ref lection and critici sm. The establishment of Marxism as “human - beings - centered philosophy” means the cr iti cism and t ranscendence of the t heory of class struggl es. Th e return t o liberalism and the turn to humanism in Marxism cooperat ed to form the second enlightenment in 1980s in Ch ina. It w as “a n aw akenin g era, which was full of ide als, pa ssions , and hopes .” “198 0s wa s full o f passions and i deals. These passions were not only for indivi duals (individual interests, personal emancipations, and so on), but also for the society, country, nation, and even higher objectives. So they were the passions connected to ideals.” (Li, Z . 2014a, 341). The second e nlightenment inherit s the basic spirits of the first one, i.e. May Fourt h Move ment , and fu ll y develo ped the m. Firs tl y, it pr ais ed t he dignity of humanity and the values of individ uals, an d oppos ed the re pressio n of feuda lism an d collectiv ism to ind ividuals . Li Zehou said, “Th e main feature o f 1 980s was the awak ening of individua ls, w hich inherite d th e characte ristic of M ay Fourth Mov e ment : individ uals’ awak ening from colle ctive contro ls. M ay F ourth Mov eme nt is the awake ning from the thous ands of years’ control of feudalist powers. In 1980s, it was indivi duals’ awakening from the dozens of years’ contr ol of collective po wers. ” (340 - 341 ). Th e awake ning of the co nsciousn ess of individ uals and h umanity w as emb odied in various ways: philosophy, literature, arts, a nd everyday lif e. Secondly, it advocated freedom and democracy, and critici zed feudali sm and despotism. In the light of the sever e destr uction of legal syst em and the abuses of human rights in “Cultural Re volution”, the political claim s of democra cy and freedo m were de eply discusse d and pursu ed. One of the effor ts is “New Enli ght enment Movement ” in late 1980s . Duri ng the great debat e on hum anism and alienati on issue, some dem ocrati c intell ectuals initiated a journal New Enlight enment . Wang Yuanhua was the editor - in - chief, and Li Shu, Li Rui, Yu Guangyuan, Wang Huide, Li Shenzhi, Hu Jiwei, Q in Chuan, Wang Ruoshui, Li Honglin, and Li Pu formed the editori al committee. The aim of this jour nal was “to promote the emancipation of human thoughts, initi ate new enlightenment in the w hole nation, and carry on the reform of politi cal system.” (Li, R. 2010, 19). New Enli ghtenment was first rel ea sed in October, 1988, and was banned in 1989. It published four issue s in total. It p romo ted the c omm unicat ion of the thoug hts of d emoc racy an d freed om. T hirdly, it a dvoc ated scientifi c spirits, and fought against ignorance and supe rsti tion. In 1978, Chine se governm ent organized the First Nati onal Confere nce on Scien ce. Deng Xia opin g call ed for “mar chi ng towar d scienc e” in thi s conf erenc e. The social atmosphere of r especting science and sci entists was f ormed (Zou, S. 2009, 39 - 40). The main diff erence betwee n the second enlightenment and the first one, May Fourth M ovement, was embodied in the relation ship betw een enligh tenm ent and salva tion or revolution . For May Fou rth Movem ent, the relatio nship between enlightenment and salvation was com plic ated, and salvat ion ov erwhe lmed en lightenm ent at last. Enlig htenment there fore be came an unfi nishe d task. For the se cond enl ight enment, the ten sions between sal vati on and enli ghtenment did not exist, and enlightenment first ly overwhelmed salvati on in Chinese his tory. Just as Li Zehou said i n 1989, “If salvation overwhelmed enli ghtenment in revolutionary age in the past, today enlightenment is s alvatio n. T he o nly way t o m ake the c ountry pro sperou s a nd s trong, and to rea lize m ode rnizatio n, is to st rive for democracy, freedom , re ason, and the rule of law ” (Li, Z. 2014b, 4 9). Ba sed o n the s econd enligh tenme nt in 1 980s, many soci al thou ght s were gene rat ed and deepl y infl ue nce the socie ty in 1990s. For exampl e, pra gmat is m, utili tari anism, cultural conservati sm, nationalism, neo -l ibe ralism , n eo - leftis m, po st - moder ni sm, and so on, were popular and influential (Zou, S. 2009, 41 - 44). Meanwhile, politics, economy, culture, and education were deeply changed. Polici es 21 Shanghai Cur ricu lum Reform . On t he background of the second enlight enment and the refor m and opening - up policy, C hinese government init iated educational reform. In M ay, 1985, the government released The Party Central Committ ee’ s Decisi on to Refor m Educatio nal Syst em . The main conte nt is to change centraliz ation into decentrali zation in educational system. It points out the m ain problems in curriculum and teaching: “Many curriculum contents are obsolete. Teaching m ethods are rigid. Students’ practical w ork is overlooked”. These problems result in “students’ very low abilit ies to live an independent life and to think creativel y” (The Party Central Committ ee. 1985). This offi ci al document points out the futur e direct io n of curricu lum refor m. In 1986, the government issued the first Compulsory E ducation Law, and regulated that China would enact 9 years’ compulsory education from 1986 on. Universal and massive education i s the basic character of C hinese education. In or der to meet the re qui re ment s of comp ul sor y educ at ion and the decen tr al i zed educational system, the government initiate d a cur riculum reform . Sha nghai, as one of the most im porta nt cities in Chin a, led th is curric ulum reform . Shanghai Curr icul um Refo rm was initia ted in May, 198 8. It was a whole syst emati c K - 12 curriculum ref or m. I n September , 1991, the ne w curri culu m was experi mented i n some scho ols. From 1993 on , it was gradu all y spread to the w hole c ity. The main a im for th is curricu lum refo rm w as regu lated a s follows : “Prima ry and secon dary schools sh ould provide well - rounde d education of m orali ty, intelli gence, body, aestheti cs, and labor. Students should becom e good citizens with well - developed ideological qualities, cultural qualit ies, physical quali ties, and labor qualities, w ho should develop good individuali ties and mee t the need of so cialist co nstructio n cau se.” (W ang, S. 1991, 20). “Quali ti es educa tion ” and “i ndiv idual devel opment” are the soul f or Shangh ai Curr icul um Refor m. To change “teaching to tests” into “qualit ies education”, and “collective - center ed education” int o “individu al development” is the main objecti ve for this reform. Because it explicitl y raised the idea of “indi vidual development”, it was the dy namic part o f the se cond e nlighte nmen t. In o rder to em body the idea o f “qu alities e ducatio n” an d rea lize th e aim of “indivi dual development”, Shanghai Curri cul um Ref orm c reat ed a “ped agogi cal model ” of c urri cul um de sign , wh ich was f ormed by t he dy namic intera ction am ong social n eeds, s ystem s of sub ject m atters, a nd stud ents’ d evelop ment . This m odel a bsorbe d the reason able ele ments of three typical theo retical orien tations o f curriculum desig n — “the subjec t - center ed curriculum”, “the student - centered curriculum”, and “the social - centered curriculum”, and carefully avoided the biases of each orientati on. For Shanghai Curriculum Reform, the integri ty of social needs, systems of subject matt er s, and stud ent s’ devel op ment forms the keys to ne of “q ual it i es educ at ion ” and “i ndi vi du al dev elo pmen t” . Thi s model over ca me the shor tc omi ngs of lon g - term domin ant orientation s of “soc ial - centered curriculum” and “subject - centered curricul um” in China, and recovered the status of students’ needs and development in curriculum (Zho ng, Q. 1 995, 30 - 36). I n order to promote “individual development” of students, Shanghai C urric ulum Reform created a new curriculum structure, which wa s constitut ed by compulsory curriculum, elective curricul um, and activity curriculum. Becau se of the highly cen tralized sys tem of curriculum mana geme nt, there was no true elec tive curriculum in the past. Shangha i Curriculum Reform hist oricall y set elect ive curri culum from grade 8 to grade 12. From then on, increasi ng students’ choice in curriculum h as been an important theme for cu rricul um reform. Meanw hile, the set of activity curriculum created the opportunity of experient ial learning for students, which was helpful to develop students’ creativity and practical ability. The emphasis of activity curriculum and e xperiential learning also forms a valuable tradition in Chin ese cu rriculum reform . Polici es 22 T he Recovery of Curr iculum Fie ld . A fter a long - term of the dis appea rance of curriculum con ception s an d res earch , accompanying the second enlightenment and relat ed thought emancipation, there was a strong thirst for curri culum field in 19 80s. C urriculum is the th ought a nd exp e rience of tea chers an d s tudents. If there is n o c urriculum conception in schools, teachers and students are inevitabl y deprived of their thoughts and experience by rigi d “official k nowledg e”. If there is no curricu lum field at universities , edu cational res earch is inescapably degraded into the m aintaine r of “officia l k nowle dge” a nd con trolled by techn ical ration ality or m ainstrea m ide ology. T he sec ond enlightenment was just lik e a “di gger”, which dig out a small but clear spring of cur riculum t heory i n China. I n 1981, the first academ ic journal of curriculum studies was established in P eople’s Educational P ublishi ng House in Be ijing, nam ed Curr icu lums, Sub ject Mat ter s an d I nstr uct iona l met hods . It has bec ome o ne of th e mo st impo rtant journ als to pu blish curriculum papers since then. S everal other educational journals a lso published curriculum papers at odds. In 1980s, dozens of papers on curriculum studies were published in China. These papers dealt with several topi cs in curr icul um fiel d: 1) the disci pli nar ity of curriculum studies, e.g. Dai B otao’s On the Importance of Research on School Curriculum (1981), Shi Guoya’s The Scope and Guidi ng Principl es of Curriculum Research (1984); 2) cu rriculum d evelopm ent, e.g . Zhong Qiqua n’s Seve ral Que stions on Mod ern Curri cul um Development (1989a ); 3 ) cu rriculum re form, e.g. C hen, Xia ’s T he Dialectics o f C urriculum R eform (1 985); 4) c urriculum h istory, e.g. Xiong Chengdi’s Research on Curri culum and Subject Matters in Anci ent China (1985); 5) hi dden curricul um, e.g. Ban, Hua’s Hidden Curriculum and the Forming of Personal Moralit y (1988); and so on. Restricted by t he social conditions at the early stage of reform and opening - up period, these papers were limited in the width and depth of curri culum studi es, but they were like buds in spring, indicat ing a beautiful fut ure. T he most important event in 1980s and earl y 1990s was the publicat ion of synopt ic text books of curr iculum studi es. It was th e first time a fter 1949 . In 1989, th e forme r director o f Institute of C urricul um and Instruct ion at East China Normal Univ ersi ty, Professo r Zhong Qiqua n publishe d the mile ston e book in Chinese cur ric ulu m fi eld M odern Curri cul um Theory (1989b) in Shangh ai. This is an e ncyclope dia - like cu rriculum boo k, whic h sys tematic ally introd uces and explores the development of curriculum studies in western w orld. It integrates three perspectives of the theoretica l, pra ctical, and in ternation al. O n th eoretica l leve l, it e xplores an cient curriculum the ory in wes tern worl d; the Enlight enment curricu l um t houghts of Johann Amos Com enius, John Locke, and Jean - Jacques Rousse au; Pest aloz zis m; util it ari ani sm of Herbert Spencer and Thomas Henry Huxley; Herb arti sm; John Dewey’s empiricism; discipl ine - centered curriculum thoughts of Jerom e S. Brunner, Joseph Schwab , and Philip Phoenix; and hum anist curricul um in 1970s. On practical level, it investigat es curriculum objectives, curriculum structures, curriculum types, curriculum materials, curriculum evaluation, and curriculum m anagement. On international level, it com para tively s tudies the c urriculu m cir cums tances in Am erica , Eng land, F rance , Germ any , Japa n, and Sov iet Union . This is a magnif ice nt pictur e of world curri cul um fi eld. It not only provides ri ch and color ful cur ric ulu m ideas , but also suggested methodical principles of the theoretic al, practical, and internati onal. It is one of the m ost influen tial cu rriculum sy noptic text in Chin a, m arks the reco very of curric ulum field in conte mpo rary C hina an d the indep ende nce of c urriculu m stu dies fro m Ka irov’s Pe dagogy . Also in 1989, Professo r Ch en Xia published a nother s ynoptic tex t Curricu lum Theory (1989) in Be ijing. It involves curriculum history in China and w estern wo rld, various curriculum schools in western world, the influence factors of school cur riculum , the n ature and ty pes of school curricu lum, curricu lum constr uction and imp lemen tation, curriculum evaluation, and so on. This book tries to absorb the “positive elem ents” from the Soviet Union and weste rn world, focus on practic al needs of Chinese educ at ion, an d fo rm a cu rriculum b ook with “Chin ese Polici es 23 characteristi cs” (Chen, X. 1989, 1). As we know, Professor Chen Xia was a curriculum scholar in the first part of 20eth c entury. He published a curricul um hist ory book The Devel oping History of the Elementary S chool Curri cul um in Modern China in 1944. His Curr icu lum The ory book meant t he “coming - back” of a curri culum scholar, although it stil l bore the heavy burden of Kair ov’s Pedagogy and the mainstr eam ideology. In 1991, Professor Liao Zhexun published the thi rd synop tic text Curri culu m Stud ies (1991). This b ook tries to con nect we stern curricu lum theorie s and C hinese ed ucation al practic e, a nd build u p a “C hines e curricu lum stud ies” (Liao , Z . 19 91, 1). It explores curr iculum objecti ves, content s, struct ures, standar ds, evaluati on, and management. Actually it is a book on curriculum development. C hen Xia’s Curri cul um Theory and Liao Zhexun’s Curricu lum Studies al so symbolize the rec overy o f curricu lum field in China . Shanghai Curri culum Reform and the newborn cur riculum field mutually promo ted. Em phasiz ing stud ents’ individ ual dev elopm ent an d qualit ies edu cation, b orrow ing we stern cu rriculum theor ies, and recove ring C hinese curricul um field, all embodied the c haracteri stics of liber alism and humanism in the second enli ghtenment. All these great achievements lai d firm foundations for the third enlight enment, new curriculum refor m, and curriculum studies with Chi nese st yle in 21 st century. Chines e Li bera lis m, Ne w Enli ghte nment, New Curri cul um Refo rm , and C hines e Curri cul um Stu dies T he turn of the century provided a valu able mo ment for Ch inese pe ople to reflect: wh ere shou ld we go in 21 st century? From early 1990s to the present , it is the period of fastest development in the past two cent uries in China. China’s wa y of development is the way of com pressed modernization. That means China uses dozens o f years to realize moder ni zat i on whi ch ta kes hundr eds of year s in wes ter n dev elo ped count ri es . “By and lar ge, the curr ent of new enlightenment in 1980s in China testifi e s the Renaissance and the Enlightenment in mo dern times, and the differ entiat ion and diversifi cation of social - cultural currents of thoughts since 1990 s in China largely testifies the circumstances of ideas and social thoughts during the transforming perio d of capitali st industrializat ion.” (Zou, S. 2009, 46). The compressed modernization or growth results in two outcomes. Firstl y, it rapidly changes China and the soc iety swiftly go es to individ ualizatio n, pluraliza tion, freedo m, dem ocrac y, and pro gress. In the past 30 years, China has cr eated a miracle of eco nomic deve lopme nt in the wor ld. Now China’s eco nomic aggregat e ranks No.2 worl dwide . 1.3 bi ll ion people ’s subs ist ence probl em has been sol ved, which i s a conti nui ngly unfin ishe d job in the past thousand s of yea rs. Political demo cracy, law construction, human rights, individual freedom, and social justice are also making big progress. Cultural development are unprecedentedly prosperous. Chinese people can almost live sa me cult ural life to th e peop le in we stern developed countries, which is unimag inable in the past. All these great achi evement are not easy to get and should not be overlooked. Secondl y, it is the best of times, and it is the worst of times. Because every thin g goes too fast and the societ y ha s no enough time to solve the problems of modernization, various social problems show up. Physically speaking, today , China ’s environ men tal pollution and de struction come to a clima x. The id eal of un ity betwe en hea ven an d human being is given up, which per sisted for thousands of years in ancient China. The sustainable development between man and the nature does not exi st. Spirituall y speaki ng, t ogether with the high - speed development of mark et ec onomy , the reif ic ati on of hu man being s’ sp ir it ual life r each es its pea k, belie f crisis and mo ral dec line ar e Polici es 24 denounced by the people in the world. C ommodity fetishism and hedonism are on the increase. “Hum an bodies become the instr uments of consum ption” , and “human spirits become the experimental sites and victim of pleasure” (Zou, S. 2007, 55). Cultural industry and mass culture forcefully control hum an beings’ spiritual life and everyday life. Not all parts of cultural industry and mass cult ure are negative, but they might decrease or deprive the transcendence of hu man spi ri ts , and make peop le domi na ted by mater ia l des ir e. They mig ht cha nge human intere sts into hum an fash ions, and c ontrol hu man sp iritual life. Fas hions hin der and de press the ind epen dence a nd individ ualizat ion of h uman life. “In form, fashion s claim i ndividuali zation. In essence, fashi ons, as market tast es, j ust realize typicalization a nd form alization of individuality” (Zou, S. 2 007, 5 6). Just like Zygm unt B auman criticized, the process people seek indi vidualit y “ is l ike the one people change clothes, wh ich ca n be fre ely chosen or put down ” (Baum an, Z. 20 02, 187. Q uoted in Zou, S. 2 007, 56). T hey mig ht colonize life world throu gh the co ntrol of peo ple’s cultural styles and life forms. W hen people’s everyday life is thoroughly dominated by cultural industry and m ass medi a, peopl e’ s uniq ue and priv at e lif e wil l di sap pea r, thei r spi ri t ual lif e wil l hav e no body to li ve in, and th eir soul s will beco me wanderi ng gho sts . The col oni zat ion of li fe wor ld goe s to i ts pea k in net work ing lif e. When info rmati on tech nology is involved in cultural industry and m ass culture, a new lif e style — networking life — wil l be cre ated . Today networking life is swiftl y and increasingl y affecting, dominating, and alienat ing the everyday life of hum an beings. “More and more people treat networking life as real life, displace and forget real everyday life. Virtualit y becomes realit y, but realit y becomes ill usion.” (Zou, S. 2007, 56). Maybe one of the most severe dangers for human beings is the displacement of lif e world by networking li fe. Ex treme free dom is no free dom . W hen hum an beings los e true freedom in inter net, human s ociety will inevitabl y fal l i nto unprecedent ed spir itual crisi s. C onfronted with the social probl ems, diff ere nt thought trends provid e differ ent solut ion s. Radical is m or new left is m tries to reinforce th e a uthority and po wer of gove rnmen t a nd solve the prob lems by top - down control and conquest. Conser vati sm or new Confuci ani sm trie s to recove r trad iti onal cult ure and moral system, and cure the soci al diseases by the p rom otion of pe ople’s mo rality. Liberalism or rightism tries to dire ctly and q uickly borro w the politi cal syst em of democracy from wester n world, and solve the problems by the rul e of law. The debates among the three s ocial thought trends have been persisti ng since we stepped into 21 st century, as if the hist ory went back to the p eriod o f May F ourth M ovem ent ab out a ce ntury a go. Wh ere is w ay to go ? Chine se Liberal is m . Tra cing ba ck to o ne hu ndred years ’ Chine se histo ry, wh en libe ralism, ra dicalism , and conser vatism positivel y interact with each other, Chinese society will develop well, and politics, economy, and culture w ill get prosperous; w hen the three thought trends blindly compete wit h each other, or one trend draws support from poli tical power to f ight t he others or ban thei r legality, Chinese society will go to crisis even disasters, like the period of Cu ltural R evolutio n (Ta ng, Y. 2 006, 2 25 - 245). Since Chinese societ y went into 21 st century, each of the three thought trends has been continuously develo ping and getting stronger and st ronger. Confucianism has been gett ing the double supports of economy and poli tics from th e gover nmen t in the past 1 5 years, a nd beco me an u nprec edente d “fad” in tho ught circle , acade mic field, and ci vil society after the end of the imperial examinations system in 1905. Accompanying the development of mark et eco nomy and t he in ter na ti ona li zat i on o f Ch in ese soc iet y, l ibe ra li sm i s no t o nl y embr ac ed b y t he i nt el lec tu al s but also supported by the m asses. The representati ve works of all kinds of liberali sm in w estern world have been transla ted into Chines e and whole hearted read. M arxism , as th e ma instream ideolo gy and as an acade mic th ought, is s ubtly distin guishe d a nd m utua lly a ffected . Ne arly all k inds of weste rn M arxism h ave been introdu ced to C hina and studied by scholars. The mainstream ideology is getti ng more open and getting rid of the control of the Polici es 31 are necessary in understanding autonomy which is why this paper concentrates on analyzing both autonomy and control. Autonomy can additionall y be viewed from the psychologi cal and sociological point o f v iew. In following , I will present fou r theories that led to the creatio n of tw o theo retical m odels for the emp irical res earch. Psychologic al researc h ha s long been divide d be tween those w ho d o no t believe in the existen ce o f the free will o f hum ans such as behaviorist s ( Skinne r, 1 971) and those who consider it illusor y (Wegner 2002), burdensome (Schwartz, 2000) or bound by culture and gender (Iyenga r & DeVo e, 2003 ; J ordan, 1 991). The self - dete rmination theory (Ryan & Deci, 2006) views autonomy as a key in un derstanding the qua lit y of behavioral regulation. W ithi n self - determinati on theory (SDT) au ton omy is u ndersto od as s elf - governance or rule by the self that is accomplished with self - determined acts. The opposite of autonomy is heter onomy which refe rs to regula tio ns from outsid e of t he phenomenal self by forces experienced as alien or pressuring which can point to inner impulses or demands or external contingencies such as reward or punishment. Unlike other psychological theories on autono my, the sel f - determinati on theory acknowledges, while referring to Pfander (1967), that self - deter mined acts must not be solely based on inner urges. Withal, they can follow external suggestions, on the condition that they are fully endorsed by the se lf. In case of curric ulum enactm ent, autono my becom es a m atter of deg ree to w hich teachers en dorse the curriculum instru ctions. Reg arding the self - determination of hum an acts the SDT dist inguishes between fi ve degrees of motivation between autonomy and heteron omy: external, introjected, identifi ed, integrated or intrinsi c motivation. Whi le the fi rs t ref ers to tot al lac k of aut on omy and the la st to abso lu te auto nom y the rest expr ess dif fe re nt degr ee s of endorsement of ext ernally suggested ideas (Ryan & Deci, 2006, p. 1563). The sociologi cal view of autonomy regards autonomy as a too individuali sti c concept and prefers using the term “agenc y” which takes into acco unt the social co nstraints to autono my (A rcher, 20 00; Pries tly, E dwards & Prie stly, 2012). In simple t erms, agency can be understood as “capacity for autonom ous social action … t o o p e r a t e indep ende ntly of t he determ ining const raints of social structu re” (Calhou n, 2002, p. 7) or as “ ability to exert contro l over and give direction to one’s life” (Biesta & Tedder, 2007). The ecological agency theory of Biesta and Tedder emphasizes agency as achievement, not “power” whi le concentrat ing on the pr econditi ons under which agency can be realized. Achieving agency involves interacti on between “individual efforts, ava ilab le res ource s an d the contextual and structur al “factors” which are bound to a certai n time and location du ring a pe rson’s life - course and related to his/her previo us e xperienc es a nd future aspiration . The go od news is that limitations to agenc y ca n b e overcome, to a certain point, by learning (Biesta & Tedder, 2007).Another sociol ogical approach, neoinsti tutional ism , re fers to the soc ial structure defining or constrai ning the autonomy of teachers by organizati onal practices and structures which are deep ly em bed ded in soc ial and po litical env ironme nts. The se reflect the rules, beliefs and con ventions of a wider env ironmen t (Scott, 2001). New insti tut ion ali sts do not see individ uals as au tonom ous aut hors of their pre ferenc es; they be lieve pre ference fo rmat ion takes pla ce w ithin the constraints imposed by instituti onal settings (Weber, 1947; Immergut, 1998), history, tr adition, and culture (Meyer & Benavot, 2013, p. 14). The philosophical , psychologi cal and soci ologic al aspects of teache r autonomy are combined in the model of Smith and Erdo ğ an (2008, p. 84) who emphasize three components of autonomy: 1) self - directedness 2) capacity 3) freedom from con trol . The se as pects refer b oth to teach ers’ pro fession al action and deve lopme nt wh ile Polici es 32 distingui shing between capacity or willingness to se lf - di rect one’s teaching and learning, and actual self - dir ected teach ing or lea rning b ehavio r. Accord ing to th is mod el the term teach er auto nomy refers m ainly to th e cap acity. These four theories were the basis for creat ing tw o theoret ical models as a theoretical framework of the study of teach er auto nom y. The first model (see Fig ur e 1) is ins pi red by neoinstituti onalism depicting the institut ional governance of teac her autonomy with t he main emphasis on discourse since institu tional o rder m anifes ts itself t hrough discour se and documents. Institutio nal levels / Forms of contr ol Regulat ive Normative Cultur al/cog niti ve I Globa l/Europe an Recommendati ons o f OECD, Wor ld Bank, UNESCO, r egulat ion through int ernational comparative testing (PISA, TIM SS) e.g. Lisbon treaty: life - long learni ng strategy for EU Curri culum/Di dakt ik theory II Nation al Education laws Nation al or sta te curriculum Curri culum, ideolo gies, beliefs and tradit ions, public di scourse in media III Scho ol/Classro om School r egulati ons, e .g. code of conduct School cu rricu lum Organi zati onal cul tur e, habitus IV Teac her Teacher - made ru les about assessment, discipli ne etc. I ndividual teaching plan Teachers’ bel iefs, perceptions, experiences Figure 1 . Institutional orde r of educa tional gove rnance The model depicts the position of teacher within the framework of inst itut ional , national and supranati onal education policy who is influenced by regulative and normative docum ents which define his/her duties and rights. By this model teachers are a prod uct of the sociali zati on in particul ar nati onal, cultural and social setti ngs refle ctin g ideolo gies, beliefs a nd tradition s w hile being im pacte d by public opinion a nd discours e in media. In order to create a multil ayered pic ture of teacher autonomy two sour ces of dat a were used: curri cula f or upper secondary school s in Estoni a, Bavaria , and Fi nland since 1990, and teac her newspapers from 1991 - 2010. Since German education system is de centra lized b etwee n 16 Länder where each Land makes the ir own edu cat i on poli cy and curri cu la, only one could be selected for this study: based on personal access to the sources, Bavaria is in the focus of this study among the German provi nces. Histo rical development Polici es 33 Follow ing this m odel th e first re search ques tion with its sub - questions is: 1) How does the education poli cy shape teacher autonomy and control? As the aforementioned theories demonstrated, teacher autonomy is a complex phenom enon that involves the social struc ture an d c ontinge ncies o n in stitutiona l an d m acro - political level as well as personal factors of moti va ti on, capaci t y and wi ll i ngn ess f or a uto nomo us acti on. Conseq uent l y, the seco nd theor et ic al mo del concer ns the pe rsona l factors o f teache r autono my a s ref lecte d in the followin g mo del: Figure 2 : Teacher autonomy in environmental c ontext Whi le synt hes i zi ng th e self - determinat ion theory of Deci and Ryan (2006), the ecological agency theory of Biesta and Tedder (2007) and the teacher autonomy model of Smith and Erdo ğ an (2008), this mod el e xplains tea cher autonomy by three factors in the teachers’ organizati onal, personal and public context: degree of freedom from control, capacity a nd degree of self - direct edness. Whereas fr eedom from control is defined by the inf luence of public sphere (education policy, public opinion) and organizational dynamic (school policy and relations), capacity is illustrate d b y interna l fa ctors suc h a s c apacity for au tonom ous pe dagog y a nd the exte rnal facto rs such as resourc es. Likew ise, teach ers’ actions regarding the con tent of tea ching (cu rriculum) a nd stud ents ref lect a high er or lower degree of self - di rectedness. Followi ng thi s model , t he second researc h quest ion i s: Public sphere Organizational dynamic Pedagogy (creative teaching practices) Resources (time, money , study aids, competence) Content (curriculum, knowledge) T eacher Learner (D eg r e e of) Fr eedom from con t r ol Capacity (D eg r e e of) se lf - direc t ed ness Polici es 34 2) How do teachers perceive t heir prof essional aut onomy and control over themselves? As method of data collect ion for the second questio n, inte rviews w ith t eache rs w ere sele cted with the pu rpose of getting insight s int o teachers ’ att itudes, experi ences and bel iefs r egarding teacher aut onomy and contr ol. Methodology The thr ee dat a sets and t he methods used for da ta anal ysis are i llus trat ed by the fo llowing table: Only upper secondary curri cula (with the except ion of German gymnasium which covers the grades 5 - 12) w ere selected for analysis since the differences o f the education systems on low er levels make the co mparison more diffi cult. Furthermore, the existence of a standardized graduation or matriculat ion exam in al l thre e e ducatio n systems presum es a particular pressure on upper secondary school teachers. I was interested in how these exams would affect teacher autonomy. The t ime period of curr iculum analysi s and media discourse of teacher newspapers was synchron ize d in order t o compare reactions to the curricula in the newspapers and the reception of educat ion policy. The method of criti cal discour se analysis (CDA) seemed appropriate since the study of teacher autonomy in curricula and teacher new spapers was carrie d out using the social constructionist paradigm which conside rs langu age a s the m ost e ssentia l syste m thro ugh w hich h uma ns con struct r eality (B urr, 19 95, p. 5; Ge rgen, 1 999, p p . 6- 12). CDA is c onside red a helpful tool in ex aminin g the u nderly ing ide as, assum ptions, conceptualizations and ideolo gies in texts and disco urses , sh edding ligh t on the overt and cov ert a genda s o f edu cationa l po licy m anifes ted Table 1 : Data Data so urces f rom: Three empiri cal st udies Estonia Germany Finland Study I : Disc ourse analysis of curricul a 1) Estonian curricul um for basic schools and gymnasia: 1996, 2002 and 2011 2) Bavari an curr icul um for gymnasia: 1990 and 2008 3) Finnish curricul um for upper secondary school s ( lukio ): 1994 and 2003 Study I I: Di scourse analysis of teacher newspapers 1) Estonian teacher newspaper "Õpetajat e Leht" from 1996 - 2010 Referen ces t o 87 articl es. 2) Bavarian newspaper of gymnasium teachers' union "Das Gymnasium i n Bayern" from 1991 - 2010. Referen ces t o 71 arti cles. 3) Finnish teacher uni on paper "Opettaj a" from 1994 - 2010. References to 55 articl es. Study I II: Qualit ative content analysis of teache r interviews 1) 10 upper s econdary school teachers from Estonia 2) 13 gymnasium teache rs from Ge rmany (9 were cur rentl y t eachin g in Esto nia) 3) 10 upper s econdary school teachers from Finland Polici es 35 in no rmativ e politic al doc ume nts su ch as curric ula, a nd pu blic dis course in m edia. C DA is an interd iscip lina ry field connecting critical linguistics and social sciences. It conceptualizes languages (discourse) as a form of social practice or behavior while making people aw are of the mutual influences of language and social structure (Titscher et al ., 2000, p . 147). Fo llowing the discou rse - historical approach of Reisigl and W odak (2009, p. 93) the analyti cal steps are operati onalized as fol lows: Operat ional ques tion Discursi ve st rategy 1. How are pers ons, object s, phenomena/events, processes and ac tions named and referred to linguis tically? Nominati on 2. What charact eristi cs, quali ties and features ar e attri buted to s ocial act ors, objec ts, phenomena/events and process es? Predicat ion 3. What arguments are employed in the discour se in quest ion? Argumentati on 4. From what per spective ar e these nominati ons, att ributi ons and arguments expressed? Perspecti vizat ion/f raming or discourse repr esentation 5. Are the respective utterances articulat ed overtl y; are t hey intensi fied or mitigated? Intensific ation/mitigation Table 2 : Discursive s trategies For the purpose of triangula tion another method was selected for the analysi s of semi - structured teacher interv iews: qua litative co ntent ana lysis. My prefe rr ed appr oa ch to qual i tat ive content an alysis is that of Mayr ing (2000) which unite s the stre ngths of quantita tive content analys is w ith the qualitative proce dure. Focu sing on a step - by - step description of inductive and deduct ive category development, the categories are rigorously de fined includ ing tex t exam ples. T o ens ure relia bility, I h ave us ed the oretica lly found ed, de ductiv e categ ories th at ena ble a comparison with other st udies. Result s o f t he crit ica l disco urse anal ysis of curr icul a The fol lowing tabl e summarize s the main findings of the co mpara tive ana lysis of c urricula: Discourses Estonian curricul a for basic schools and gymnasia (1996, 2002 and 2011) Bavarian curri culum for gymnasia (1990 and 2008) Finnish curr iculum for lukio (1994 and 2003) School autonomy through school based curricul um development (SBCD) Introduced i n the 1996 curriculum, more detailed guidelines about SBCD in the 2002 versi on. No requ irement for SBCD, however promises of increasi ng school autonomy in the future i n the 200 8 curriculum . Introduced i n the 1994 curriculum, more detailed guidelines about SBCD in the 2003 versi on. Teacher autonomy Changing rol e of teach ers from cu rriculum imple menters to curricu lum The 1990 curr iculum is very prescri ptive, onl y allowing spac e for Changing rol e of teach ers from cu rriculum imple menters to Polici es 36 developers si nce 1996. Curri cular deci sion making involve s decis ions abo ut metho ds, mat e rials and assessment. The freedoms r egarding assessment and new cours e design incr ease since 2011. meeti ng stu dent s’ interes ts, cross - curricular projects, pedagogical conversations, current ly impo rtant topics and limited extracurr icular activit ies. The 2008 curriculum adds two career - related sem inars for teach ers to desig n. curriculum developers since 1994. Compared to Estonian curri c ulum of 1996, Finnis h curricul um of 1994 has more details about teacher autonomy, includ ing selec ting the content. Social c onstruct ivist learnin g parad igm Strongl y repr esented s ince 1996 by describi ng teachers as “guides”, “designers ” or “creators of lear ning situations.” Si nce 2011 intens ification of th e discourse of “learni ng environment” whic h starts to replace teacher s and miti gat e t hei r a genc y. The 1990 curr iculum is traditiona lly teacher centered whil e the 2008 curriculum introduces social constructi vi st keywords but they are used simultaneousl y with the para digm of “knowledge transm ission”. Strongl y repr esented since 1994 by describing teache rs as “guide s”, “designers” o r “creators of learnin g situatio ns”. In 2003 curricul um teachers are less f requen tly mentioned than i n 1994 resulting in mitiga tion of teachers’ agency. Change of rhet oric in the 2000s The 2002 curr iculum uses more nor mati ve rhet ori c. Al l choices refer to col lective decision - mak ing of te acher s, not indivi dual deci sions, especially in the 2011 curriculum where “school” is replacing tea chers as the decision - mak ing bod y. Increas e of schoo l autonomy rhetori c but at the sam e time tigh ter standardizati on and decrease of choi ces for students i n the 2008 curriculum as well as l ess time for c ov ering all the topics tha n before th e G 8 reform. The 2003 curr iculum is more nor mati ve and somewhat reduces teacher autonomy: when the 199 4 curriculum was more or les s a sug gest io n then the 2003 curr iculum makes it s c ompul sor y character very clear. Forms of contr ol/ standardization Stress on self - assessment of schools, although ext ernal evaluation of schools also exists. Comparati ve c entral ized tests and interregion al tests are emphas ized in the 200 8 curriculum . Symbolic control of civil servants through o ath - taking. S tandardiza tion of education i s the str ongest in Bav aria. Stress on self - assessment of school s. Table 3 : Compara tive results o f the curricu lum ana lysis The most sign if ic ant differences between the autonomy express ed i n upper secondary school curr icula of Estoni a, Finland and Germany lie in school autonomy although this does not automati call y transl ate into teacher autonomy. Wher ea s Finni sh and Est on ia n curr ic ul a auth or iz e si n ce 1994 and 1996, respectivel y, the development of school curricula based on the national curriculum, the Bavarian curriculum for gymnasia was still centrally prescribed in 2008. Although some concessions were made for independent design of career - related seminars in grades 11 and 12, no school - based curriculum development on a comparable scale was authorized, yet promises were made in the 20 08 Ba varian c urriculum to incre ase sc hool au tonom y in the future. Teachers’ rol es are described in the 1994 Finnish curricul um and 1996 Estonian curriculum as changing from “curriculum impleme nters” to “curriculum d evelope rs”, a nd in th e E stonian cas e, v ery optimistically eve n to “m akers Polici es 37 of education policy”. The Estonian and Finnish curric ula of the 1990s mention as au ton omy of teach ers sp ecifically decisions regarding methods, m ateri als and assessment, and the Fi nnish cur riculum additionally refers to cont ent. Simult aneousl y, t he Bavar ian c urri culu m of 1990 i s ver y pres crip tive , even extra curri cul ar act ivi tie s are c aut ioned to be select ed as “not to contradic t the purpose of educati on”. Another differen ce in the curricu la is the dominant teachi ng paradigm which is in the Es toni an and Finnis h curriculum since 1996 and 19 94 strongly social - constructi vist, referring to te achers as “guides” , “designers” or “creators o f learning situations”, while Bava rian curriculum is more teach er centered, repres enting the paradigm of “know ledge trans mission”. A change in rhetor ic of the Estonian and Finnish cu rri cula is notic eable in th e 2000s when the curriculum tex t becomes m ore normative, emphasizing more the duties than freedoms of teachers and tending to avoid the word “teache r” by rep lacing it by “schoo l”. The res ponsibility of individual te achers is clouded as m ost dec isions are m ade collect ively and also autonomy becomes a collective concept. The Bavarian curriculum of 2008, on the other hand, increases the autonomy rhetori c while concurrent ly referring to increas ed standar dization and control by comparative testing. Control disco urse altogether is in Estonian and Finnish curriculum disguised as self - control and self - assessment making it rather latent. In comparison, the standardizat ion discourse is the strongest in Bavari an cu rri culum. Result s o f t he crit ica l disco urse anal ysis o f t eacher newspapers The res ults of th e comparat ive analysis of teache r newspa pers such as E stoni an “Õpetajate leht” (1996 - 2010), Finnish “Opett aja” (1994 - 2010) and Bavarian “Das Gymnasium in Bayern” (1991 - 2010) are summarized in the followin g table: Disc ourses Estonian context German c ontext Finnish cont ext I. Status o f teachers General ly low, much criticized. Attempts to raise i t after 2003: “Teacher liberat ion and empowerment” discourse Contrad ictor y: highl y pai d but crit icized and envied General ly high but contradictory: “l ove - hate” relationship II. The influ ence of PISA test s on educational discourse Strong: a plea sant sur prise: “Teachers deserve mo re respect” disco urse; increased out put standardization Very st rong: PISA shock: “bad schools and bad results” discou rse, rapid reforms: m ore control and standardization. Strong: retur n of the equality di scourse and intens ified evalu ation discourse III. Neolibe ral discourse: 1) competiti on between schools 2) “parentocr acy” 3) “teachers as servic e providers” Very st rongly represe nted, resisted by sc holars and somewhat by teachers. 1) Very str ong, teachers fear losing their job du e to sch ool closures. 2) Strong, teachers f eel powerless and not supported by t heir principal s. Very st rongly represe nted as well as very strongl y resisted by tea chers. 1) Low, as s chools have more sta ndar diz ed curricula and teachers as civil servants ar e centrally paid. 2) Increasi ng, teachers fear loss of autonom y and Very st rongly represe nted as well as very strongl y resisted by tea chers and scholars. 1) Strong on upper secondary school level, felt particu larly in bigg er cities and south of Finland. 2) Strong, teachers f eel Polici es 38 3) Characteri zes the attitudes of poli ticians, students and par ents. control. 3) Not so pr evalent. bullied and threatened by parents. 3) Characteri zes the attitudes of poli ticians, students and par ents. IV. Disco urse of autonomy Strongl y discu ssed but diverse concept s. “Teacher as an arti st” metaphor = interpre ter of the cu rriculum. School cu rricu lum development as i mposed autonomy. Fear of responsibility a nd additional worklo ad. Strongl y discu ssed in the context of “school autonomy” which has a negative connotat ion, instead “ pedagogical freedom ”. Teach ers prefer a c entrally determined curr iculum. Not ve ry pr evalen t but increa sing sinc e OEC Ds remark: “Th e system of trust”. “Te acher as a n artist metaphor”, t eachers generally f avorable toward s school cu rriculum development and autonomy but cri tical of growing workload. V. Disc ourse of democracy Teachers cri ticiz e strongl y the “auth oritarian” an d “undem ocratic” educationa l governance. Strong confrontational att itude between teachers and other stakeholders. General ly missi ng, exce pt for the “G -8- reform ” which was deci ded “ behind closed doors”. Miss ing. Ge nera ll y friendly re lationship between teachers and the authoriti es. VI. Di scourse of evaluation and control Strong b ut cont radict ory: school inspectors want more power to sanct ion schools, punitive di scourse; s cholars want to “liberate” tea chers from bu reaucratic control. Very st rong si nce 2002, the PISA shock: “M ore testing = more qua lity” to which teacher s re spond: “we want les s control and more fr eedom and ti me” Strong wi th emphasi s on self - evaluati on and school development but wi th national c riteri a. VII. Discours e of equality Moder atel y pres ent in th e context of comprehensive school discourse as opposed to democrati c and diversifi ed school. Strong: basic counterargument agai nst school autonomy. Traditi onally ver y strong, intens ified by PIS A test findings . Table 4 : The comp arative dis course an alysis of tea cher's new spaper s The discours e analysi s of teacher newspapers regar ding teache r autonomy and contr ol is summarized by seven dominant discourses which play a more or less signifi cant role in different national context s. For example, the democracy discourse is only prevalent in Estonian context and missing almost com pletel y in German and Finnish context. This can be explained by the histo rical eve nts a nd th e sta tus of Esto nia a s a cou ntry in trans ition from Soviet total it arian ism to democracy in the 1990s. Estonian teachers perceived the educati on polic y - maki ng as an authorit arian top - down activity where teachers were not sufficiently invo lve d nor their com men ts take n se riously. Relat ed to democrac y discours e, the teach er autonomy discour se was very str ongl y rep r esented in Estonian teach ers’ n ewsp aper but ra ther m ode stly co vered in F innish teache rs’ un ion p aper. It see ms that in Finlan d tea cher autonomy was t aken for granted while Estonian teachers had to fight for it. In Bavari a, the discourse of school autonomy took a surpri sing turn where it was associated w ith negative things such as an irresponsibly unfunded increa se of work load and in dependent m anagement of reduced resources. As such, school autonomy was completely resented by Bavarian gymnasium teachers who preferred a continuing central guidance of the curriculum and central ly provided f unds so that t eachers could be autonomous in t h eir classr oom. Polici es 39 The penetrati on of neoliberal vocabular y into education with education as a market place where schools are in competition with each other for students as “ clients ” and where parents gradually gain m ore influence was very strong in all three coun tri es, although the reactions of teachers va ried. While Estonian teachers regarded the neoliberal discourse neutrall y, Finnish and German teachers acti vely opposed it. The result s of the PISA tests became a catalyst for inc reased ev aluation and con trol disc ourse affect ing Germany the most due to its disappointi ng r esults which were publ ished in 2002. Increased standardi zation similarly followe d in Eston ia and Finland where results were good. In fact, internal school evaluation discourse i n connection w ith school qua lity discourse became one of the dominant topics in the Finnish teachers’ newspaper in the 2000s. On the positive side, the PISA results , which exce eded e xpecta tions in E stonia , s tarted a d iscours e for im proving teach ers’ low status and givi ng them more credence . Result s o f t eache r i nter views The sample of t eachers who part ici pated i n te acher i nterv iews i s char acteri zed by the f oll owing t able: Estonian teachers German t eache rs Finnish t eachers Number of int erviewee s 10 13 10 Geograph ical location Tallinn 8 Paide 1 Viimsi 1 Teachers wit h experience worki ng in Estonia and Germany: 9 Teachers currently teachin g in Bavaria: 4 Helsi nki 5 Tampere 5 (S) Saxon ia: 2, (BW) Ba den - Wuer tt ember g: 1, (RP) Rhin eland - Palati nate 1 (NRW ) North Rhine - West phal ia : 2 (Br) Brem en: 1 (B) Bavaria : 2 Gender 2 men 8 women 5 men 8 women 3 men 7 women Work experience 5- 40 years 1- 34 years 5- 31 years Table 5 : Sample It is a purpos eful sam ple, inten ded to inclu de as ma ny differe nt subjec t te achers as possib le. Teach ers we re contacted via existing contacts or by e - mail provi ded on schoo ls ’ homepa ges . All int erv ie ws were condu cte d Polici es 40 personally and lasted 1.5 - 3 hours. All t eachers taught various subjects on upper secondary school level, additional ly , the Esto nian and Ge rman teac hers had classes on lower secondary level . The int erviews took place from 20 12 - 2013. The content of the interviews w as cat e gorized by th e th eoretica l mo del (see Figu re 2 ) in three categories: self - directedness , capacity , freedo m from control . Add itionally, one inductively derived ca tegory wa s added: teachers ’ respon sibility and accou ntability fo r studen t achiev eme nt. The study revealed G erman teachers perceive to be externally directed regarding the educational goals while there were none among Finnish teach ers who admitt ed it. Some Estoni an teachers perce ived the nation al curri culu m development as externall y direct ed despite the ostensi b ly d emoc ratic involv eme nt of tea chers wh ich u nfortu nately did not yield in any of their suggest ions being accepted. The diff erence in endorsement of the curricul um is striking: Estoni an teachers are most cri tica l regarding the curri cul um while curricu lum u sually "makes sense “ to German and Finnish teachers who are m ore loyal to it. Estonian teachers often felt that the lack of resources and study aids does not allow them to ful ly implement the cur riculum. The most valuabl e resource that is in short supply e verywhere is time. Teachers in all three countries voiced concern about not having enough time for al l topics prescribed in t he national curr iculum. In terms of freed om from co ntrol all te acher s pe rceived to ha ve p edag ogical auto nomy . However, many Finnis h teach ers p refer greater autonomy, teaching witho ut tex tbooks whil e usi ng th eir ow n choice of mater ia ls . Further more, they t ake autonomy f or granted: “I don’t t hink there is so much cont rol and that we thrive because of this ped agogic al fre edom tha t w e h a ve guaranteed in the law in Finland and being so trusted as a professional group.” (EnSF25) 1 . Estoni an teache rs did not percei ve teachi ng witho ut textb ooks as tr ue freedom , ra ther as imposed sin ce textbook s in severa l s ubjects w ere totally o utdate d. In a dditio n, Estonia n teachers d emo nstrate d less frequen tly their own pedagogical agenda than German or Finnis h teachers which i s an indi cator of capaci ty t o enact autonomy. The most compelli ng differen ces in teacher autonomy concern teacher accountabili ty for students’ test results. In Estoni a, school administrators, students and parents frequently put an equal sign between student achievement and the quality of teachers’ w ork. Estonian teachers feel pressure to be accountable for the results of graduation exam s and ranking lists of schools while German and Finnish teachers em phasize more the responsibilit y of students and see thei r own role i n student achievement merely as f acilit ators of learning. Conclu sion The analysis of the curricul a, teachers’ newspapers and teach er interviews clearl y shows that curricul um discourse can be misleading as the promised autonomy often will not be realized due to social, organizational or personal constraints. In Estonia, teac hers never became “makers of education policy” as suggested by the national curriculum of 1996. The Bavarian teachers saw a contradiction between the increasing rh etoric of autonom y in th e 2008 curriculum and the reform in 2 004 w hich com pres sed the g ymna si um time and content designed for 13 years 1 The code combinati on refer s to the taught subjects , gender and work exper ience of the int erviewee i n years ( EN – English , S – Swedish, F – Female) Polici es 47 signed by their respective governing bodies dem ocraticall y legitimized and only by converging w ill both pa rti es can change them "(ibid.) . This specific reference to the two D efi niti ve Statut es is still crucial and a central part to a better overall understanding of the i ssue, since it stems from the existing law that the autonomic frameworks of the two Regions should not necessarily be equal, moreover appropriate to the views, expectations and w ishes of the people of each of the arch ipelag os, e xpress ed th rough their e lected depu ties to their respec tive L egislativ e As semb lies, m eanin g there is no "closed , o ne and indivisible " a utono mous m odel app licable to both Region s, either the possibility of each to opt for the s olution it may cons ider m ore ap propria te to its specific contex t. Interes ting a nd rath er ex plicit in this reg ard is the p osition that "T he s tate is politically unitary , but it is cons idered constituti onally limited by the insular autonomies (.. .) an d b y the prin ciples of sub sidiarity and democratic administrat ive decent rali zation " (Sousa, NJVAS :2013: 1). On what concer ns to the regi onal iz ati on of educati on in Madeir a, the outlo ok and the general framewor k of the issue is e stablish ed on the already m entio ned Defin itive version of the 1999 Statute (Law 130/99 of 21 August) , at Arti cle 40, item o), where it is set that "Preschool Educati on; Primar y Educati on, Secondar y, Higher and Special Educati on" are "matt ers of speci fic int erest " o f t he Reg ion. In addition and revealing the w id espre ad politica l im pact in the M emb er States o f th e EU Tre aty of 1992 a nd the 1995 White Paper on Education and Training, the cited 1999 version of the Madeira Statute also enshrines, in a specific art icle (Nº 11) at its Chapter I - Fundamental Princi pl es – meani ng app li cab le t o a ll l eve ls of t he re la ti ons hi p between the Republic and the Region, the pr ecept of subsidi arity , namely whi le st ating t hat: "In the relation ship betwe en State bodies a nd self - government bodies of the R egion the principle of subsi diarit y shall be applied, according to which, and outside the scope of the State's exclusive competence, public interventi on is done preferably by the Board level that is closer and most able to interv ene, un less the sp ecific obje ctives o f th e action c once rned can no t be su fficiently achieved b ut b y the top man agem ent leve l". Polit ica lly and symboli call y not negligibl e, or even to be categor ized as very relevant to the matter under discussion, was the fact that this political and administrative Definitive Statute of the Autonomous Region of Madei r a has bee n adopt ed unani mous ly and by accl amat i on, by all polit i cal parti es fr om the extr eme righ t to the extreme left, both at the Regional Parliament and at the Assem bly of the Republic, which is worth saying tha t the country as a whole, va lidated through its legitimate representatives, with the inherent consequences, the spirit and the le tter of s uch S tatute, w hich, as state d aga in by Mota Ama ral (ibid.), " No one can theref ore ignore tha t it corresponds to the wi ll of the mos t repre sentativ e bod y of the Portug uese people ". Wor th to say is that i n the two deca de s peri od betwe en the pu bl i cat ion of the 1979 Dec re e Law, wh ic h fir st addressed the issue of regionalization of competences in the sector, and the time of publication of Law 130/99, it seems that a substantial chang e, in legal terms (and eve ntually in the so - called mental schem es) in force in the Republic and in the Region, have occurred on the issue. That said, it is known that reality in politic s has 3 level s. A first, discursive, which embodies a philosophical and ideolo gical d imens ion an d a v ision. A seco nd, juridica l and polit ical, w hich transfor ms a nd e mbo dies, in lega l term s Polici es 48 and at various levels, those ideas and perspectives on diplomas and polici es. And finall y, a third, operati onal (which o ccurs in sev eral planes ), embod ying (partially or co mpletely) th e published declared intentions. Whi le the tr an sf or mat i on in dis cu rs iv e and jur id ic al ter ms seems to be real in this 2 0 - year interval (safeguarded the exceptions of the Constituti onal Court and the Ministry of Education in several – prominent -- circumstances) the truth is th at at the level of the ap plication o f th e law the pra xis dem onstr ates the o ppos ite, vis -à- vis the issue of regiona lization of E ducation and Curriculum, being paradigmatic and to be underlined the fact that if the Region would ever do anythi ng lik e, its student ’s mobili ty wit hin the countr y would be denie d, as it has alr eady, by the way, been done to a few t eachers of special education when tr ying to apply for a job in the m ainland of the country, not to me ntion trying to bring to co urt a secre tary of state of the regio n for assu ming a ce rtain polic y should n’t be imple men ted in a certain w ay. Stil l to deem very interest ing on this specific item is the fact that this disc ussion which disr espects the Region's abilit y to decide on matters of Curriculum, is not applied by the Portuguese Republic "toward" other geographies and spaces that hold those same (or even less) competences, namely within some of the CPL P (Com mun ity o f th e Portug uese Speaking Countr ies) and region s of other EU Member State s, as well as to the countri es where the Portuguese Diaspor a has expanded. In fact, in one c ase o r an other, especially at the Compulsory Education and Secondary Education levels, any student com ing from those countries educational system s – over which Portugal exercises no power at all -- has direct access to the same level and grade, safeguarded stil l the additi onal support to learni ng the Portuguese langu age, if they com e from cou ntries whe re this is not the official one … a p o s s i b i l i t y t h a t h a s s y s t e m a t i c a l l y b e e n denied to the R egion of Madeira and its students of those sam e levels, ever y t ime i ts Parliament and Government tried to im plem ent it bas ed on all the pre viously c ited doc umen ts and practice s. In this gener al conte xt, it is su ch a proces s, partic ularly its c oncer ning pr esupp ositions and p rinciples , b ut also its constraints, that w e wa nt to anal yse through the case o f Madeira, and via it try to infer which are the limit s, mani fe st ed and / or possibly hidden (Bernardi:1974) , to the Regionalizat ion of Education and in particular of the Curri cul um. Problem and re search questi ons Thus, the central i ssue of the res earch is t o und erstand what / which (if any) a re the lim its to the decentrali zation/ regionali zation of the Educational system to the polit ically Autonomous Region of M adeira, and particul arly those concer ning the Curricul um. From the mention ed pr oblem deri ve d th e funda menta l questio ns of re search , which a re, briefly , the follow ing: 1. How do the general presuppositions and obligations re sulting from our integ ration in transnation al spaces, like th e Euro pean Union and th e CP LP as well a s in m ore in forma l unive rses like the re lations hip with the countries of the Portuguese Diaspora, i nfluence the det ermination of Educati onal policies ? 2. How does the poli ti cal and adminis trat iv e organi zati on of the State perce ives the organi zat ion of the Educati onal system in Portugal and its interac tion w ith the p olitically au tonom ous re gions of the A zores and Madei r a ? Polici es 49 3. Shoul dn’t the hist oric al proce ss and the cul tural reali ty of a People, as pil lar s of one’s Cit ize nship and Personal Development , be considered in the Educationa l polici es of the Regions, in particul ar in Insul ar and Ultra Peripheral ones ? 4. How does th e construc tio n of the Cur ric ulu m as a key component of Educa tio n polici es must ta ke into account t he cultur al, economic and soci al condi tions of Cit izens and Territ ories ? Literat ure revi ew Having established the problem and the questions referred above, it was necessary to define the core themes of the litera ture rev iew, wh ich we re basic ally perce ived in fo ur plan s: i. Polit ica l Sc ience; ii. Development Theories and in par ticular Regional Development ones; iii. Theory of Organi zati ons and the Const raint anal ysis Met hodology, and fi nally, iv. Curri culu m Theo rie s. Wit hi n t he f i rs t, 3 le ve ls w er e to b e st ud ie d: O ne, eminently historical, concerning the political and administrati ve organization of Portugal until the 25 th of April 1974 and the struggle process for autonomy of the peoples of the Azores and Madeira til l the “consecrat ion” of the 1st and Pr ovisional Polit ical Statute of t he Autonomous Region of Madeira in 1976. A 2nd one, relat ed to the effec tiv e establ ishmen t o f po litical auton omy in the P ortugu ese con stitutiona l fram ewo rk and its evoluti on unti l the approval of t he Defini tive Pol iti cal Stat ute of Madeira i n 1999, and final ly, a third plane, induced by the formal integrati on of Portugal in transnati onal spaces and the inherent obligati ons, particul arly with the European Union (in such a case specially due to the primacy principle of its legislati on over the Member Sta tes but als o for the assu mpti on of the pri nc ipl e of subsi di ar it y as a deter mi nant tool of pol itical organizati on) and the CPLP (considered the established processes and types of mobility in the area of Education among its Members), as well as a more inf ormal one wit h the countri es of t he Portugues e Diaspora. Regarding the 2 nd plan, the one conce rn ing th e D evelopm ent theorie s, the aim w as to identify, in its mo st v arious plans and with an anthropological and sociol ogical perspective, which axes are to be considered decisive for the generally perceiv ed development, as w ell as in a m ore focused approach in the Regional dimension of it, particul arly regarding relocation issues; de concentration, decentralizati on and regionali zation ones, and their correspondent processes and implicat ions. The analys is at the light of the Theory of O rgani zatio ns (al ong with the Cons tr aint Met hod of Goldr att ) had an evolutionar y logic crossed with specific the Portuguese history on the matter , starting in the 2nd w ave period (Toffler:198 4) up to the new technological realiti es of the 21 st century, in order to better und erstand the consequences of each choice for instit utions of al l kinds, either economic, social, cul tural or political . Finall y, wit h regard t o the Curri culum theo ries, the fundament al ide a was to percei ve it s visio n and mission, along with their evolut ion, and the role that fits to “space and time variabl es" in its design, that is to say to the cultur al, Polici es 50 economical and social realities , se nsu lato , p articularly in geo graphic ally d iscontin ued coun tries and their educational systems. Methodology Defi ned th e problem, having been put the m ain issues and identifi ed the core themes of the literature review, it is now time t o refer to methodol ogy. Given the framework defined , it is essenti al ly qual it ati ve and of i nte rpr etat iv e / c ompreh ensi ve natur e, in which the most impor ta nt role was init i all y res er ved to documen t anal ys is and, fur t her , to semi - structured interviews to mult i ple stak eho ld ers and dec isi on - makers part i ci pat in g in th e proc ess , bei ng the "tr ia ngu lat ion" sup por te d on these and their c omp arison. A w ord, at this p articular point, to refer that s everal of tho se inte rviews are still to b e made, meaning our work is not yet closed, although the al ready analys ed undoubtedly point s out a perspectiv e. In te rms o f d ocum ent a nalysis, regard ed a s an u ndersta nding mechani sm of the st r uct ur e an d es sen ce of circumstances that allow the descript ion of the "deep structu re" of the phenomena (Sousa, JM:2011: 63), particular focus w as there to a ll ty pes of le gislation , w hethe r E urope an, Nationa l an d Regiona l A utono mous , e xt ended to the forma l agreem ents with the C PLP a nd to the in formal w ith the cou ntries of th e Diasp ora, as w ell as to the political programs of the Governments of the Republic and R egion and to the speeches of the national and regional politi cians. Neither negligi ble was yet the understanding of the “how” of the operational processes led by both national and regional entities, as in " The approach of qualit ativ e resear ch (...) everything has the potential to constitute a clue that allows us to establish a m ore insigh tful und erstan ding o f our o bject o f study "(Bogdan Blik en:199 4: 49). As fo r t he se mi - structured interviews and because " We ai m to reach , I assume , the human s ig ni fi ca nce of t he processes inherent to our instituti ons " (Stott: 1973, quoted by C harles Hor ton Cooley in Bogdan Bliken:1994: 33) they involve national and re giona l policy ma kers, e ither fr om the natio nal a nd re gional parliame nts a nd governments, m embers of the representati ve parties, as well as with Mayors; Teachers' Union representati ves and Par ents and Students Associati ons as well as wi th pri mary and secondar y School Di rectors. Conclu sion Very briefl y, fo r has referre d som e o f the interview s ar e still to be d one, the provisional con clusions lead us to a kind of an ambivalent political regime t o whi ch more import ant t han the a) L etter and spirit of the Laws (the European, the National, the Regional and/or the ones subscript on agreements and protocols w ith third countries, either Portuguese speaking ones or others) and their general pr esuppositi ons and princ iples, or b) C oroll aries of scientific, theoretical and methodological perspectives of such different theories like the Regio nal Devel opment , Organ izat io ns a nd Cu rri cul um one s, or Polici es 51 c) R esult s of the pedagogical pr axis centr ed on one’s cultural background and one’s soci ety hist orical process and reality , versus a p rescri ptive and ‘ top - down’ one from a cent ral and (underst ood as a) plenipotent iary state department, what effect iv ely matters and count s, though not bein g assumed neith er said, is the perce ived po litical sens ation (and a cting at differ ent levels ) that th e capital of th e coun try’s ruling (p robably , so me say, for its five hund red y ears of imperial and colonial past) has exclusive powers and competences in order to guarantee what i s assumed, lik e in the p ast wh en the motto was “F rom M inho to East - Timor”, as the “unity” of the process of “product ion” of Portug u ese citizens, even, let us reiterate, if such an attitude is counterproductive, anti - scientific and not even respec ting the divers e le vels of norm s, rules and p rinciples the co untry as a w hole sho uld be imp lementing , particul arly , one shou ld say, fo r the s ak e of all its C itizens , Region s and Institutions . Thus the main observable constrai nt, following Goldbratt’ s methodology (from the very front line of the process – the tea cher in a cla ssroom facing p upils – to th e conceptualiz ation and design of t he Curri culum ), and acco rdingly the limit to th e region alization o f Educa tion and p articularly o f the Curric ulum , is an intangible and ideological one, the so c alled cultu ral and m ental sch eme w hich is still institu tionally incu lcated in th e centra l g overnin g bodi es of the country and its represe ntatives (fro m w hatever political party) , for it go es fu rther, a s w e ha ve ob serve d thro ugh Blanco de Morais ’ analys is on the Basic Law of the Land Use Policy and Planni ng, than the Educatio n system, and crosses every depart men t of t he Portug ues e poli tical organizat ion. Refer ences Apple, M. (2004 ) I deolog y and Curri cul um; Lo ndon; Routl edge Falmer. Araúj o, A. (1999); The 1997 constit uti onal revisi on - a test for politi cal and const itut ional history; Coimbra; Coimbra Edito ra. Arist otl e ( 1977) Poli cy Tr eaty; Li sbon; Europ e Ameri ca ( orig inal ly publi shed in the four th c entur y BC). Bernard i, B. (1974) ; I ntr oduct ion to Et hno - Anthr opolo gical Stu dies; Li sbon; 70 edit ions. Mora is de Blanc o, C. (199 8) ; The inter nal dime nsi on of the prin cipl e of subsidiarit y in Portuguese law in Journal of the P ortugue se Law yers - Year 5 8 - July (pp 779/821.); Lisbon Bogdan, R. C .; Biklen, S. K. (1994) ; Qualit ati ve Researc h in Educati on - An Introduct ion to Theory and Methods; Porto; Por to Edit ora. Europ ean Commission (1994); G rowth, Competitiveness and Employment - The chall enges and ways for ward into the tw enty - first ce ntury (W hite P aper); L uxem bourg; O fficial Pu blication s of the E urope an Co mmu nities. European Com mission (1995); Teaching and learni ng - Towards the learning socie ty; Luxembourg; Offi cial Publi cati ons of t he Eu ropean Communiti es. Portug uese Consti tut ion (2005) ; Li sbon; The Parl iament' s we bsit e; http: //www.parl amento.pt/Legi slacao/Pagi nas/Constit uicaoRepubli caPortuguesa.aspx Decree - Law 364/79 ( 1979); Gazet te Seri es I, No. 204, September 4; pgs. 2184/ 2187. Polici es 52 Polit ica l an d Admini str ati ve Sta tute of the Autonomou s Regi on of Madei ra ( 1991); Li sbon; Offi cia l Gaze tte No. 1 98 - Series I (pp. 301 6/3024 .). Polit ica l an d Admini str ati ve Sta tute of the Aut onomous Reg ion of Made ira (1999) ; L isbon; Off ici al Gazett e No. 195 - Series I (pp. 557 2/5614 .). Fino, C.N. (1996); Against Oneness Curriculum. In Perspectives and Debates Archipela go (39/46 pp.); Spring 1996; Funchal Goldr att , E. (1998 ) " Focus ing on co nstr aints, not costs" in Rethinking the future (pp 111 /.) ; Edited by Gibson, Rowan; Lon don; Nic hola s Br eal ey Pu bli shi ng. Goldr att , E. (1 999) “Wha t i s thi s thi ng cal led The Theo ry of Const ra int s”; Gouvei a, JB (20 12); The Legis lat iv e Aut onomy of the Auto no mous Reg ion s - A contribut ion of regi onal constituti onal law; Lisbon; EdiUAL. Regional Government of Madeira (1992;1996;2000;2004;2007;2011; 2015); Government programs; Funchal; Regional Government of Madeira. Basic Law o n Educa tio n (19 86); Lisb on; Offi cial Gaz ett e No . 237 - Series I (pp 3 067/30 81.). Mini st ry of Educa ti on (DE B) (20 04) ; Cur ri cul ar Organ iz ati on and Progr ams 1st cycl e of bas ic educat i on; Mem Mart i ns; ME ht t p:/ / san ti ago mai or. dr eal en tej o. pt /s it e/ pr ogr amas /o cp1 c Mini st ry o f Edu cat io n (DEB ) (2 001) ; Nat ion al Curr icu lum of Basi c Edu cati on - Essent ial Ski ll s; Mem Marti ns; ME Mota Amar al , J. B. (20 07) ; Refle cti on s on Regi ona l Fi na nce - The epilogue mode; www.parlament o.pt; http:/ /paginaspessoai s.parl amento.pt/ jbmotaamaral/pagi na.aspx?confi d=17&ID_Conteudo=254 Secret ary of State of Madeir a f or Edu cati on; DRPRI PORTAL; http:/ /www02.madeira - edu.pt /Portal s/2/Documentos/Demograf ia2014.pdf Simões Lopes, A. (1987); Regional devel opment: practi ce, the ory, models ; Lisbon ; Caloust e Gulbenki an Foundation. Sousa, JM (2011) C urriculum and Ethnography of Education: A Necessary Dialogue (pp 45 - 68.) In Ethnography of Educati on; org. Thi n, C.N . ; Wood; CI E - Uma. Sousa, N.J.V. A.S. (2013); The cur rent refor m of local administ rati on; Lisbon (79/97 pp.); Lusophone Unive rsi ty; http://r evistas. ulusofona. pt/i ndex.php/rf dulp/ar ticle/ download/3801/2538 Tedesco, JC et al (2013) ; The curri culum debate: why it i s important today; Geneva; UNESCO International Bureau of Educati on Toffl er, A. (1984); The T hird Wav e; Lisbon; B razil books. Toffl er, A. ( 1974); Future Shock; Lisbon; Brazi l Books Treaty on Europe an Union (1992); Luxembourg ; Off icia l Publ icat ions o f t he European Communitie s. Polici es 53 Curri cul um a nd d idak ti k i n 21 st century: Stil l di vergent or convergi ng? Tahirsyl aj, Armend ( ar mendtahirsylaj @gmail.com); The Pennsylva nia St ate Uni versi ty , United States of Am erica An intensi ve dialog ue between US, German and other European scholar s on the topi c of didakti k and curricu lum theory too k pla ce d urin g 1990s. Here, I review this dialogue and extend it into current post - 2000 conversations regardin g did aktik a nd c urriculum theory to exam ine h ow th e tw o trad itions are be ing affe cted by g lobal tre nds in education. German didakt ik theory is central to curri culum, teaching and learning in Continental Europe generally and German speaking w orld specifical ly, but is m ostly unknown in the E nglish speaking w orld (Hopmann, 2007; West bu ry et al. , 2000) . Curr ic ul um is use d widel y by many count ries but I ref er her e on ly to cu rriculum traditio ns employed in the U .S. The objective of this work is to discern threads of development both within curricul um and didaktik orientat ions, and identify whether they are still holding to their tradit ional assumptions about education or they a re con verging towa rds on e anoth er. An other o bjective for this the oretica l work is to revita lize the c ross - national and cross - cul tural educational dialogues and exchanges between didaktik and curri culum theorists and educational researcher s. I util ize conte nt analy sis to ex amine p ublicatio ns that de rived fro m pre vious cu rriculum - didaktik dialogue as well as recent education policy docum ents and education developments in U.S. and G ermany, as the two core curricul um and didaktik countr ies respecti vely , to pu rsue the o bjective s of this pa per. Then, I exemplify the initi al state and the identi fied changes through two logical models, which compare and contrast didaktik and curriculum theor y as two educational pol icy systems. Logi c Models are tools pri mari ly developed and used by program managers and evaluators to describe programs in terms of their assumptions, inputs, activiti es, outputs and outcomes (McLaughlin & Jordan, 1999). The results point to two key educational changes, which are elaborated on m ore in depth, including the introduction of common core educational standards, i.e. national educational standards in the U.S. and introducti on of exter nal assessments in Germany. While curriculum and didaktik still hold to thei r tradi tional concept ualizati ons of the field, I conclude that to some extent both tradi tions are movi ng towar ds one anoth er as a resu lt o f globa l educat i on tren ds such as i nt ern at ion al as ses smen ts an d the coordinati on of teac hing and learning around research - based learning trajectorie s and learning progressions, in math education and scienc e education, respect ively. Keywords : curriculum, d idaktik, lo gic mod els, educa tional polic y, comp arative edu cation Introd uction Intens ification of g lobal cross - national cooperation in almost any fields , inclu ding e duca tion, ha s be en in viting fo r educational theori sts and practitioner s to look ‘over’ the borders of their nations for exchange and tr ansfer of ideas for educ ational im provem ent. Bu t for exc hang e a nd transfe r to oc cur, som e lev el o f un derstanding is required to enable the flow of ideas in a two - or multi - way direc ti on. In effort s to reach that level of unders tand ing, European and US scholars init iated a more intensive dialogue to discuss and understand similarit ies and differences betwe en German - based Didaktik and US - based curricul um theory traditions during the 1990s. The spark for that intensi fied dialogue, after som e earlier exchanges between two tradi tions starti ng from 1960s, came from the interest of US educational scholars to bet ter u ndersta nd w hat wa s this co ncept c alled ‘D idaktik’? (H opm ann & Riqua rts, 200 0). Of c ours e, the unde rl yin g obj ect iv es a nd i nt enti ons wer e much br oader an d t he d ial ogue tr ied t o add ress que sti ons, Polici es 54 such as: How did the two tradit ions compa re and contrast ? C ould, and to what extent, one tradi tion inform the other? Is there something that they can learn from one another? etc. W e have summarized the f indings of the dialogue dur ing 1990s in Table 1. So what is Didakt ik the ory? Ge rman Didakt ik theory is central to curricu lum, teac hing and lea rning in Contin ental Europe generally and German speakin g world specif ical ly, but is mostly unknown in the English speaki ng world (Hopm ann, 2007; Westbu ry et a l., 2000 ). The Germ an term Didakt ik is well - established in post - 1990s E nglish literatu re, a nd t o av oid t he u se o f m ore nega tively load ed conc ept of d idactic s as teac her cente red and con trolled instru ction (Ka nsan en, 200 2), we u se the or iginal spe lling Did aktik thro ugho ut t he article . In its or iginal c onceptualiz ation, “Didakti k is about how teaching can instigate learning, but learning as a content - based student activi ty not as swallowing a sermon or a monologue or otherwise one - sided distribution of knowledge by a teacher” (Hopmann, 2007, p. 113). The inte rpreta tion o f Did aktik across Europe led to a varie ty of mo des but Ho pma nn points out they shared three common aspects, "(a) the concept of Bil dung, (b) the embedded differenti al of matter and meaning, and (c) a concept of the necess ary autonomy of teaching” to address “problems of order, sequence, and choice within thei r respecti ve frames of refer ence" (Hopmann, 2007, p. 115). We will return t o Bildung later , as another key concept withi n Didakti k theory . Curri cul um, on the other hand , is a wid ely u sed theory amongst m any countries, primarily in the English - speaking worl d, but we focus here more on its North American and more speci fi cal ly US tradi tio n. While there are numerou s definit ions and construc ts on curric ulum, varying largely from one period of time to the other, w hat we refer to as curriculum here, is the prevailing curri culum model that has been in place in the U.S. since early 1900s, w hen the so - called social efficiency model o f curriculum promoted by Franklin Bobbit and largely perpetuated by US indus trial forces of the tim e, won the A merica n e duca tion battle ag ainst hum anist ic - based m odels of curriculum, who were mainl y led and suppor ted by John Dewey (Kli ebar d, 2004 ). Acc ordi ng to Kl ieba rd (200 4), ideas out si de the realm o f edu cation, suc h as those of Frederick T aylor, an engineer from scienti fic managem ent, that gave birth to soc ial efficienc y as a s ocial idea l a nd ed ucation al doctrin e, and id eas of E dwa rd Thor ndike fro m psy cholog y, who intro duced educat ion al or “intel li genc e” measuremen t into A merica n ed ucation , led to socia l efficie ncy curriculum mode ls within th e U.S. ed ucation . Such models have shaped US educat ion curriculum and educational thinkin g a nd practice to the prese nt d ays with continu ed heavy foc us on e xterna lly - mandated asse ssm ents accountabil ity models. S ocial efficiency models suggested that students would learn in schools only what they needed to know in order to perform as an adult mem ber of social order, that is, “To go beyond what som eone had to know in o rder to perfo rm tha t ro le succe ssfully wa s s imply w asteful” (Klie bard, 20 04, p. 77). Mo re recen tly th e critici sm against so - called ‘business - driven’ educational policies in the U.S. have mounted to such heights where it is arg ued that “t he co mmo n sch ool be came first a fa ctory, then a corporation, now a cram sch ool, but always a business” (Pinar, 2012, p. 15). H owever, with advancement of the learning sciences in the last several decades, curriculum has seen a shift towards cognitive and constructive models of curriculum, but the driving assumptions about educati on have not been chal lenged. Debates between D idakti k and curricul um have already been extensive during 20 th cen tury. During 1960s, there was an export of curri cul um idea s fro m the U.S. curr icu lum to Germany (Gund em & Hopmann, 1998), during 1990s, there was a dialogue for the benefit of better understanding between traditions (Westbury, Hopmann, & Riqua rts , 2000), while more rece ntl y there is renewed inter est in cros s - cultural com parisons and sch olarly exchanges be twe en the US cu rriculum an d G erma n D idaktik, es pecially in rela tion to lea rning pro gressio ns a nd Polici es 55 teach ing s eque nces researc h an d to cur riculum con tent issues (Duschl, Maen g & Se zen , 2011). This rekindled intere st is an oppor tunity for bo th tradition s to re flect upo n their recen t past and curre nt develop men ts and identify areas in which they could be strengt hened if they ar e open t o changes and willi ng to l earn f rom one another . In our analys is, we e xtend th e prior w ork in th e field in an inno vative w ay by transla ting the o utcom es of th e Didak ti k - curriculum dialogue into logic mo dels. Logic Models a re tools primarily developed and used b y program manag er s and eval uat ors to desc ri be prog rams in ter ms of their assumpt io ns, input s, activ it ie s, output s and outco mes (McLau ghl i n & Jorda n, 1999) . In t his ar t icl e, we concep tua li ze Di dakt ik and cu rr ic ulu m as t wo broad programs of education policy systems repr esenting German and US contexts and thr ough the logic m odels did analyses of salient changes over the years. Wh ile we u nderst and tha t D idaktik w ould stro ngly re sist such a comparison model, w e consider the m odels do provide a clear layout as to how Didaktik and curriculum compare and contrast across same logic model categor ies. One purp ose fo r our theor eti cal work is to revitaliz e th e c ross - national and cross - cultural educati onal dialogues and exchanges between Didaktik and curriculum theorists, educational practitioners, researchers, and policy makers. We feel that a more intensive and extensive educational exchang e between nations’ scholars could lead to 1) a deeper and better understandi ng of pedagogical tradit ions and 2) better informed decision - mak ers and pol icy makers to help avoid challenges in policy development and program implementation. A second purpose is to sho w how the adm inis trati on of internati onal assess ments such as Trends in Internati onal Math and Science Studi es (TIMS S) and P rogram me for In ternational S tudent A ssessm ent (PISA ) has pu shed m any co untries, inclu ding the U.S. and Germany, to unde rta ke reforms that impro ve th eir stud ents’ a chievem ent in those ass essme nts. Th ese global and national educational processes as well as the lessons learned in the past in D idakti k and curriculum tradition s cou ld save signific ant res ources and time for n ations en gaged in furt her educational developments in the coming years (e.g., 21 st Century Skil ls, Diagnost ic Assessme nts, Scienti fi c Practi ces) by avoidin g developmen t of policies that lead to one versus another outcome. An example here is G ermany’s decision to in troduc e e xternal assessments, which have not proved to increase student achievement over time in the U.S., therefore it would save resources required f or test development and administration, etc., if such a policy was never put in place. Comparative educ ation schol arship i s divided over usabili ty and vali dity of c ross - national education r esearch due to national cultural and historical differences. Indeed, scholars partici pating in Didaktik - Cu rri cul um debat e duri ng 1990s noted that educational issues “[ … ] are always rooted in the particul ariti es of national histories, of national habits, and of national aspirati ons” (Reid, 1998, p. 11 - 12). However, we cont end that fruit ful insights and understandings emerge when trying to disentangle global and cross - national educational developments and practices . While it is argued that educational policy discourse has largel y been standardized globally (Schriewer, 2000), withi n - country educational differences in Germany and the U.S. still provide relevant potential rese arch - based solutions for one another. An exam ple is with issues related to curriculum coherence and alignment, as central elements for provisi on of high quality education and experiences for everyone partici pating in and contributing to education systems in respe ctive co untries . We b egin th e pape r by pro viding discus sions o f the theore tical fram ework s a nd me thodo logy that in formed o ur w ork. W e th en follow w ith prese ntation s o f res ults and discussion, and concl ude with some insight s as t o where our thinki ng mi ght lead to i n the near fut ure. Polici es 56 Theoreti cal F ramework We dra w fro m thr ee theo re t ic al per spe ct i ves to con ce pt ua li z e the dis cu ssi on on Dida kt ik and curr i cul um t r adi tion s: logic m odels , D idaktik /Bildun g, and cu rriculum theor y, with an e mph asis on te aching sequences and learning progressions. First , we employ logic models of inputs/ outputs t o put Didakt ik and curri culum tradi tions i n a comparative and co ntrasti ng perspective. Logic mo dels are a way to highlight the key elements of a project or program from assumptions to inputs to outcomes so that those involved in design, implementati on and evaluation use the same plat form as a point of ref erence (McLaughli n & Jordan, 1999). We view Didaktik and curri culum tradition s as two se parate standa lone program s of e ducation; therefore, the logic models framework serves our purpose to examine both tradit ions t hrough t he same perspect ive and t o faci lit ate our discussi on here. Second, we use Didaktik/ Bil dung t heory to focus the discus sion on German educat ional thi nki ng. Klette (2007) described this tradit ion “as a relation between teachers and learners (the who), subject matter (the what) and instru ction al methods (the how)” (p. 147). Simil arl y, Didaktik “provid es teachers with ways of consideri ng the essential what, how and why questions around their te aching of their students in th eir classrooms” (Westbury, 2000, p. 17, emphasis in the original). Hopmann (2007) stated that Didaktik is a matter of order, sequence, choice; feature s that align well w ith co ntemp orary thinki ng regarding US standards revision and attenti on to Learning Traject ories in mathematics educat ion and Learning Progressions in science educat ion. Within the frame of order , sequence, and choice, Hopmann stated that “ Didaktik became the main tool f or cre ating s pace for local t eaching by providing inter pretati ve tool s for dealing with st ate gui delines on a loc al basis ” (p. 113). As noted above, Bildun g is a cent ral concept in Didakti k tradi tio n. German concept Bildung is a noun meaning something like “bein g educated, educatedness.” It also carries the connotat ions of the word bilden “to for m, to shape”. Bildung, as understood by Hum boldt (1792), means ‘grasping as much world as possible’ and as ‘contri buting to hum an kind’ by development of one’s own unique self. In B ildung, whatever is done or learned is done or learned to develop one’s ow n i ndividual ity, to unfold the capabil ities of the I (Hopmann, 2007). The notion of Bil dung, as developed in the D idakt ik perspec tive, sees Bildung as an individual outcome, not as a program for education. This is in opposition to US testing - driven education and international testing programs where the meani ng of the subjec t matt er cont ent i s fixe d, an d in mos t cases o nly o ne righ t solut i on is s oug ht fro m ev er yone . Further m ore, competence - based curricul a are problematic as i t is not possibl e to match a certain competence with a certain content matter, and also gaining competence is but one of the many potential m eanings which can be achieved by a given content matter (Hopmann, 2007). Bildung is seen as an ideal aspiring to be m astered by students with teacher’s support and so mething to hold on to and w ork towards throughout a personal life journey. In other w ords, it me ans pre paring stu dents fo r life long learn ing beyo nd form a l educa tion, for the s ake of transfo rming them selve s as hu man being s, a nd to the exte nt p ossible, exte nd th at tra nsform ation to w hat the person does ( occupation) and soci ety at large. Third, we draw from th e more r ecent work in the curriculu m theory, whic h is shifting its focus from being m ore behaviorist ic - to b eing m ore c ognitivist - and constructiv ist - oriented. In particular, we focus on l earning tr ajector ies in m athem atics educa tion a nd lea rning progre ssions in sc ience educa tion p laced within US educa tion al res earch, and curriculum theory. Learning tr ajector ies is a promising field of research in mathematics education that f ocuses on better curriculum, instruction and assessment alignment for the benefit of students’ learning. More specifically, learn in g traj ectori es were def ined as: Polici es 63 teach ers a re gr eatly d isadva ntage d by o ur co untry’s la ck of a common, coherent curricul um and the text s, mate ri al s, an d t ra in ing t hat mat ch i t” ( p. 1) , while an al ogou s concer ns were voiced r epe ate dl y b y ot he r resear ch er reports ( Schmidt, Wang & McKnigh t, 2005; Schmid t, 2008; Nati ona l Rese ar ch Counc il [NRC] , 2007 ; Fortus & Krajc ik, 2012). Therefor e, as the Carnegie Corporati on of New York, & Institut e for Advanced Study (2009) re port suggested, an alignment across curriculum, instruction and assessment would be the response to upgrading education st andards for all students and schools in al l states with t he hope to improve students’ achievement within country and vis -à- vis internati onal peers. Almost all U.S. member states have signed up for ‘common core’ standards and national assessments expected to be put in place starting fr om 2014 - 2015 school year. In turn, school d istr icts are expected to follow - up and develop their curricul a that are in line with the national standards adopted at both st ate and federal level. Whet he r th es e s te ps wi ll p ro duc e in te nd ed out co me s remains to be seen, but concomitant developmen ts are major shifts fr om curriculum structure of t he past. In particul ar, US developments are strikingly dif ferent fr om century - old beliefs and pr actices, where school cur riculum is an i nherentl y community - ba sed aff air to be deci ded indivi dually by schools and districts. In Germany’s case, developments are in line with past practices of national curricul um, but introd uction of com pete ncies or Bildungstandards , is to some exten t in c ontrad iction w ith the Dida kt ik prin ciples since focusing on certain standards means dum ping dow n curriculum. From Didaktik perspective, when teachers and students meet ar ound specifi c content matter, t he result is not a specifi c outcome, in t he form of competenc ies, but the outcomes are multiple and go beyond any individual competence (Hopmann, 2007). However, G erman educators seem to have well - situated their competency - based education within Bildung, considering standards as another way of achieving the ideals of Bildung, as the case has been within Didaktik all along (Köller, 2009). The shift from didakt ik - based models of education towards models more in line wit h curriculum and competency - based model s seems to be a tren d in ot her Cont in ent al Eur ope an count ri es forme rl y do mina te d by Didak tik tra di tion (Panti ć & W ubb els, 201 2). The work on learning t rajector ies and learni ng progressions i n the US contri buted to fur ther acceler ate decisi ons on having national educati onal standards, which in turn would evolve into some kind of a national curricul um, and then to cu rriculum alignm ent a nd co heren ce. As Fortu s and Krajcik (2012 ) hav e note d, learn ing pro gress ions ar e descripti ons of successively more sophisticat ed ways of thinking about how learners develop key discipli nary concepts and practices within a grade level an d across multiple grades. In turn, they further argue, learning progressions allow designers to bring coherence to their curricul um m aterial s, coherence that is crucial in supporting student learning by providing al ignment bet wee n standar ds, i nstruct ional tasks, and assessments across grades and grade bands. We pred ic t that with the st ar t of imp le men ta ti on of the nat io na l sta nd ar ds and curriculum in the U S, there will be a greater need for results from educational research in lear ning tr ajectori es and learn ing progress ions. Also, this need will re sult with m ore fundin g fo r th is line of ed ucation al re searc h a s b oth policy makers and educators at schools, distri cts or state or federal levels will be interest ed to have em piri cally established learning trajectories in math and learning progressions in sciences. In turn, extended learning about learn ing trajecto ries and lea rning pro gress ions will ass ist teache rs in schoo ls t o im plem ent the ne w curricu lum, an d policy - ma ker s at de ci si on ma king levels to bring intended curricul um goals up to scale across the nati on. The most recent emphasis on accelerati on of STEM educati on refor m in the US demonstra tes a unique and ambitious agenda to redesign the science teaching and learning across the nat ion. To this end, a num ber of influen tial N ationa l Re searc h C ouncil (NR C) repo rts h ave draw n a ne w ro adma p fo r U. S. sc ience ed ucation . Polici es 64 Among them, Taking Science to School: Learni ng and teaching scien ce in grades K - 8 (N RC, 2 007) , A Framework for K - 12 S cience Education: Practices, Crosscutting Concepts and Core Ideas (NRC, 2012a ), Educati on for Life and W ork (NRC, 20 12b) and Developin g Assessment s for the Next Genera ti on Science Standard s (N RC, 201 4) represe nt th e stepping stone s for the c hanges tha t are already initiated and those yet to come in US science education. A key recommendation that spans across all these reports is that science learning be organized into longe r le arning se quenc es, i.e. learn ing prog ression s th at s pan ver tically acro ss grade s a nd horizontally w ithi n a given school year. A nother key recommendation that em erges from the reports m aintai ns the need for fewer focus ed discip linary core ide as that pro vide for de eper lea rning, as w ell as inte gration of sc ience an d e ngine ering practices and crosscutti ng concepts to facili tate learning of core knowledge and practices that are crucial for mast er y of scie nti f ic knowle dge and reason in g. Thes e devel op ment s are tak in g scie nce educ at io n into a new space in eff orts t o overcome the past labeling o f the U S curricu lum as a “mile wid e and a n inch de ep.” In the new agenda, a renewed definit ion of science is reconfirmed: “Science is not just a body of knowledge that refl ects current understanding of the world; it is also a set of practices used to estab lish, e xtend , an d ref ine th at k nowle dge. Both elements — knowledge and practice — are essential.” (NRC, 2012a, p. 26). To some extent, the redefined science for the US context sounds quite similar to the p ositions within Didaktik system that view the role of e ducation beyond immediate knowledge mastery – such that entails a more transformative role for the students involved, t he professional communities they engage wit h, and societ ies they contr ibute to. To make this possibl e in the U S, the Educat ion for Life and Work rep ort (NRC , 2012b) recom mend s incorpo ration of “21 st century competencies”, such as problem solving, critical thinking and collaboration into teaching and learning activiti es for deeper learning purposes. The orientati ons laid out for the f uture of science educati on in the US start to sound a lot more a s i de al s a spi r ed to be r eac hed t hr oug h B il dun g in Di dak ti k tr ad it io n. More sp eci fi ca ll y, t he K - 12 Science Educati on Framework sits on three dimensions, incl uding scienti fic and engineering practice s, crosscutting concepts, which have applicabilit y across science disciplines, and core discipl inary ideas. In more detail , the scientific and engineering practi ces for science classrooms include: 1. Asking questions (for science) and defi ning problems (f o r engineering) ; 2. D evelopi ng and using models ; 3. Planning and carrying out investigations ; 4. Analyzing and interpreting data; 5. Using mathem atics and computational thinking ; 6. Constructing explanati ons (for science) and designing soluti ons (for eng inee ring) ; 7. Enga ging in arg umen t fr om evidence ; and 8. O btaini ng, evaluating, and com municating information. In turn, there are seven crosscut ting concepts, including patterns; cause and effect: m echanism and explanation; sca le, proportion and quantity ; systems and system m odels; en ergy and matter: flows, cycles and conservation; structure an d function; an d stabilit y and change. The third dimension on disciplinary core ideas lists 13 core ideas distributed across physical sciences (four), life sciences (four) , earth and space sciences (three) and engineer ing, technology and the applicati ons of sciences (two) ( NRC, 2012a). In the report words: Understanding the core ideas and engaging in the scienti fic and engineeri ng practices helps to prepare students for broa der un derstan ding, a nd de eper lev els of s cientific a nd eng ineerin g inves tigation, la ter on – in high school, college, and beyond. One rationale for organizing content around core ideas comes from s tudies c ompa ring exp erts and novice s in any fie ld. Expert s understan d the core principl es and theore tical cons tructs of their field , and the y u se th em to m ake sen se o f ne w inform ation or tack le n ovel problems. Novices, in contrast, tend to hold disconnected and even contradict ory bits of knowledge as isol ated facts and s truggle to fi nd a way to or ganize and i ntegrat e them [24]. The assumption, then, is t hat Polici es 65 helping students learn the core i deas through engaging in scientifi c and engineering practices w ill enable them to beco me le ss like no vices a nd mo re li ke experts (NRC, 2012a, p. 25). The Framework sets high expectati ons for the US students, and t he ideals for developing a highly scient ifi call y competent citizenry for both professional and other less formal contexts are largely comm endable. These ideals pose a giant l eap away from the past curri culum thinki ng and begin to even surpass ideals in Didakt ik tr aditi on as part of Bildung. One key challenge that needs to be resolved is whether US teachers will have the professional autonomy to adapt these high id eals into clas sroom rea lities o f the ir distr icts a nd s tudent pop ulations . W hile teach er autono my unde r D idaktik is still m aintain ed, and teac hers are less threa tened by ex ternally - m andated accountabil ity models, if at all, the accountabilit y systems in the US will stil l be in place and thus US teachers will have to walk again the fine line between supporting deeper learning for students and meeting accountabili ty requirem ents imp osed thro ugh extern ally - administer ed assessments. To this e ffect , a latest N RC re port on d evelop ing ass essm ents for the N GSS (NR C, 20 14) re cogn izes th e challenges that might be e ncountered in implementation o f the three - dimensional approach to S TEM education, namely, practices, crosscutting concepts and core ideas, and emphasizes the need for adequate classroom assessments and m onitor ing assessments. The report recomm ends the use of both formative and summ ative classroom assessments, i.e. formative for the needs of instructi onal improvement and summ ative for t he needs of st udent grading. The monitoring assessments are recomm ended to track student learning and m astery of scientifi c practices , concepts and core ideas across different settings and time periods. The latter focus on m onitor ing assessments demonstrates continuation of past curricul um theory thinking is in line with the curriculum theory assumption that holds obj ectivi st and posit ivist view of the world in which learning can be tracked and measured – a notion that Didaktik tradi tion i n Germany has al so star ted t o lend i tself int o. Returni ng to scien ti fic and engineeri ng pract ic es one more time, here we offer a more extensiv e elabor ati on of the third scientific and eng ineering pra ctice, i.e . Plan ning and Ca rrying Out Inves tigations as per The Framework provisions (N RC, 2012a). Planni ng and carr ying out inve sti gat ions is a scie nce practi ce for making sense of and explaining the natur al world. The outcomes of investigations help in the discover y of patterns and the development of cause and effect mechanisms that are u sed to explain and understand natural phenomena and engineer ing designs. For scientist s and engineers, planning and carryout investigat ions has many steps, involving numerous decisions, and frequently requires repeated attempts. It takes time to sort things out in the natural w orld, to ask the righ t q uestion s, and to m ake the approp riate me asurem ents a nd obs ervation s. The Framework points out, however, that such sense - making enact ment s are missi ng in the cur ren t US K - 12 science programs. One goal of the F ramew ork is to ma ke learn ers’ exp erience s with scie nce a bit of a str uggle in or der to dev elop im ages tha t science is a way of know ing that strives to make sense o f the world. At its core, planning and carrying out inves tigation s is a se t of sen se - makin g practi ces. Thus, the Framework suggests that over a three year grade band (e.g., K - 2 3 - 5, 6 - 8, 9 - 12), students’ engagements with the planning and carr ying out of investi gations, teachers should increas ingly lead them to broaden and deepen the co mplex ity of investigations; both in terms of the questions and problems being posed as well as the measures and m ethods being employed. The Framework’s intent is to avoid stude nts only doing investiga tions that pre sent science knowledge and inquiry in ways that lead stud ents to see scie ntific k nowle dge as non - problematic. Non - problematic in the sense that science i s seen as an easy straight forward path to answers and explanations where Polici es 66 there is no struggle . Ask a qu estion, you a lways get the answ er. M ake meas u reme nts, you always s elected th e right tool a nd proce dure. M ake ob servations , you alw ays obta in the corre ct informa tion know ing whe n and w here to lo ok. S uch investig ations - without - struggles leads to students leaving school with naïve notions that the resu lts from inve stigation s an d sc ientific know ledge as non - problemati c. Thus, planning and carrying out investigations should instead reveal how obtaining, buil ding and refining scienti fic knowledge through scientif ic inquiri es involves working thr ough a var iety of com plex proble matic p roces ses. So how can investi gati ons be planned and carri ed out withi n the classroo m setting s? Planning invest igat ions begins with designing experimental or observational inquiries that align to the question(s) being asked or the hypothesis being put forth. One begins thi s process by considering t he relevant proper ties, attribut es and variables and then deter mining how they may be observed, measured, and isolat ed or contr olled. Isolating and cont roll ing variables are imp ortant for determini ng patterns , establi shing cause and effect relati onships and buil ding mecha ni sms to expl ai n or d escribe events and systems. I n l aboratory or design experiments, students need to decide: 1. Whi ch var ia bl e( s) wil l be tr eat ed as re sul ts, th e outcomes of the experiment that are allowed to be differ ent and vary, and 2. Whi ch v ar i abl e(s) a re t o be t reat ed as t he i np ut s an d th us m ust be hel d co nst ant, t ha t is c on tr ol l ed . In field obse rvations , planning investigatio ns begin s with finding out what ca n and can’t be contr olled and then deciding w hen to do measurements or how t o collect different samples of data under different conditions. The range of choices , th e complexities with obtainin g and setting up materials, and the wide variety of sources of er ror are what makes scient ific knowledge problematic – it is c omple x w ork and thinking tha t can freq uently be inacc urate o r misd irected . Let’s consider then about some of the problems o f measure ment and m easur ing. Im portan t decis ions abou t measu re ar e pa rt of planning and carrying out inve stigations. What meas uremen ts shou ld be taken? Wh at level o f accuracy do y ou want? What i nstruments or tool s should be used to make such measurements? Precisi on is ver y impo rtant, the g oal is to measu re and re cord a s accu rately as possible so a s to try and eli minate as many sources of error as possible. T hen there are the precision issues when doing field studies such as conducting observation, conducting counts, gathering samples, and generating representations and drawings. Once again, w e see how obtaining, buildi ng and refini ng scienti fic knowl edge becomes problematic. As noted earli er , Framework’ s goal is t o avoid student s developing ‘ Knowledge Unproblematic’ views of scienc e knowledge and scienti fic inquiry. Planning and carrying out investigati ons are important experiences that help students acquire conceptual knowledge, procedural knowledge and epistemic knowledge and develop a ‘Knowledge Problematic’ view of scientifi c inquiry. Again, considering scientif ic pra ctices fro m the Did aktik - Curricu lum dic hotomy , it becomes obvious that teacher’s role is central in engaging students in investi gations with open ended solutions – in those where the goal is not only to achi eve to an answer that will be relevan t in a n upcoming standardized tests. In other words, dimini shi ng teache r autonomy and prof essi onal ism thro ugh account abi li ty models in t he US, and anywhere where tho se mo dels ar e i n pl ace, mi nimi zes the oppo rtu nit ies fo r t each ers to all ow b oth th emselv es a nd s tu dents to engage in investigati ons that face errors and failures and experience ‘problemati c’ nature of scientific knowledge, thus a voiding the trap of ‘knowledge non - problemati c.’ Polici es 67 Introd uction of Exte rnal Asse ssme nt in Ge rman y an d A daptiv e In structio n a nd Professio nal Development Releva nt to be Ta ught in the U.S Extern al asses sments i n K - 12 education have been around for a long period of time, but that was not the case in Germany unt il the begi nni ng of 21 st century. Didaktik liter ature does not elaborate much on e xternal assessm ent, if at all. The primary reason for t he lack of external assessments in Didaktik traditi on i n the past is the notion of teach er’s auton omy an d unique ness of m eetings be tween te acher s a nd stude nts aroun d conten t m atter. Did aktik the ory suggests that student assessment is a sole discr etion of i ndividual teachers when individual student s try to come to terms and understand some specific co ntent (curriculum) (Hopm ann, 2007). Considering how long these Didak ti k pr inc ipl es have been hel d amidst educator communities in Germany, external assessment is indeed a majo r revol ut io n in Germa ny, and the one tha t is al re ady faci ng some resi st anc e and oppo si ti on wheth er it fi ts wi th German Didakti k - based educational model. H opmann (2007) considered that if “[ … ] ma ny po liticians and researc hers argu e that nation al te sting com bined w ith re ducing the s tate curriculum to com petency e xpectation s would enhance the autonomy of school s and teac hers , this is – plainly speaking – educational rubbish, at least f rom a D idaktik perspe ctive” (p. 120). Acc ording to him , this approach would redu ce teache r autonom y, as the expectati on would be to match specific matter with competence, and aut onomy of situated meeting the leaner with matt er woul d get lost, under Bild ung per spective. Didaktik literat ure shows that some curriculum principles were tried in Germ any durin g 1960s , but resulted with a short - lived exchan ge and retur n of Didaktik t o its traditiona l roots. Howeve r, we argue that the friction a nd ten sion b etween Germ an po licy ma kers w ho ins ist on external assessment and education comm unity who insists on Didaktik principl es will continue for some time, and while the administrat ion of external assessments will persist , Didakt ik wil l not give up its princi ples ei ther. The changes wit h regard t o adaptive instr uction and professional educati on relevant to curr icul um to be taught on the U.S . edu cation spe ctrum ha ve a bette r cha nce to succ eed for th ree reaso ns: firs t, that the y se em to b e be tter aligned with the overall nat iona l a genda f or curricu lum alig nme nt; seco nd, ada ptive ins truction re quires s ome teach er a utono my in a djusting na tional curriculu m standa rds for th e n eeds of individu al a nd specific stude nts, schools and districts in the U.S.; and third, because teachers wil l nee d to ha ve hig her ac ademic leve ls t o be abl e to teach a m ore deman ding c urriculum an d they will n eed p rofess ional d evelop ment tailored to spe cific cur riculum content areas they w ill be teaching in schools. Indeed, research reviews have pointed to ‘a daptive instruction’ as a single most effective way to bring about intended changes at classroom settings (Co rcoran & Silander, 200 9) . ‘Ada ptive in structio n’ is a vagu ely de fined term but it is sugg ested t o ma ke us e of a varie ty of in structio nal approaches that are cu stomiz ed to individ ual stude nts or gro ups of stu dents an d classro oms , su ch as gro up learn ing, p roject based learning, and dialo gic te aching to name a few. Corc oran and S ilande r (20 09) fu rther argue that their conc eptualiza tion of adaptive inst ruction as well as formative assess ment practices that pertain to providing immediate feedback to students for the sole purpose of advancing student learning and not evaluating them could p otentially lead to e ver incre asing h igher a cadem ic levels studen ts are expect ed to achieve. However, they caution that “It is impo rtant to reco gnize that wh at is being “adapted ” in a daptive instru ction is not th e lea rning goals for students, but rather the instructi onal strategies and supports offered to help students rea ch the goals” (Corco ran & Silande r, 20 09, p . 17 5). In ad dition, th ey noted tha t, “Ad aptive instruction co uld incorpo rate th e effecti ve instructional approaches we have been reviewi ng, but add the power of real - time feed back and contin u - ous improvement, for the studen t, for the te acher, a nd for th e profe ssion” (C orcora n & Sila nder, 20 09, p. 1 74). Polici es 68 It is ey e - opening to see how well adaptive instruct ion argumentation fit w ithi n Didaktik and Bildung principles in general and to the W olfgang K lafk i’s Didakt ik ana lysis in particu lar. Fo r exa mple, Dida ktik re quires teach ers to undertake a Didakti k analysis prior to teaching any content to students, asking for content of instruc tion to be analyzed at three levels: Relat ing it to subject matter as a str uct ure of know ledge ; Rela ting it to s ubject mat ter as in use in everyday li fe, and; R elati ng it t o subject matt er as in use i n the frame of school ing and rel ations t o other school su bjects and its p lacement in the curriculum as a whole. (Westbury, Hopmann & R iquarts, 20 00, p. 198). From this perspect ive, it is ironic to observe how both Didaktik and curriculum tr aditi ons are m oving towards each other ‘territ ories’ in areas they are being asked to change. W e argue that it is tragic to some extent to see how Germany is tr ying to emp hasize e xternal assessments despite an ever growing bod y of decades of research against external and standardi zed testing in the U.S. By the same token, we contend the shift towards more teach er a utono my, ada ptive instruc tion and form ative as ses sment in the U.S. as an advoca cy towards D idaktik - based thinking and practices, which Germany policy - maker s a re t ry in g to do aw ay wi th , b ut resis ta nce of Dida kt ik scholars is promising in that it m ight lead to preservation of these values for the benefit o f developing each students’ indi viduality t o their fullest potential. Conclu sions In the g lobalized world o f th e 21 st cen tury, intensifi ed by massive technological developm ents, education sy stems in the U.S and Germany, and indeed everywhere, are under d ouble pressures: first , how to build a respectable and valid education system at home, i.e. w ithi n country, that matches the needs of students and expectations of the society, and second, how to increase achievement in internati onal assessm ents to prove th at they too have a ‘world cla ss’ educatio n irre spect ive of how ‘w orld class’ educa tion is def ined. Didaktik an d c urriculu m are b eing shaped by these pressures, and the changes introduced in both camps hold significant implications for further work in edu ca tional ar ena. Didak ti k/cu rri cul um change s we iden tif ie d here have impli cat ion s for educati onal research, poli cy making and educational practice for both countries. With regard to educational research, the example of the Didakt ik - based model of educati onal rec onstruction (ME R) research program c an be considered. The MER (D uit, Gropengie ßer & Kattman , 2005) , co ordinate s thre e do main s of rese arch – 1) Investigations into students’ perspectives; 2) Clar ifi cat ion and analysi s of subj ect matter cont ent ; 3) Design of learning environments. The MER offers a well - conceived framework for educational research as well as a context for co nducting theoretical, basic, a nd applied researc h. The corne r s tone of this resea rch progra m is the ‘Teach ing Experim ent’, an interview - typ e meth od that seeks to underst and how indivi duals coordi nate core concept ual underst andings in domain - specifi c contexts (e.g., evolution, ecology, adaptat ion, cell ular funct ions, among others) . This research can be a useful complementar y to the resea rc h on learning traject ories and learning progressions in the U.S., as US scholars and researchers undertake more extended initi atives to bring curriculum coherence and alignment at classroom level as a tool for teachers to prepare students to engage in deep er m eaning making for the goal of transforming their lives, their professions and thei r communities and society at l arge. Indeed, the learning traject ories and learning progressions Polici es 69 researc h in the U .S. is alread y stimulatin g rich deb ates as how to achieve m ore coherence and better alignment and rigor in c urricul um - instru ction - assessment triangle. Wit h rega rd to poli cy - makin g, the two tradi ti ons seem to be movi ng towar ds a simil ar educ ati on al tren d and furt her developments will be crit ical to see whether the trend wil l continue or whether tradi tions will withdraw to their own roots again . As arg ued in th is pa per, th e ch anges obs erved in the U.S. policy sys tem seem to be be tter align ed between policy m akers and education/academic community, therefor e, w e pred ict a bett er ch ance of suc cess in these p olicy e fforts wh ich are b uilt arou nd the conc ept of c urriculum align ment. In Ge rmany , th e situa tion is m ore diffi cult to predict as it seems there is more resi stance from academic community t o the policies i ntroduce d by the policy m akers. However, we note that while external assessment will continue to be administer ed in German education system, Didaktik - oriented teaching force and academic comm unity will do its best to align those assessments wit h Didakti k and Bil dung pri nciples, or di scontinue them completel y. Educati onal practic e is another fiel d where we might expect new development s. Will US ‘common core’ init iat ives bring about intended result s? H ow will US policy - make rs adapt the ir polic ie s in the lig ht of even tual poten tial imple men tation cha llenge s in sc hools? To w hat exten t w ill G erman po licy mak ers pus h fo r ex ternal as sessm ents to be u sed for accoun tability purpo ses in a cou ntry where tea chers’ profe ssionalis m and autono my have be en central to education for cent uries? All these questions invite for further attention to be paid to these developments, but as the trend identif ied here shows, Didaktik and curriculum are likel y to evolve into more converging than diverging education spectrums. Signi fic ant c hange s in both systems – in G erma ny’s ca se, the shif t tow ards c ompe tency - based educational standards, introduction of external standardized assessment, and modifications in teacher education programs, and in the U.S. case, the shift towards national comm on core standards, alignment of assessments to standards, and increased focus on teacher professional development relevant to content to be taught – show that the past few years of n ational and global forces a nd trends have reshaped an d restructured them in ways unimaginable a few decades back. The effect s of thi s reshaping process is already f elt in bot h Germany and the U.S. in ter ms of new policy and research ini tiat ives being designed and supported (f or example, Bildungsst andards in Germany and Common Core Ini t iative a nd N ext G ener ation of S cience Stan dards in th e U .S.). N ext, the challe nge w ill be how these in itiated cha nges will be im plem ented at the c lassroo m level by te achers a nd learne rs as key be neficiarie s and contri butors to the educational tr ansformation hoped for, and ar guably needed, in t he 21 st century. Refer ences Baumert, J. , Bos, W., L ehmann, R. ( Eds.) (2 000): Dri tte Int ernat iona le Mat hemati k - und Natu rwis sensc haft sst udi e: Math emat is che u nd nat ur wis sen sch aft liche B il dun g am En de der Sc hul l auf bah n . Bd . 1: M athem atisch - naturwissenschaf tli che Grundbil dung am Ende der Pflicht schulzeit . Opladen: Leske + Budrich. Carneg ie Corporat io n of New York, & Inst it ute for Advanc ed Study. (2009) . The Opportuni ty Equation: Transfor ming M athemati cs and Science Educa tio n for Citi zensh ip and the Global Economy . Retrie ved from : http:/ /opport unityequati on.org/ uploads/f iles/oe_r eport. pdf Clement s, D. H., & Sarama, J. (2004). 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Polici es 72 Curri cul ar j usti ce: I nfluence s of TEIP pr ogram and sc hools’ exter nal eva luati on proces s Sampaio, Mar ta ; Faculty of Psychology and Educ ation Sciences of the Uni versit y of Port o , P ortuga l Leite, Carl ind a ; Facult y of Psychol ogy and Educati on Scien ces of the Universi ty of Port o , P ortugal In Portug al, th e p olicy mea sures wh ich followe d th e A pril 1 974 dem ocratic rev olution attribu ted to educ ation the "mission" of gu aranteeing the rig ht to a fair and effecti ve equali ty of opportunity in school access and success (Portugu ese Educationa l Syste m L aw, 1 986). As exa mples of these m easures, the T EIP p rogram (in En glish E TPI - Education al Territ orie s of Prio rit y Intervent ion) was create d in t he 90’s involving schools linked to social inequality 'prob lems ,' dro pout and school failure (Leite, Ferna ndes & Silva, 2013) with t he m ain aim t o su pport schoo ls in dealing w ith these situations. Firstly, a diagnosis of the problems is m ade and, afterward s, the aspects that need impr ovem ent are sele cted and it is develop ed an appr opriate intervent ion projec t. This policy m easur e, which m ay be considered as "compensatory education", has em erged associated to other international m ovements such as the "H ead Sta rt" and "F ollow - Through" projects (United States) ; the “Priorit y Education Zones” (France); and "Education al Priority Areas" and "Edu cation Action Zon es" (England). Ano ther policy measu re initiated more recently, in 2006, is the schools extern al evaluati on (SEE) process. Also infl uenced by intern ational po licies (Dale , 2007) and associating the evaluat ion of educati onal institut ions to account abili ty ( Afonso, 2009; Fullan, Rincon - Gall ard o & Harg reav es, 2015) , this measure is rel ated to decentr ali zat io n pr ocesses and t he intenti on of improving education quality (Pacheco, 2000; OECD, 2012). Assum ing that is a politi cal responsibi lity to promote an educational improvement (Bolívar, 2003; Coe, 2009 ), it is im porta nt to analyse wh ether the SE E pr ocess and TEIP program follow - driven by democratic and egali tarian principles , i.e., if thes e pol itical m easures contribute to the achievement of social and curricular justice, essential in building a democratic school (Apple & Beane, 1995; Leite, 2002 ). Co nseque ntly, th e study aims to understand how the objectives of these two policy measures are being imple men ted an d how sch ools s eek e ducat ional im prov emen t base d on curric ular an d so cial justic e (C onnell, 1995; Crahay, 2000; Rawls, 2003; Dubet, 2008; Santomé, 2013). To achieve t hese goals, w e did 5 sem i dir ective interv iews (H opf, 2 004) t o the N ationa l Educ ation C ounc il Presid ent; th e pers on res ponsib le for T EIP p rogram at national level; and three explor atory interviews in a TEIP school t o the headmaster, the TEIP program coordinator and the self - assessment team coordinator. The interviews discourses were subject to analysis and reflecti on throug h a pr ocess o f con tent ana lysis (Kripp endo rff, 20 12), using the N Vivo softw are (v. 10 ) an d w ith th em it wa s possible t o understand how, l ocally, the SEE process and TEIP program are experienced and interpret ed at a curricular level. The study allowed understand that these policies - schools evaluation and TEIP program - even constituti ng two sep arate m easures, are interconnected i n order to promote school success and educational impr ovem ent. H aving mod erately posit ive effe cts o n sch ool ev eryda y life, it is possible to re cogniz e atte ntion t o social and cult ural diversi ty of students and the use of strat egies that see k to ensu re the success and educational impr ovem ent of a ll, even thoug h in som e sc hools th is situa tion is no t yet a n institut ionalize d prac tice. 1. Int roduction Accordi ng to the Portugue se Educati onal System Law (1986), school educati on must ensure the right to a fair and effecti ve equalit y of opportuni ty in school access and i n school success. The schools’ external evaluation proc ess (SEE) a nd the TE IP p rogram (in E nglish ETP I - Educati onal Territori es of Priori ty Inter venti on) are two differ ent measures t hat nowadays influe nce scho ols ’ at organi zational, pedagogical and cu rricular levels. This study has as Polici es 79 5. Some Conclusions Concer ning the data coll ect ed we t rie d to an swer t he st art ing research quest ion s. I n thi s way, it is po ssi ble to conclude that there is still w ork to do to a chieve the full inclusion of students. However, it seem s to be a greater awareness and critical reflection about the actions that are required to implement student’s inclusion, in particul ar the need of schools integr ated and coordinat ed work . To the intervie wees these measures are perceived with positi ve effect s for th e p romo tion of s ocial justice, eithe r fo r combating school/grade retention or as positive discrimination. T o the schools headmasters, it is recognized the positiv e effects on the perfor mance of schools leaders actions and in the promotion of equity and curri cular justice. Nevert hel ess , there is a n eed to streng then the le adersh ips tra ining, in orde r to im plem ent a cultur e of forma tive evaluation as an instrument for change and maximize the relationships between SEE, self - eva luat ion and internal evaluation. In su m, t hese policy measures have an impact and moderately positive effects on school everyday life and although constituted as two separate policies, they are inte rconnecte d in differe nt asp ects. It se ems to be a s trengtheni ng of the idea of evaluat ion as a monitoring mechanism of educational and improvement plans and, for that, it is es sential the su pport of an ex ternal elem ent, a "critica l friend “, in the organizati onal and curricular development of schools. 6. Bibli ography Afonso, Almerind o Janela (2009). Políticas avaliati vas e accountabilit y em educação - subsídios para um debate ibero - americano. Sísif o. Rev ist a d e Ci ênci as da Ed ucaçã o , 09, pp . 57 - 70. Afonso, Natércio & Costa, Est ela (2011). A avaliaç ão ex terna das esc olas: um instrument o de regulação baseado no conhecimento. In João Barroso & Natércio Afonso (Orgs.), Políti cas Educativ as. Mobiliz ação de conhecimentos e modos de regulação (pp. 155 - 189). Gaia: Fundação Manuel Leão. 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Pacheco, José Augusto (2000 ). Polí tic as curri cular es descent ral izadas : Autonomi a ou recentra liz ação? Educação & Soci edade , 73, pp. 13 9 - 161. Rawls, J ohn (2003 ). Justiça como equidade: uma reformulação . São Paul o: Marti ns Fon tes. Santomé, Jurjo Torres (2013) . Curríc ulo escolar e just iça social : o Cavalo de Troia da Educação . Porto Alegr e: Penso. Wood , El i za bet h; L evi nson, Mar ti n; P ost leth wai te, Ke it h, & Bl ack, A li so n (2 01 1) Equit y Mat ters . Unive rsi ty Exe ter. Polici es 81 The ref lect ion on cult ural competency in Estonia n nati onal curri cula for upper secondary school Män d , Kat eryn ( [email protected] ) ; Tal linn Univer sity , Estonia Estoni a’s educational policy is refl ected in the National Curriculum for upper secondary education (NC), where cultural competency is included as one of the main objecti ves. Almost ten years separate the rati fications of t he two most re cent versi ons of the NC in 200 2 and 201 1. Between these year s, Esto nia joined NATO and the EU, survived the economic recession and experienced important controversies between the Estonian and Russian linguis tic com mun ities dur ing the Bronz e Nigh t in 200 7 The national curriculum always reflects a c ertain view of what a culturally competent citizen should know, do and be. Researchers (Westbury, 2007; Rosenmund 2006) have found that in the societal context, the discourse of curriculum add resses a specific social problem. In Estonia, culture has a lways been strongly linked to the language. As Estonia’ s main minorit y language, Russian i s actuall y spoken by a large number of peopl e around the worl d, the Esto nian languag e is consid ered as a means to grant the surviv al of a cultur e. The curr ent NC sti pul ate s that the upp er s econd ary schoo ls w here Ru ssian or anthe r m inority lang uage is the langu age of instruc tion, 60% of the study proc ess has to be held in E stonian . T his m ean s tha t the cu rricula aims to imple men t Co ntent - and Language Integrated Learning (CLIL), where cultur e is one of the core components in addition to content, communication and cognition. At the same ti me, the curriculum do esn’t offer a separated CLIL pr ogramme. Resear cher s (Grandi anet ti , Lange ll oti , Ting, 2013) have express ed thei r conce rn tha t o n th e level of en acted curricula, the danger is that it can be interpreted just as “teaching in another language”. T he author (Mänd , 2010) has studied the 2002 cur riculum using a m odel designed by a French didactic, C hrist ian Puren (2006). Puren sees cultural competency issues as a complex of different co mponents: transcultural, w hich refers to values; meta cul t ura l, which is knowle dge ; int er cul tu ra l, in repre sen ta ti ons ; plu ri cul t ura l, found in behavi our ; and co - cultural, or cooperat ion. T he present paper investigates t he two versi ons of the Estonian NC in terms of to what extent the components of cultural competency are stressed out and how these com ponents are distri buted between the differ ent chapters of the curriculum. The corpus of st udy includes the general guidelines and the com petencies expected to be developed in the school system. The aims, content and outcomes of the two, at the m oment, separated fields of Foreign Languages and Social Studies are analysed because they have become important in the CL IL. The stu dy uses c ontent an alysis m ethod ins pired by d iscours e analys is, w here la nguag e is consid ered to reflect them es tha t refer to ce rtain com ponents of cultura l c ompe tency an d therefore , cultural com petenc y components are a nalysed in their resp ective categor ies. The expected results are that i n compari son, the new NC aims to bring more attention on the pluricul tural com ponent whereas the study outcomes are hardly linked with the same objective, intercultural com ponent being stressed out in the assessm ent of Foreign and Second language learn ing and the m etacu ltural co mpon ent in th e outc omes of Soc ial Stud ies. Keywords: Educat iona l poli cy, curri culu m, cult ural competenc y, plu ricu ltur ali sm, for eign language teachi ng and learning Polici es 82 Introd uction Edu cation has o ften be en understood as so mething that prepares the future cit izen. In the context of globalizat ion processes, questions about the concept of citizenship, for merly firmly r elated to the nation ar e put to t he tes t. Two majo r appr oa che s to cur ri c ulum studies define the purposes of the Curriculum. On the one hand, there is the German Didakti k tradition w hich fo cuses o n the d evelop ment o f th e individ ual, and o n the o ther, the A nglo - American curri culu m tradit ion, where attenti on is brought to the ass essment and the quality of instructi on. In this paper, I will intend to argue that although the Estonian national curricul a for upper secondary schools (2002 and 2011) contain the main elements of Anglo - Ameri can curricul um policy such as the object ives , me thods , conte nt and assessment guidelines (inspired by the Tyler’s rationale) , they still refer to the elements of the Didakt ik tradition , to the in terplay be tween th e in dividua l an d the wo rld, whe re e duca tion mea ns form ation, pe rhaps ev en transfo rmatio n, a s argues B yram (2010). M y focus is on the developme nt of the m eaning of the cultural competency in the two most recent Estonian national curricula (2002 and 2011). A recent study on t eacher’s views of curricul um policy (Erss, Mikser et al. 2014) demonstrat ed that a lot of Estonian teach ers do n’t fee l involve d into the curric ulum policy m aking and ar e there fore a lienated of its content. On the other side, researcher s such as Westbury (2008), Si vesin d and Kareseth (2010) underline that the curricul um policy refl ects always what is happening in the society and is strongly infl uenced by globalization processes. Therefor e the curricul um is a reflection of the demands of the societ y. The cultural aspect of globali zati on raises impo rtant q uestio ns ab out w hat s hould be the purposes of the curricul um in terms of cultural competency, as there are a lot of scholars i.e. Ball (2003), Hopmann (2003), Sivesind (2013) who alert for the constant attenuati on of assessment and performativi ty in curri culum planning and are worr ied about the disappearence of the general purposes (not just objectives and outcomes) of educati on. A s the cultural competency is consider ed as a key element of curricul um purposes, this article focuses on the question of what characterizes cultural com pe tency in the na tional cu rricula. Diff ere nt Weste rn count ri es, such as France , Ita ly and USA sti ll strugg le to fi nd answer s to the nee d to adapt to the cultural diversity within the society. Diffi culties are often differently emphasized and are often driven from the current comp ositi on of the existing communities within a country. In E stonia, questions a bout quotas for the refugee s de mand ed b y Eu ropean com mission has bee n co mpared to the already perce ived p roblems with Rus sian mino ri ti es , who usua ll y have li ved in Estonia during decades bu t often feel alienated from Estonian society. T hey original ly were not refugees, but migrant s. According to Statistic s Estonia, 25% of Estoni an populati on (1,3 mil lion people) is from Russi an or igins, 5% from other origins and almost 1% of the population has an undef ined citizenship in 2015. A recent report of the E stonian Ministry of Culture on integration in Estonia a ddresses concern that 19% of res idents from foreign origin s who have born in Estonia and who’s parents are born in Estonia don’t hold Estonian citi zenship. This is lar gly because Estonian citi zenship is not granted by the birt h to children whose parents are not Estonian citizens. There are also 6,5 % of residents who still carry the “grey passport”, issued afte r the co llapse o f the UR SS to those w ho did n’t want to acqu ire nor E stonian or Rus sian citize nship. One o f the la tes t trends in cu rri cul um mak ing i s t he attempt to f ind possib il it ies t o i nte grat e differ ent su bjec t fiel ds. The Content and Language Integrated Learning (here and aft er CLIL) has raised hopes to lighten the overburdened curricula. In Estonia, the CLIL could be consid ered as a n integ ration p roject in sch ools w here the langu age of ins truction is m ainly R ussian . T herefo re the cu rriculum bear s im porta nt me aning fo r th e deve lopm ent Polici es 83 of cult ural com petency. The Estoni an Basic and Upper Secondary Schools A ct as well as the National Curricul um for up per Se conda ry Sch ool curr ently in fo rce (he re and after NC 2) defin e that 6 0% o f th e teach ing and le arning on the upper secondary level m ust be held in Estoni an. This was not m entioned in t he National Curriculum for Basic and Upper Secondary School derogated in 2002 (here and after NC 1). Still , there are no separat ed programs for CLIL cl asses. Several polit ical represen tati ves of the Russi an community in Estonia express their fi rm opposit ion to the educational reform ef forts in ter ms of the prerogati ve of t eaching i n Estonian, consider ed as dis criminati ve. Estoni an is spoken by the majority of Estonians , but it is a language not very much known in other parts of the worl d. Russi an is a mot her ton gue for appr oximatel y 30% of Estonian population and is spoken by a large num ber of people around the world. It is not surprising that Estonian language has been considered as a m eans to safeguard the culture. The NC2 explicitly a ims to implement CLIL for Estonian as a foreign language. According to Eurydi ce study (2006), Estoni an CLIL aims are specif ical ly language - related. The status of Estonian language influen ces a lso th e cho ice of subjects to be taug ht in E stonia n on uppe r seco ndary leve l (socia l scien ces, E stonia n musi c and li te rat ur e) , compa red to most of the count ri es in Europ e. Est oni an cult ure and lang uage are str ong ly interlin ked, the latter is o ften consid ered as a m ean s to ada pt s tuden ts w ith a diffe rent moth er t ongue (m ainly Russi an) int o Esto nian societ y. The decisi on to teach 60% of the subjects on upper secondary level in Estonian could be a result of policy borrowing. Amo s Paran (2013) has proposed a n hypothesis that the CLIL imple men tation in man y Eu ropea n cou ntries h as F inland’s succe ssful u se of thi s method as an example to follow. He argues that CLIL implemen tat ion is the ref ore not alway s a well thought throu gh descis ion and often fai ls to take into cons ideratio n co ntextu al fa ctors that are cruc ial to a polic y’s succes s. S uch conte xtual facto rs c an be for example the status of teacher education in a given country, the status of the language of instruct ion (minorit y or majo ri ty langu age , lang uag e spoke n in the soci et y or not) , or the prepa red nes s of the tea chi ng sta ff to impl ement changes. Although dif ferences of opinion st ill exist, t here appears to be some agreement t hat CLIL refers to the valorisati on of content, cognition, communication and culture, the “4Cs” (Coyle, 2007, Mehisto, Marsh, Frigols et. al. 2008). Coyle (2007) def ines effec ti ve CLIL as „a progression in knowledge, skill s and understanding of the content, engagement in associated cognitive processing, interaction in the comm unicati ve context, the development of appropriat e language knowledge and skills as well as the experience of a deepening inter cultur al awareness“. Cummins (as cited in Coyle, 2007 , p. 551) explai ns tha t the “framewor k (of the “4C’s” ) puts cult ure at the core and intercul tural understanding pushes the boundar ies towards alternat ive agendas such as trasformative peda gogies, global cit izenship, student voice and identi ty invest ment”. But although the culture is accentuated in these propositi ons, Coyle (2007) considers the interact ion (mainly between the students) in the learning context as fundamental to learni ng. Ther efore it seams to be the intercul tural competency that is in the core of the C LIL meth od and in thi s pape r, I would li ke to di scu ss how the se pro posi t io ns on cult ur e tha t engl obe such a vast combination of elements could be appr oached from a dif ferent angl e. In t his paper, the cult ure is not considered as something that could be separated from the ot her components of the CLIL but rather englobes them. Many researchers in foreign language teaching and learning field such as Abdallah - Pretc eil le (2006), Byram (2010), Dervin (2009) and Puren (2002, 2006, 2014) have reflected upon the historical development of the concept of cultural competency and studied discourses in legisl ative docum ents and theoreti cal lit erature that explain those developments. Intercultur al com petency is one of the most emphasized at the m oment but has been subj ect to Polici es 84 contradictory interpretat ions. Dervin (2009) argues that it has tendency of being too underestimated when reduced to com mu nication and in teraction as a m ere s ending and r ece iving of me ssage s. On the oth er han d, it is d ifficult to gasp the whole signif icati on of cul tural education with a single denominat ion of “int ercultur al competency” , ther efore Abdall ah - Pret ceil le (2006) speaks of “cul tural it y”: knowledge about other ness ha s to be com pleted with constant work on ones elf . Byram (2010) argues that paying attent ion to mult il ing ual and multic ult ural aspects of soci al intera ction can „enrich educa tion f or citiz enship an d tha t in the b est o f all possible s w orlds, the in tercultu ral citizen is gebildet (refere nce to Bildung concept of cit izenship), is a social agent active in a multi cultural so ciety, w heather “national - state” or international polity“. By ram is also positive about the p erspective of implementing CLIL to gain these ob ject ives. Puren (2002) sees the cult ural compete ncy issues as a complex of differ ent components. He has defined five of them in te rms o f how they have em erged in the con text of lang uage teac hing a nd lea rning since 190 0 in W este rn countries (Europe and N ort h- America). Fir st and foremos t, there has alway s been a great impor tance giv en t o th e transcul tural component, which ref ers to val ues. The values were once cons idered univ ersal, or at least , univer sally applicable, w hich has arrived to a certain cultural p re - em inati on of w estern countries over other cultures. Simil arit ies can be found in the original ideas of Bild ung , the german conception of the educational purpose to prepare a cultivat ed, cultured, well - read person. The need for a different approach in de velopment of cultural competency was in the metacultural component, which is knowledge. The objective was to underline essential differ ences in the matter of how the foreign cultur e appears through the poli tical , educat ional structure, geography or fi ne ar ts, which were m ainly o bserve d via te xts. The refore th is com pone nt of cultu ral com peten cy wa s deve loped main ly by ac ti vi ti es whi ch de mand a comp le x of di ff er ent cog nit i ve ac ti vi ti es , s uch as pr opo sed by B. Bl oom ( 195 6): reme mbering , analysing, inte rpreting etc. With the growing possibi lit ies t o travel to foreign countr ies (i n the 1970s, in Esto nia in 1990 s), the inter cultural co mpo nent app eared . T he objec tive was to be ab le t o ta lk w ith the nat ive speaker in punctual situations, such as buying a bread at local grocery’s or reserving a train ticket. The main objecti ve of cultural competence was to discover one’s representati ons of everyday practices of the foreigners and to cha nge on e’s beha viour ac cording ly. As the c ontacts with the “O ther” did n ot alway s en gage people only in punctual communication and interact ion with forei gners, the pluri cultural component appeared in the 1990s. Pluri cult ural component refers to living side by side with people from differ ent cultur al backgroun ds and origi ns, with no act ual obl igation to i nteract with t hem: here, we speak about behaviour as the need t o accept the “Other ” as he or she is. Theref ore, representati ons and behavi our are essentiall y int er - related: rep resentation refers to personal beliefs (or beliefs shared with people from the same background) about cultural practices and the need to modi fy them in ord er to inte ra ct wit h th ose fr om oth er cul t ure s, plur ic ult ur al refe rs to the tak in g acco unt of dif fe ren t cultural practices and phenomena, that influence the behaviour of the “Other”. The co - cultural co mponent, m ost recently em erged, refers to the conc eptions of action. As the pluricu ltural, this com pone nt o f cu ltural co mpete ncy has an important role i n the Common European Framework for Languages (here and aft er CEFR). This component sees the coo peration as a making of a com mon culture. Puren’s model is hence important for the present research as it defines the development of the concept of cultural competency in detail and gives opportunity to trace in the Nati onal Cur r icula the eme rging co mpo nents, such a s pluri - and co - cultural (see table 9 .). Polici es 85 Component Study activities Social o bjective Key concept Histor y Transcultur al Reading, translatin g texts To be able to recogni ze common values values traditiona l methodology, 19th century Metac ult ura l Work wi th different oral and written documents (Bloom’s taxonomy) To be able to inf orm oneself on t he forei gn culture, to i nform others knowledge 1910 - 1960 active metho d Intercultu ral Role p lays To be able to communicate in punctual sit uations wit h foreigne rs, to know cultural norms Communicat ion, representa tion 1970 – (in Western Europe) Communicat ive approach, communicative metho d Pluric ultur al (formerly “multicultural”) Discuss ions, work wi th t exts , opinions To be able to li ve side - by - side with people from other origins, to underst and the need to act accordingly, to be cultural ly tol erant behaviour, attitude 1990 – (CEFR , plurili nguism and pluricul turalism) Co - cultural Project s, ta sks To be able to work toge ther with people fro m part iall y or entierly different cultur al backgrounds, to adapt or create a long - standi ng “comm on culture” Common conceptions of action, c ontextual values 2001 – ... (CE FR, “active appr oach” Table 9 : Christian Puren's model of cul tural competenc y It is im porta nt to n otice that in Esto nia, the Com mu nicative app roach eme rged significa ntly late r than in W estern Europe and North - Americ a. This is m ainl y due to the fact that until 1990s, Estoni a was occupied by the So viet Union and the possi bil ti es of travel li ng, with some exept ions for people who had rel ati ves in Western count ri es, were rest ric ted to c ount rie s of the former URSS, where the main common language of inte ract ion was Rus sian . In addition t o the defici t of study materials in the 1990s (the textbooks from Soviet period were tainted with communist ideology so they had to be excluded from the study material), new innovative m ethodologi es w ere discovered moderatedly af ter t he Restorat ion of Independence in 1991 . Resear ch qu esti ons Prior resear ch (Mänd, 2010) about the importanc e of cultural compete ncy in the general guideline s and Foreign langu age field in th e NC 1 sh owed that the cultu ral co mpet ency doesn’t confine a nymo re w ith the tradit ional approach by knowledge and values but al so indicat es the importanc e of understandi ng representations, behaviour and cooperation. Nevertheless, the results of the analysis show ed that as for the foreign languages subject field, the develo pmen t of cultura l com peten cy co mbin ed m eta - and intercultur al aspects and lit tle att ention was attri buted Polici es 86 to plur i - and co - cultural competency. Therefore further support was expected to be found in com parison of the NC1 and NC2. How ha s the meaning of cultur al compet ency deve lope d in the curri cul a in terms of the impor tance attri buted to the pluri - and co - cultural compo nents of cultural competency? What kind of changes can be observed between the t wo most recent Estonian curric ula? What hypot hesis coul d be elabor ated in terms of the meaning t hat teach ers in C LIL c las ses co uld attrib ute to th e dev elopm ent of cultural comp etency ? The method of analysis The corpus of study includes the general guidelines and the competencies expected to be developed in the school system; the aims, co ntent and outcome s of the two, at the moment, separated fields of Foreign Languages and Social Studies are analysed because they have become important in the objectiv e to implement CLIL in mainly Russi an - speaking schools in Estonia. The study uses content analysis method inspired by disc ourse analysis, where lang uage is consi der ed to refle ct themes that refe r to certai n component s of cult ural competen cy and therefo re, cultural compe tency com pone nts are a nalyse d in the ir re spectiv e c ategorie s. L auren ce Bardin (2007 ) defines the notion of theme on a semantic level, thus the elements of the analyse have variable length. The recordin g unit was comp osed of uttera nces which contain a ve rb and was also defined in term s of verbalisa tion (refers to an actor), or nomina lization (refers to a co ncept) . In th e case of nom inaliza tion, the record u nits which did not contain any verb, the semi - colon was replaced with “[means]” to d isti nguish the recording units. Then it was categorized according to the Puren’s model for cultural competency, presented ab ove . T he conte nt of the compared sections was coded in http:// www.qcamap.org software in order to create an exel fail with catagorisations. Then the file wa s reviewed an d co mmented. Although this enables to describe the c ategori es quantitat ively, further reading from other researcher s should be done to confirm the reliabi lit y of the conclusions. The sections of the curricula were compared with one another to find out in which categories of cultural competency they differ f rom one a nother and if th ere are any significant s wifts in the impo rtance o f the p luri - and co - cultural components. Result s The relativel y similar structure of curriculu m text permitted to compare what is the role of each cultural competency component w i thin an d in b etwee n th e cu rricula. W hen it c omes to va lues w hich refer to the transcul tural component of cu ltural competency, they are important almost in ea ch se ction of the curriculum exept for the study outcomes of the foreign language subject fiel d. In the Foreign lan guage s s tudy outcom es, only the section for Estonian as a foreign language in the N C2 st ates that the stu dent “unders tand s his p lace within the society”. Elsewher e, ref erence s to the tran scult ural component can be observ ed by numerous recor ding units that are introd uced w ith verb s s uch as “fe els, res pects, v alues, fo llows, ac know ledges ”. Extra a ttention in th e gene ral guidelines of both curricul a is brought to the need to ensure the preservence the E stonian culture. In the NC1 the need to “ safeguard and develop Estonian nation and culture” is altered in the NC2 with the need to “safeguard and develop Estonian nation, language and culture” and also underlines that “ther efore in the upper secondary school special attention is paid to teaching the E stonia n langu age“. These p articular re cording units can be found as th e introd uctive sente nce of th e N C1’s gene ral aim s, where as th e N C2 places them as the last recor ding units in the Polici es 87 “setting of goals” section. Introducing and conclu ding are consider ed as means t o bring at tention to certai n elements of discourses. Although these statements apply to both, Estonian schools as w ell as schools with a partial ly diff erent language of instruc tion, it demonstrates the aims of the Estonian integrati on policy and indicates in my view , the de termin ation of Eston ian culture thr ough lang uage . Th is m odifica tion mos t pro bably de rivates from an import ant changement in the Estoni an Consti tution (1992): in 2007, a modificati on of the preamble was derogated in order to add “language” to the following sentence: “With unwavering faith and steadfast will to strengthen and deve lop the state (.. .) w hich m ust guarantee the preservation o f the Estonian people, the Estonian langu age a nd the E stonia n Cultu re (...) th e peop le of Es tonia (...) h ave ad opted th e followin g Con stitution”). S imilar attenti on to val ueing local culture was observed by Karseth and Sivesind (2010) in the Norwegian Curricul a: in the globalizat ion context, the need to respect the cultural origins does not neces saril y conflict w ith the differences between cultures because personal cultural heritage is consi dered as something to be appreciated and developed worl dwide . Both curri cul a point out the concern to assure that the student will have to avoid opinions whic h violate essential values, such as hum an dignity. This is explained thoroughly in the section of So cial stud ies su bject field . The N C1 phrases this through nominalisation and considers the possibility that the student could be holding unacceptable beliefs: “the beliefs which do not correspond to the general values can only be alt ered in i ndividual and systematic work, gui din g the student delicatel y [towards socially accepted be liefs] ”. The NC2 on the contrary, verbalizes the study outcomes: “The student respects the individual, cultural differ ences and various viewpoints in case they do not demean human dignity”. Therefore the lat ter define s this tran scultura l co mpon ent throug h th e stu dents ’ exposure to opini ons that coul d have a negat ive impact on his or her beliefs and signals the need to be more analytic al and caut ious whi le const ructing opinions. If the inte rest of th e read er of the c urricul a would be i n the understanding of the meaning of cultur al competency as it is stated exp licitly, th en t he p erform ance of k nowle dge about cultur al arte facts, gene ral et hics a nd m oral norm s would defi ne it especi al ly in the NC1 and NC2’s fir st version, therefore referring to a combination of tr ans - and meta cul t ura l compo nent s. In the NC2, the value compe te ncy has been renamed as “va lu e - and cultural competency” and the content of the first version of the N C2 has been completed with no tions of pluricult ural significance ( “the capacity to value human, cult ural and environmental di versity”). Movi ng on to the role of the knowl edg e in the cur ri cul um, the most import ant shif t in the imp ort an ce of the metacultural com ponent, wh ich refers to the capa city to inform and to be informed is observed in the general guidelines of the curriculum. W hile the NC1 gives a detailed description of information processing (the ability to understand, inter pret, exchange, create texts) the NC2 is more general (refers to the ability to define the function of texts) an d adds th e a bility to com pose lon g - and short - term plan s (e ntrepre neurs hip com petenc y). There fore the aims of the new curriculum stress out less individual capacities of knowledge processing. Karseth and Sivesind (2010) in their study o n the Norw egian cu rriculum refo rm stated that the new conce ption of kno wledge s ociety should refer t o the shareing of knowledge and its use rather t han to simple act s of inf ormation processing. The subject field of Estonian as a forei gn language has also a section on cultural history in the NC1. This secti on emphasizes all elements of culture t hat represent cultural heritage, although specif ic arti sts are not desi gnated. In Puren’ s terms, “approac h by the repres entat ive” (in Fr . l’app roche pa r le rep resenta tif ) m eans that the a rtist is considered as the right person to sense the essence of his or her time and culture. in NC2 the culture is not Polici es 88 referred to a s cultural history and is des cribed as on e of the gen eral them es. Rega rdl ess of that, in both curricula it refers to trans - and metacultural components (in NC 2, the sub - title of the se ction “Cu lture and cre ativity” is “Cu lture as creati vity” ), mainly because the cont ent is described by noti ons. The intercult ural component is th e most emphasized in the study result s of the subject field of f oreign languages. The record ing uni ts in both cur ricul a are strongly marked wi th ref erences to communication skills, for exa mple the aim of teaching Estonian as a foreign l anguage is that “the student will acquire the capacity to interact in differ ent situations in Estonian language” (NC1), sim ilar to the aim “the student acquires a level o f language skills which allow hi m or her to communicate in oral and wri tten production while f ollowing the respective cultu ral norms” (N C2). Both curricul a in the foreign languages sections refer to the need to pri vil ege communica tiv e methods in the teach ing process , th e N C1 desc ribes study activities in the frame of „com mun icative cognitiv e a ction“, the NC2 refers to the comm unicative a nd active a pproach . Puren (2 006) has propose d anothe r definition of active approa ch, which is “acti ve perspe cti ve” (in French perspectiv e actionnelle ). The ta sk - based class activi ties do not grant, in his opinion, the real aims of the act ive appr oach, which in the CEFR, is “ the for mation of a social actor ”. T he reasons why the study outc omes indi cat e mainl y to int erc ult ural compone nts are direc tly deriv ated from the need to asse ss the students indivi dually. In the f inal eval uati on, the student i s indivi dually r esponsible and t herefore, assessment of team - work is pr obabl y l ess cur rent i n t he stud y pr oces s. One pa rt icul ar it y of t he Esto nian cur ri cul um i s t hat t he ev alu ati on descr ipt io ns f or eac h l evel of l angua ge p rof ici enc y are de scribed al most as in the CEFR by refer ring to t he understandi ng, writ ing and speaking ski lls ( levels A1.1 - C1 ), the E stonia n vers ion ha s sep arated gram mar evaluation explic ations in addition to the 4 co mmu nicative skills. T wo possibil ities of interpr etation for th is dec ision c ould b e co nclude d: firstly, the teac hers in E stonia (i.e. b y w hom the curricul a should be enacted) are m ore acquainted with traditi onal methodologies of language teaching, therefore the authors of th e c urriculum m ay be co ncern ed th at th ey do not see the language skill s (reading, writi ng, listeni ng and oral and w rit ten production) in the context of language structures. Another way of interpreti ng this decision to keep the grammar description in the curriculum is maybe a certain vigilance toward s th e Com munic ative app roach, which for its fasci nat ion for speak ing skil ls and the excess ive use of dialog ues as a learn ing mater ial has been critici zed for not granting suffici ent knowledge of language structures. C ontent - wise, the deci sion to keep the grammar in the curriculum refers to the need of to focus on texts (mostly reading) which are presumed to grant opportunit ies to analyze t he str uctures. This is observable also as the reading skills are assessed with the highest number of credit points (30/100 ) fo r th e obligatory foreign languag e state exams, comp ared to oral e xpression , which give s a maxi mum of 20 credi t poi nts . Th is di ff ers fro m the Estonian lang uage profici ency exams, wher e the maxi mum for each communi cat i ve skil l give s 25% of the fi nal result. In terms of assessment, foreign languages field is ass essed as an ob ligatory s tate exam in Esto nia. The social scie nces s ubjects, w hich un til 2013 w ere optional state exams, are not longer state - wi de exams. Hence the study outcomes for social s ubjects’ field are much less perfo rmat i vi ty - or iented than for foreign l anguage field and ther efore, these sections of the two curri cula do not r efer t o the interc ultural component. Impo rtant shift in th e attentio n to the pluri - and co - cultural components c an be observed in the NC2. These components of the cultural competency are q uite balanced in the N C2, w hile in NC 1 the pluricultur al emerges on the seco nd place after the me tacultur al an d th e co - cultural is the least important of all five componen ts. T he c o- cultural a ppears mainly in the NC2’s sections for “social and civic competence” and “entrepreneurship Polici es 95 servi ce of a d ec e nt ral ized an d p ro f essi on al iz ed se rvi c e, in wh ich sc h ools ac cep t th at th e r es ult s of th eir s el f - eva luat i on c an b e q u es t ioned b y th e re su lts o f ex t er n al eval uat ion (Th u rle r, 1998 ). Th e pr oc esses a nd p rac tic es of P or tu gu ese e duc at io n and t ra inin g are i nc r e asi n gly in te gr at ed i n gl ob ally st ru ct u r ed age n d as, a nd their ar e a of inf luen ce is p laced in th e c omm on f r ame of E uro pea n Uni on p olicies a nd tran sn at io n al bod ies s uch as O CD E (Pa ch eco, 20 09 ). D ep artin g fr o m th e p ol itic al and ec on omic an al ys is of glo b ali zation on e du cat io n and ma king a c ri tic al a pp ro ach t o the p olicies of sh ar ing ( Ta ka yama, 20 13 ), it is ai med t o an aly z e t he m ed ia tio n of the pressure applied by curricula poli cies of homogenization and st andardization of results (Afonso, 2012, Santiago & Donaldson, 2012) and their influ ence o n the ro le of local p layers, namely the teachers o f Mathe matics . Eval uat i on h as be en acq u ir in g, in the las t d ec ad es, a c ri t ic al ro le, e xtrap ola ting i ts i mpo rtan ce b eyond th e f ie ld of ed uc at io n (Af on so, 2 01 0) . Th e e m ph asis given t o s ch oo ls’ ev al u ation d eriv e s fr o m tw o t re nd s th at a ff ect mo st Eu rop ean co un t ries: th e d ec e nt ral izat ion of me an s and th e cr ea t ion of nat ion al g oa l s a n d of levels of s ch ool r es ult s (Eu ry d ic e, 20 1 1). In Po rtu gal, du ri n g th e 9 0 ’s, sc h ools w ere u nd er Ce nt ral Ad mi nistra t i on an d w ere eva l ua t ed as orga n izat ion al un i ts . Th en , th is m od el ev o lved towa rd th e d ec e nt ral izat i on of p ub lic ad mi nist ra t io n a n d to ward an in cre ase o f the a ut on om y giv en to sch ools, w hich c ame t o s h ow th eir c ri tic al val u e. Th e fou ndat io n s n ecessar y for t h e b irt h o f sever a l in itiat ives b ot h of ex t er n al eva luat ion an d s ch ools’ sel f- eval uati on w ere cre at ed ( Clíma c o, 20 10 ). Th e Observ at ory f or Sch o ol Qual i ty (1 99 2) , a nd lat er th e Pr oje ct Q u ali ty XXI, t he Pro j ect of I nt egr ated Eval uat ion i n Schools (19 9 9), a n d th e P r ogram AV ES (200 0) car ried b y M anu el Le ão Fou nd at ion are go od exam pl es of such in itiat ives. In th ese in itiat ives, t he i nf lu ence of e ff icien t sch ools, whi ch rais e d so m uch i nt ere st am on gs t p oli tic al educ ati on auth o ri t ies and edu cat ion acto rs, is very not i c eab le ( Lima, 20 08 ). Th e p ub lica ti on of the Law on th e Sy st em of Eva luat ion of Edu cat ion and of No n - H ig h er E duc ati on– Law N o 31/ 20 01 o f 2 0th D ecem b er – set s a n ew p ath f or the eva lu ati on of sc ho ols in P or tu gal. A d ou b le eval u at ion is ad voca ted n ow – ex tern al eval u at ion a nd sel f- ev al ua tion . Th ese two t yp e s of eva luat i on a re oft en p oi nt ed o ut as h avi n g o pp os ite lin es of th ou ght – sel f- eval uation he ad in g to w ar ds orga n izat ion al d evel op ment and ex t er n al eva luati on f ocu si n g mo re on ac co unt ab il ity – d es p ite th e c om p le m ent ari t y aims th at th e two mig ht h ave for a tt a inin g high er and b ett er lev els o f s ch ool p erfor ma nc es (Min is t ry of E du cat io n , 2006). D erivi ng f r om th e ab ove me nt ion ed law an d fr om a p il o t ex p er ien ce t ak en p la ce in 2 00 6 , a pro gram f or Ex tern al E v al ua ti on of Schools w as im p le me nt ed in P or tu g al, un d er the pu rview of GIES (General Inspectorat e of Educati on and Scienc e), wh ose f irst e val u ati on cy c le w as f in is h ed in 20 11 . Am on gst th e c ou nt ri es w i th in O CD E, sch ools’ ev al ua ti on te nd s to b e c on si d er ed as a “ge n er a t or of ch an ge, as it cont ri bu t es t o d ecisi o n m a kin g in th e tea ch in g sys t em , t o th e d is t ribut ion of r e so u rces an d to an imp ro vem en t of sch ool le a rni ng (Sa nt ia g o, 20 1 0). Ac c or din g t o th is a utho r , th is ten de ncy is m ain ly du e to greater a ut on omy gra nt ed t o s ch ools, w hich , in m ost of th e c ases, ex p lai n s a h ig h er e m ph asis on ac cou nt ab il it y, al on g with a higher imp or tan ce att ri but ed t o “mar k et m ec han isms as a f orm of ac co u nt ab ili t y” ( Ide m , 201 0, p. 2 9). Polici es 96 Th er ef or e , the s yst em of ac cou nta b ili ty ent ails r e la tion s and int erde pen de nc ie s, in wh ic h eval u at ion, ac cou nt ab il ity an d lia b ili t y are inc l ud ed , also t aki ng i n to con sid er a t ion p ri ncip les s uc h as j us tic e, tr ansp are ncy a nd the ri gh t to inf orm at ion (Afon so, 201 1) . Great accounta bil it y improve s the present as it shapes the futu re. It invests in, grows and ci rcul at es profes sio na l capital throughout the system . Com bine interna l and extern al acco untab ility, an d we will get higher perfor mance, greater self and group responsibilit y for results, and more commitment to sustaining and enhancing all students’ learn ing, dev elopm ent a nd suc cess (F ullan, R incon - Gal lardo & H argre aves, 2015, p. 14 - 15 ). Th e s ch ools’ aca dem ic p erf orm an ce of st ud e nt s in ma th e ma tics is cu rr ent ly eval uat ed t hr ou gh t w o b ig i nt ern at ion al su rvey s: th e TIMSS a nd t he PISA ( Eu ry di c e, 20 11 ). Ge n er ally ! speaking, the TIMSS aims to evaluat e “w hat th e students kno w ”, whe reas the PISA ! tri es t o as cert ain “wh at th e s tu de nt s c an do wit h th e ac qu ir ed kn ow le d ge”. T h e c ollec t ed d at a h as th r ee as p ec t s: th e ex pr e ssed cu rric ulu m def in ed b y a coun t ry or e du c at ion s yste m, the imp le m e nt ed cu rri cu lu m whi ch te ac h ers ac tu ally t ea ch, an d the acq u ir ed cu rric ulu m, or wh at s t ud e nt s h ave le ar nt ( Mu llis, M ar tin & F o y, 2 008 , p. 2 5). T he PI SA is n’t dir ec t ly f ocu sed on a s p ec if ic asp ect of th e cu rric ulu m; i nst ead it a tt em pt s to eval uate h ow 15 - ye a r-o ld st ud e nt s c an a pp ly th eir math kn ow le d ge i n eve r yday li fe, thu s givi n g em ph asis to mat h li t er ac y. Th e re sults of th ese s tud ies h ave b eco me incre asi n gly im po rt ant thr ou g ho ut the years, t o t h e ex te nt of cau sing de ep c ha n ges in th e w orld e du cat ion p olicies. Th is is an im pr e ssi ve f ac t , sinc e th e c om p aris on b et wee n Sy ste m s of Edu ca tion thro u gh th e me an s of ra nki ng s a n d th eir i nt erp reta tio n is le ad in g to e du cat ional po licies defined in a n orm at ive m ode (B u lle, 201 1 , p .5 0 3). In this perspectiv e, the p articipan t coun tries are in vited to compete against each other in order to redefine their educational systems based on the results obtained (Idem,p.503) . One of the indi cat ors th at attract s p ub l ic i nt er e st the most is th e r el at ive ra n k of th e aver a ge t es t s r esu lt s i n eve ry cou nt ry, creatting pr e ssu re so th at tea ch in g p rac tic es of cou nt ries w ith b e tt e r p erfor m an ce le vels a re ado pt ed b y a ll co u nt r ies (S t ei ner -Kh amsi, 200 4; Tak ayama, 2 0 13 ). M ath em ati cs as a s ub j ect h as b e en ga inin g a n i ncre asi n gly sig n ifica nt r ol e in t h e stu de nt s’ e du cat io n , since it imp ro ves s k ills a nd c om p ete nc es, s uch as p ro b lem solv in g, arg um e nt at ive sk ills, f orm u lat ion a nd te st of h yp oth esis, c omm uni cat ion sk ills an d ac cu ra cy of o b serv at ion, wh ich are c ri tic al ma tt ers th at w ill f acili ta te in clu sion as w ell as p ers on al an d prof essi on al su cc ess in an i ncr e asi n gly comp etit ive w orld (N CT M, 2007 ; Ro th & Ra dford , 20 1 1). He nc e: “In a w orld of p er m an ent ch an ges, th ose wh o un d ers t and an d su cc ee d in le a rn in g m a them at ics w ill sig nif ica nt ly h ave b ig g er o pp ortun it ies a nd bett er o pt ions to bu i ld th eir fu tu re . C om p ete nce in ma th ema tics op en s d oors t o m o re pr odu ct ive fu ture s. Th e l ack of th is com pe ten ce kee ps th ese d o ors c los ed … All stu de nt s s hou ld h ave th e o pp ort un it y a nd th e n eed ed su pp ort t o le a rn sig n ifica nt ma the mat ic s w ith dee pn ess a nd un d ers t a nd in g. Th ere is no t a co nf li c t b et wee n e qu it y a n d ex c ell en ce” (N CTM , 20 00 , p .5 0 ). In m ost E urope an co untries the c urricula of ma them atics p resents itself a s a formal docum ent of a n orma tive nature, which specifies the topics to be learnt and describes study programs and their contents, as well as Polici es 97 teaching, learni ng and evaluat ion m ateri al s that should be used (Kelly, 2009). One of the chief goals of teaching reforms is the improv emen t of education patterns an d, conseq uently, of stud ents’ acad emic perfo rmance . One of the main reasons underly ing the most recent updates wa s th e in clu sion of an approach based on learning results, defined in bro ad terms as the kno wledge an d co mpete nces needed to prepare a yo ung person for a life o f personal, social and professi onal well - being (Psif idou, 2009). T he curricul a based on learning results focuses on the lea rning pr ocesse s and aims to be mo re broa dening and flex ible than the trad itional sub ject bas ed curr icula. The use of learning result s on the curricula can also be related to the new concepts of ruling and managing qualit y. Some people believe that the creation o f r egulatio ns based o n learning r esults is a way o f a ssuring q uality in teach ing, and thus confe rring more a utono my to schools a nd teache rs to b uild learning p rogram s that will respond to their s tudents ’ needs (Cede fop, 20 08). In P ortuga l, after the chan ges introdu ced to the cur riculum in 2008, the prese nt pr ogram be came mo re e xplicit in what concer ns the stude nts’ expect ed perfor mance in each mathemat ica l issue and in the cross curri cul ar competences related to t his subject (Eurydice, 2011). Most Europe an count ri es are tryi ng to asses s the eff ect i vene ss of the i mpl emen ta ti on of curr i cul um usin g diff er ent means , but curr i cul um effe ct iv enes s is mainl y assess ed thr oug h the nati on al evaluati on of students. In almost every educational system, sta ndard t ests and nat ional examinat ions t ake place, one of their aims being to eval uate curriculum effect iveness ( Eurydice, 2011). There aren’t many specific surveys about the way a curricul um is taught in each school, but usually this type of inform atio n is collected under the general framework of external evaluation of schools. However, the results of schools’ self - evaluation are the second sourc e of data more comm only used by countries to assess the effecti veness of t heir curricul a (I dem , 201 1) 2 . Met h od An e mp irica l qu a nt i tati ve s tud y w as carried out (M or e ira , 2 006), depar tin g f ro m th e co nc lus io n s o bt a ine d th r ough th e analysis of r e po rts an d fr om th e re vi si on of to pic- re la te d l it eratu re also u si ng a su rvey by ques ti o nnaire (T uck ma n , 1 9 94 ; Gh iglio ne & M at a lon , 1 997), d eve lo pe d w ith it em s d is t r ibut ed b y Li k ert s ca l e, t argeting ma th te ache rs from f ir s t to si xt h gra d es of pr ima r y e duc ati o n fro m s ch ools i n a Mun icip ali ty i n th e n or th of P or tu gal, wh ose r e li ab ili ty w as t es t ed by an o the r e mp iric al stud y (M a rque s, 201 3). The sample (n=51) was randomly select ed from school s ranging from Primary and Elementar y Educatio n (1st to 6th forms) from a s chool gro uping in the no rt h of Por tu gal, in wh ich m o st r esp o ndent s are fe ma l e (9 2% ) and th e re st are male ( 8% ) . The majority of the respondent s’ ages in the age range f r om 30 t o 45 yea rs old (4 5% ) , f ollowed b y r es po ndent s over 45 ye ars old (3 7%) , and those unde r 30 th ere represent o n ly 1 7% . M ost o f th em p ossess a un iversit y d eg r ee (8 6%) , a nd th e rest of th em h ave a ma s t er’s d egr ee (14% ) . Regar d ing th e s ub j ec t g r oup , Element ary (5 th and 6 th fo rms) is th e pr edo mi nant on e (6 5% ), a n d th e o th ers be lon g to Primary School (3 5% ) . Co ncernin g th e number of years o f servic e, th e major it y ha ve betw een 11 a nd 20 years (4 5%) , f ollowed by th ose wit h m or e tha n 2 0 years (2 8% ), a nd fi na lly th ose with m ore th an 10 ye a rs (2 7% ) . Polici es 98 3 . Prel i mina ry R esu lts Th e r es ult s of th e su rvey are org ani z ed in two t ab le s , in d esce nd in g or d e r of me an o bt ained in th e f oll ow ing ar e as: Curri c ul ar ch an g es (tab le 10 ) a nd Te achin g Cha n ges (tab le 11 ). It e ms M in im um Ma x im um Me an S ta nd ar d De viat ion The r es u lts ob ta i ne d by stu den ts on n at ion al t es ts co ntribu te to the co ns tr uc tion o f t he sc h oo l s oc ial i mag e. 2 5 4.39 0,635 N at ion al math t es ts sh oul d take p la c e in t he e nd o f e ach stud ie s c yc le (4 th , 6 th and 9 th g ra des ). 2 5 4.35 0.976 Th e Mat he mati cs Plan co ntri bu te s fo r a lar ge r t eac hin g coo pe rat ion am ong teac he rs. 3 5 4.33 0.622 Th e c re at io n o f r ank ing s enha nc es co m pe titive ne ss am o ng s t sch oo ls . 3 5 4.22 0.702 Curric u lar go als co r resp on d to fi n al go al s. 1 5 4.10 0.855 Curric u lar go als de fi ne t he co nte n ts th at stu den t s s hou ld le ar n. 2 5 4.01 0.787 The sch oo ls w ith the bes t re su l ts in math sh ou ld b e an exemple o f g oo d teac hing p rac tice f o r oth e r sch oo l s. 2 5 3.98 0.969 Ext ern al e va lu at io n o f sc h oo ls h as co ntri bu t ed to a be tte r cur ricu lar a r tic u lat ion am ong s choo l dep artm en ts. 2 5 3.84 0.784 Th e f o rmat io n o f ra nk ing s help s co m pe titiv en e s s am o ng teac he rs o f sub jec ts w ith n at io n al ex ami n at i on s, inc ludin g mat h. 2 5 3.84 0.857 N at ion al e x ami nat ions h ave con tri bu t ed to the cre at ion of a ye ar ly mat h co mm on gl ob al t es t, for e very c la ss be lo ng ing to t he s ame sc h oo l g ra de . 2 5 3.82 0.713 The evaluati on of st udents t rough nati onal examinati ons cre at es in the tea c he r s the f e ar of pro fe ss io n al fai lure. 2 5 3.78 0.702 N at ion al e x ami n at i on s h ave co ntrib ute d to th e crea tio n o f equ al t es ts fo r a l l c la s se s be l on gi ng to the sam e sch oo l g ra de . 2 5 3.73 0.635 The r es u lts o f int ern at io n al ex ami n at ions (P I SA , T IM SS , f o r ex am pl e) co ntri bu te to a bi gg er im po rtanc e o f math in t h e cur ricu lar p la ns o f P ri mary Teach i ng . 3 5 3.67 0.589 Ext ern al e va l u at ion o f sc h oo ls h as co ntri bu t ed to t he cre at ion of a y e ar ly math co mmo n glo b al t es t, fo r e very c la ss be lo ng i ng to the s ame sc h oo l g ra de. 2 4 3.59 0.572 Su ppo rt le ss ons sh ou ld o n ly be pro vi de d f or stu de n ts who d o no t pre s en t a si gn if ican t de fic i t in t he ir l e ar ni ngs . 2 5 3.56 0.760 Stud en ts’ e va l u at ion thro ug h na tio n al ex ami n at i on s h as he lpe d me im pro ve m y p ractic e as a teac he r. 2 5 3.51 0.758 Inte rm e d iate t es t s an e ff ecti ve ma n ag em ent t oo l to im pro ve stud en ts ’ r es ults. 2 5 3.49 0.857 Stud en ts fr o m p ri mary edu c at ion g ive mo re val ue to math due to th e ex ist en c e o f n at ion al ex ami n at ions in the en d o f th e cy c le o f s tud i es . 2 5 3.47 1.007 Ext ern al e val u at ion o f sc h oo ls h as co ntri bu t ed t he cr eat ion of equ al t es ts fo r a l l c la s se s be l on ging to the sam e sc h oo l g ra de . 2 4 3.43 0.640 T es t-base d stud en ts ’ e val ua tio n co nt ri b utes to t h e indi vi du al iz at ion o f t he teac he r’s wo rk. 1 5 3.43 0.922 The Mat he mat i cs Plan co ntribu tes to the im pro vem en t o f math sch oo l r esu l ts o f s tu d en ts fr o m p ri mary edu c at ion. 2 5 3.31 0.860 Polici es 99 As a math teac he r I f ee l res po ns i bl e for my st ud en ts’ re s ul ts in n at ion al ex am i n at i on s. 1 4 3.22 1.026 I fe el co mf ortab le w ith th e ex ist en ce o f a t es t -base d stu dents’ e val u at ion. 1 5 3.12 0.973 The curric u lar go als rep la c e the pr og ram . 1 4 2.25 1.055 Table 10 : Curric ular chang es Itens Mini mum Maximu m Mean Standard Deviati on Ho me wo rk co nt rib u tes to th e im prov em en t in s tud en t’s sc h oo l r esu l ts in ma th. 3 5 4.43 0.575 As a math tea c he r I fe el pr es sur ed to t each my s t ud e n ts to b e pr ep ar ed fo r n at ion al ex am i n at io ns . 2 5 4.27 0.723 Sch oo l t eac hing sup po rt le ss ons fo r stud en ts sho u ld b e dir ecte d f o r th e subj ec ts w ith n at io n al exa mi n at io ns . 3 5 4.24 0.473 Tea ching fo r t es ts re su lts co ntrib utes to an im pro vem ent in th e stud en ts ’ sc h oo l r esul ts. 2 5 3.94 0.858 Math teac he r s are inc reasi ng ly teac hin g fo r th e res u lts i n n at ion al ex ami n at i on s. 2 5 3.90 0.922 The stu den t is the main r esp on si b le fo r h is sch oo l pe rf o rma nc e. 1 5 3.90 0.922 As a math te ac he r I fe el re sp o ns ib le for th e res u lts t h at my stu d en ts ge t o n the interna l e va lu at io n dur in g th e sc h oo l ye ar. 2 5 3.82 0.767 The s oc ial a nd e co no mic ba ckg ro un d is th e main re sp on si ble fo r t he st ud e nts ’ p e rf o rma nc e. 2 5 3.75 1.017 The marks o b ta in e d in i nterm ed i ate t es ts sh oul d be i nclu ded i n t he st ud e nts ’ fi na l e val uat ion fo r th e inter nal e val uatio n. 3 5 3.69 0.616 Ext ern al e va lu at io n o f s ch oo ls h as co n tri bu te d to a bi gg e r coo pe rat io n am on g math t ea ch e rs in th e c la ss r oo m te ac hin g ac ti vi t y pl ann in g ( pr ep a r in g ma te ri al s … ) 2 5 3.69 0.948 Ext ern al e va l u at ion o f sch oo ls h as co ntri bu t ed to the cre at io n of a y e ar ly math co mmo n gl ob al t es t, fo r e very c la ss be lo ng i n g to the s ame sc h oo l g ra de. 2 5 3.55 0.702 Ext ern al e va l u at ion o f sch oo ls h as co ntri bu ted to a bi gg e r coo pe rat ion am ong math teac he rs in the cre at io n o f t oo ls o f interna l evalua tion, includ ing corre ction an d mark s criteria. 2 5 3.47 0.833 Ext ern al e va lu at io n o f sch oo ls h as co ntri bu te d to a bi gg e r coo pe rat io n am on g math t eac he rs in t h e pr ep a rat io n of teac hing co nt en ts (d e fi n ing strat eg ie s, se q uen c e … ). 2 4 3.45 0.673 Ext ern al e va l u at io n o f sch oo ls h as co ntri bu t e d t o a bi gg e r coo pe rat ion am ong math teac he rs in l ess o n p la n ni ng . 2 4 2.43 0.755 Su ppo rt le ss ons sh ou ld o n ly b e pro vi de d f or stu de n ts w ho do no t pres en t a si gn i fic an t de fic i t in t he ir le ar ni ngs . 1 4 3.20 0.849 Tea c he rs a re t he mo st impo r ta n t fa c to r i n t h e stu de nts’ pe rf o rma nc e. 2 4 3.10 0.964 A s a math t eac he r I sti ll tea c h t h e s ame w ay as be for e, r eg ar dl es s o f na tio na l ex am in at io ns . 2 4 3.02 0.905 Su mmati ve tes ts res u lts m ust be the m ost in fl ue nt componente in the stu de nts ’ e val uat io n. 1 5 3.0 1.249 Polici es 100 A s a math teac he r I sti ll te ac h t h e s ame w ay as be fo re, r eg ar dl es s o f e xter n al e val ua tion o f sc h oo ls. 2 4 2.86 0.825 T es t-base d s tud en ts ’ e val uat ion c o nt ribu t es to the o bjec ti vi ty in the e va l u at ion. 1 5 2.86 1.184 As a math teac he r I val ue mo re the su mmativ e e va lu at ion th an the fo rmat i ve one in the fi n al eva lu at ion o f s tu d en t s. 1 4 2.63 1.095 Math res u lts on n at iona l ex am i n at ions are a refle ctio n of the stud en ts ’ a ct u al le ar n ing . 1 4 2.22 0.923 Table 11 : Teaching changes By analyzing the questions related to the topic of curricular changes (tabl e 1), some specif ic conclusions m ay be drawn: the respondents agree on the following ideas: the school result s that students achieve in national examinations have an influence on the schools’ social image (X =4.39 ; D .P.=0 .635); na tional ex amin ations o f math emat ic s shoul d happen at the end of eac h cycl e of st udi es (X= 4. 35; D.P.=0 .9 76) ; the Mathe mati cs Pla n contributes to a higher level of teaching cooperati on among teachers (X=4.33; D.P.=0.622); the cr eation of ranking s contribu tes to c ompetitiven ess am ong schools (X=4.22 ; D .P.=0.70 2); curricular goals c orrespon d to fina l goals (X=4.10; D .P.=0. 855), and curricul ar goals set the cont ents that students should be learning (X=4.01; D.P. =0.78 7). In wh at Te ac hing Changes are concerned (table 2), the results show that the respondents agree on the following ideas : hom ewo rk con tribute s to t he im prove ment in stu dent’s scho ol res ults in ma th (X =4.43; D.P. =0.575 ); m ath teachers feel pressured t o teach for national e xaminations (X=4.27; D.P. =0.723); s upport les sons in school s should be direct ed for the subjects that have a national exam inati on (X=4.24; D.P.=0.473); teaching with the purpose of preparing the students for tests contributes to an improveme nt of school results (X=3.94; D.P.=0.858); ma th teach ers are incre asingly tea ching to pre pare the ir stu dents for na tional exa minatio ns (X=3 .90; D.P.= 0.922 ); the student is the m ain responsible for his/her school performance (X=3.90; D.P.=0.922), and math teachers feel re sponsible for the results that their students g et on the internal evaluation during the school year (X=3.82; D.P. =0.76 7). The respondents’ indecision on the evaluation , which was calculated through the correlat ion coeffi cient , can be seen on the effects of summative evaluation on the students’ final school marks, as w ell as on the objectivity of a test - based evaluation. 4. Conclusi ons Th e respo nd e nt s of th is s tud y, m ath t ea ch ers f ro m 1 st to 6 th gra d e, s h ow agre e men t on th e e ff ect s th e e xt ernal eval uati on h as on th eir p rac t ice an d al s o th at the achie vem ent s ou t li n ed on th e r ep o rt s o f ext ernal ev alua tio n a re rhet orica l , al th ou gh th ey agr e e t o t h e f act th a t e xt ernal evaluat ion is giving an important contribution to the te aching d irected to ward s tests a s well a s to the stand ardizatio n of res ults. Th e idea that the re sults ob tained on National Examinations along with the exi stence of rankings contri bute to competiti veness among schools can be seen on the results of this survey; however, the re is h igher agree ment a round the ide a that the re sults on m ath national examinations m ay not be a refl ection of the actual learning done by students, or that their influence may cause an increase of competition among teachers. Polici es 101 The concept of object ivi ty o f a tes t - based evaluation is a source of large uncertaint y by the respondents, who answered in very cont radictor y ways. The majority of the respondent s admit that there is pressure to teach for nati onal examinati ons, that the support lesso ns sho uld be d ire cted for subjects with national examinations, that the students are the m ain responsible for their sc hool pe rforma nce, an d that tea ching fo r tests co ntribute s to an im prove men t in schoo l results. Nevert hel ess, the re is indec isi on about the idea that curri c ular goals are a replacement for the program, which can be seen through a very diverse range of answers. Also, there is no agreement on how comfortable teachers are with a test - based evaluation of their students, and that they are responsible for the resul ts o f the ir s tudents o n national examinations. Indec ision is a lso prese nt in wh at c oncern s th e influ ence of sch ools’ extern al e valuatio n a long with intern ationa l tests (P ISA, T IMSS , for insta nce) co ntributin g to the importa nce giv en to m ath in th e curric ul ar plans of Pri mary and Element ary School and for the teachi ng pract ice of the respon dents (c ooperat ion among teacher s, buil ding mate ri al s, a cti vi t y p la nni ng, what c ont en ts t o tea ch … ). Looking at the results, it must be pointed out that the majority of the respon dents conside red th at the scho ol res ults obtained on national examinations contribute to the social image of school, and that math national examinations should be done at the end of each cycle of st udies, despi te the thought that these examinati ons haven’t contri buted so far f or an improvement of the teachers’ pract ice nor do t hey reflect the actual learning done by students. In the study final results, som e issues should b e address ed: what purp ose may exa minatio ns have at the end of a cycle, if they do not reflect the actual learning of students? W hat is their influenc e on the quality of learning as well as on the actual teaching practi ce? Refer ences Afo nso, A. (2 012). O compa r a ti vi sm o avaliador e a teo ria d e m o de r n iz a ção r ev is it ada. In M. P. A lve s & J .C. Mo rga d o (Org .), Aval iação em Educ ação: pol íti cas, proc essos e pr áti cas (p p. 43- 54 ). 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Polici es 104 Curri cul um making in the Munici pal Schools of Petrópol is: Arena of confli cts, resistance and reconte xtualisation Corrê a, Cínt ia Chung Marqu es ( ccmchung@ compuland.com.br) ; Univ ers idade Catól ica de Pet rópolis , Brazil Ramos, Rosan e Ka rl ( rokarl35@ yahoo.c om.br); Pontifí cia Univ ersi dade Ca tóli ca d o Rio de J aneir o , Braz il In o rder to c omply with the edu cationa l nee ds presen t in the Brazilia n fed eral Law num ber 9.394 /96, s uch as the broadening of mandatory Basic Education to nine years and assessment issues, the Municipal Secretari at of Educati on of Petrópol is (Rio de Janeir o State, Brazil) organized , all along the year 2014, meetings, seminars and worki ng sessi ons with school coord inat ors and teachers , with the spe cific objective to reform the official school curriculum for the five initi al years (1st to 5th years). Fortnightly meetings and/or working sessions were he ld during 2014 so as to deepen and discuss issues pertaining curriculum, like curricul um structure, pedagogical aims and strategies, and, p articul arly, selection of contents to upda te the official curriculum that would be implemented in 2015. This paper presents a synthesis and analyses the results of these m eetings and working sessions, w hich were obser ved by one of the writers . The main objective of this paper is to un derstand how the State, represented by the Secretar iat of Education st aff, acts as a “recontextual ising agent” (BERNSTE IN, 1985), and the educational professional s, on the other hand, recont extuali se educational poli cies in thei r everyday practi ce in their school s and classrooms (BALL, 2013). W e adopted a qualitative approach, using as research instruments observation, interv iews and d ocum ental/te xtual analysis . Du ring the pro cess, it could be observed a series of diff erent interests, positions , and conflict s amongst the partic ipants, which cont ributed t o some critici sm and to an attitude of suspici on towa rds the re al e ffectiven ess of the fina l do cume nt. One of th e m ain res ults we h ad after the a nalysis is th at th e final docu ment – which has recent ly been offi ci all y implemen ted - , despite havi ng been created in an apparent democratic atmosphere, is st ill object to discontentment and cr itici sm by the larger group of teachers t hat do have to “e nact” it in their everyday working places. The document faces resistance and critics, which may endanger its own implementation and validity, si nce, as Pacheco (2002) writes, “consensus i s something of a fiction, or ( … ) [it] just o ccurs amo ng ac tors w ho a c t in acco rdance with the ir own in terests”. Introd uction The first Brazili an Law of Directi ves and Basis for National Education, number 4.024/61 , was sanctioned on December 20th, 1961 acco rdi ng to the proj ect of the Minis try of Educat ion of the ti me, Cle ment e Maria ni . This Law was changed by amendme nts and articl es, an d it was r efor mulat ed by th e Laws 5.5 40/6 8, 5.692/ 71 and, at la st, i t has been substit uted for t he Law number 9.394/96 on December 20 th , 1996, which has been used as the Dir ectives and Basis for Nation al Educ ation (C ERQ UEIR A et al , s/d, p. 2). The Artic le 2 of the Law 9.394/96 establ ishes that educati on is both a family and a State responsibil ity, and that education aims to fully develop the person, so that he/she may be w ell prepared for citizenship and well qualified for his/h er future w ork ca reer. Acc ording to this Law , Articles 1 1 and 1 2, it is the m unicipa l r espon sibility to organize, m aintai n and develop its offici al instit utions and or ganizations of its educational system, and each educational premises wi ll have the obl igati on to pl an and execut e thei r pedagogical proposal s. The m unici pal government of Petrópoli s, Rio de Janeiro State, Brazil , launched in 2014 the document “ Petrópoli s Curri cul ar Referen ce/Cu rri cul ar Proposal ”, plann e d to “support the work done at public m unicipal schools, to Polici es 111 accordance with the needs of each individual school. Ball (1994) discusses the unceasing m ovement that configures the curri cular text producti on. Such production does not get to an end when the text is released. In the act of its implementation, this text is, somehow, re - wri tt en, re - inte rpreted, and re - configur ed due to the new context where i t wil l be use d, and due to the mean ing s constructed by its implemente rs . Thu s, the practice conte xt of a te xt involv es not only the curric ular policy itse lf, bu t m ainly othe r te xts that are produ ced in acc ordan ce with this one, as well as di scour ses tha t exis t i n the scho ol envi ronmen t, to whic h po li cy t al ks. Presenta tion of t he ne w curri cular ref erence Before being sent to the schools , the new Proposal for basic edu cation in Pe trópolis was pres ented at a me eting with school dire ctor s, coordi nato rs and teacher s of all schools that consti tut e the publi c munici pal syste m. Duri ng the m eeting th ey pre sented a brief su mma ry of the trajectory for the ela borati on of the docum ent, and some suggestions on how to i mplement the actions. By studying the Proposal , w e have obs erved that the final doc umen t ha s b een base d o n th e a ims of the Federa l government program “Compromisso Todos pela Educação”, on the “Plano Nacional de Educação”, als o on the “Pacto Nacion al pela Alfabetizaç ão na Idade Certa”, and fina lly on th e “Diretrizes Curriculare s para o En sino Fundamental” . In the Proposal it is sa id that the g uiding d ocum ent wa s “Elem entos c onceitu ais e me todoló gicos para defi nição dos direitos de aprendizagem e desenvolvi mento do ciclo de alf abetização do ensino fundamental ” (PETR ÓPOL IS, 2014). Carla 13 , an other inte rviewed teache r, s howe d her con cern ab out the efficie ncy of the ne w curricu lum for ba sic education, in relation to her work at school: We must ana ly se and di sc us s th is new doc ume nt tho ro ug hl y. You se e, the same l ear ni ng ri ght s dir ec te d to literacy classes a re the b asis of th e learning rights for the 4 th and 5 th grades. I bel ieve their intention is to drop t he quali ty of education. This was a great discus sion issu e at the firs t pedagogic al meeting w it h the teachers at Aquarela S chool 14 at the beginning of the year 2015. At this point, we coul d observe t hat the teachers considered that t here was a gap between the sc hool team ’s o bjective to kee p th e schoo l’s tea ching qu ality a nd the aims pre sente d a t the n ew Proposal . The Curri cul ar Porpos al pres ented the learning rights divided by knowledge areas, and these were organized in general r ights, learni ng right s by g rade and axe s, into each sp ecific subjec t area. Expanding the i dea of “ learning rights” to al l school subject s had been i nfluenced by the gui ding document r eleased by the Minis try of Education and the Secretariat staff complied wit h it. However, it i s not possible to assert that the teach ers a t the munic ipal sc hools were willing to do so, o r eve n tha t they were all in favor of this curricu lum perspectiv e. In our research, most inter viewed teachers declared their interest in having been provided with a clea r 13 A fi ctit ious name. 14 A fict iti ous name gi ven to the sc hool wher e part of t he rese arch was conducted. It is a s chool th at is part of th e public munic ipa l s yst em, and it ha s ar ound ei ght hu ndre d st uden ts (f rom 1st to 9t h gr ades ) and four tee n t each ers who te ach 1st to 5t h grades. Polici es 112 contents list to be w orked on each grade. They said that this need is som ething that emerges on the daily practice in the classro oms. The elaboration of the learning rights for each school subject and the approach designed for each grade supposedly org anized the knowledge content in t he Proposal . In the teachers ’ o pinions, som e of the se rights were unclear i n regard to the content to be worked with the students. They also pointed out that some of the rights t hat are only fully integrat ed in the 5 th grade could have been presented before. Ball (1994) affirms that polit ical texts are not necessaril y concise, but they m ight comprehend m any different meanings in the text, being even contradictory. Some terms may be used in diverse ways, some pieces of inform ation may generate more questions than a nswe rs. The presentat ion of a curri cular text under the learni ng rights mode tried not to attai n itsel f to a contents li st to be worked during the school year. To the teacher s, the task of havin g to defi ne the knowl e dge to be taught according to the re ality of the ir pupils a nd the c lass pro file is not a s easy as it migh t soun d. In th e Proposal , an introdu ctory s ection w ritten b y the S ecreta riat staff h as no t been includ ed, wh ich wo uld ha ve avoided misunderstandings. If the re h ad b een su ch in troductio n, th e te achers m ight h ave un derstoo d th e Secret aria t’s inte ntio n in preparing the Curr icu lar P ro posal , its aim s, o bjectives and me thodolo gy. F or insta nce, the lack of such infor mation led the Aq uarela Sc hool team to org a nize their own directives to guide the teachers that work from 1 st to 5 th grades. T here were two m eetings with the school team during the fir st week of F ebruary 15 aiming to study and evaluate the Proposal . At first, th e te ache rs trie d to ad just the le arning rights approach by grades to their cla s srooms realiti es. Later, they listed contents they believed should be wo rked with the students by bimester, in accordance with the ones presented in the official document. B owe, Ball e Gold (1992) assert that the pol itical text is not simply receiv ed and interp reted by the subje cts that are to act based on it, but that it c an be re - interp reted a nd re - created, considerably influenced by t he implementation process of the public policy. The Cur ric ular Proposal got t o a school where it s teac hers have mature concepts about the t eaching and learning process, and they were not expecting for external directives to guide their actions. In this school, there were previous proposals, which had been built on a collect ive basis of educational practice, consolidated by the lived experiences of those responsible for the educational process. In this sense, Ball (1994) argues that the text production context does not involve just the curricular policy itself, but also other texts that are produced according to it, as w ell as tex ts prese nt in the s chool e nvironm ent w ith whic h the po licy talks o r is even oppo sed to. Conclu sions By using the information gathered along the field research and our theoretic al basis, w e have presented an analysis of the elaborati on and implementation processes of a new curricular proposal for a public municipal system of education in a town in Brazil. Su ch system is formed by one hundre d schoo ls that cater for the init ial years of basic education (1st to 5th grades). C onsequently, we are aware that by observing only one of these schools cannot be considered represent ative of t he whole process. Neverth eless, our researc h provides clues as to 15 The school year in Brazil usually begins i n February and ends in December. Polici es 113 what may be happening in the other schools as well. Thus, the considerations presented here may be understood as a st arting point to new res earches and ques tionings. To present an d implement a new cur ricul ar propos al is not just a matter of releasing a document and deli vering it to the s chools , so that th ey m ay re - organize thei r lessons pl ans. It is essential that t he educational staff in charge of the sch ool discus ses its text an d organiz es the plan s, the strateg ie s to its implementation, aims and objectives with the teache rs. From this momen t o n, the e ducatio nal profession als involved m ake their own plannin g, a ctivities and projects to be developed, which should be followed by the educational team of the school, li ke the coordinators. This fol low - up should not aim to control the teachers’ work, but in a partner ship sense that is created by the medi at ion bet wee n t each in g an d th e sc hoo l ad min is tr at ors . T his fo ll ow - up involves assessment, suggesti on and re - planning. Thus, the context of people administration takes place, helping to create an atmosphere of understanding, implementat ion, bet ter practic es and lear ning, and good resul ts. As far as the data is concerned, we conclude that the document Curr icul ar Propos al , ev e n though it has already been releas ed in its final version, is still source of discussions and debate in the public municipal schools of Petróp oli s, faci ng r esist ance, cr iti cis m and runni ng t he bi g r isk of having it s i mplement ati on do omed t o fa ilur e. It i s possi ble that the educational changes have lost their innovative sense since they have been stifled by the impo sition cha racter o f n ational po licies. De aling with d ifferen t p aradig ms ma y be hard fo r th e teach ers. Ma ybe it is not that easy for them to de - construct an identit y that has already been forged from a sequential and ordered kind of curri culum. Most of t he times, t eachers are led t o incorpor ate the real izati on of pre - det ermined ri tuals, whi ch may be confr onted by policies like school cycles (and not “grades”) and directi ves that assure the learni ng ri ghts of students. Refer ences BALL, S. J . ( 2013) Education Debate. Sec ond Ed iti on. Great Bri tain : The Poli cy Press. ___________. (2003) The teacher's soul and the terrors of performativit y. Journal of Educati on Policy , 18:2 , 215 - 228 ____________ (1994) Educati onal reform – a critical and post - structural a pproach. Bucking ham: Open Universit y Press. _____________; BOWE, Richard; GO LD, A nne. (1992) Changing Schools – case studies in policy sociology. London: Routl edge. BERNSTEIN, Basil. (1985) On Ped agogic disco urse. Handboo k of Theory and Resear ch in the Sociol ogy of Educati on. New Yor k: Green wood Press . BRASIL. Lei de Diret riz es e Bases da Educ ação Na cional . Lei nº 5.692/ 71. BRASIL. Lei de Diret riz es e Bas es da Educa ção Nac ional . L ei n º 9. 394/9 6. CERQUEIRA, Ali ana Georgia Carvalho; SOUZA, Thiago Cavalcant e de; MENDES, Patríci a Ador no (s/d) A trajetória da LD B: um olhar cr ítico frente à realida de bra sileira . Dis poníve l em: http:/ /www.uesc.br/ eventos/ci closhis toricos/ anais/al iana_georgi a_carvalho_cerquei ra Aces so em 03/08/ 2015 Polici es 114 DAVIES, Brian . (2003 ) Berns tei n, Durk heim e a Socio logi a da Educaç ão na Ingl ate rra. Cadernos de Pesqu isa , n. 120, p. 51 - 74, novembro. MOREI RA, Ant ôn io Fl avi o B. (2 013 ) Em busc a da aut onomi a doc ent e nas prát ic as cur r icu la res no Bras il . I N: Oli vei ra, Maria R ita N.S .; P ACH ECO , J.A. (orgs) Currícu lo, didát ica e formaç ão de profes sore s. Campi nas, SP: Pap irus . PACHECO, Jos é Augus to. (2002 ) Polít ica s Cur ricu lares . Porto: Porto Editora , p. 137 - 138. PETRÓPOLIS ( 2014). Ref erenci al Curri cula r par a os anos ini ciai s d o Ensino Fundament al. ROLDÃO, Maria do Céu.(2 003) Difer enci ação curri cul ar revis it ada . Conceito , discurso e práx is. Porto: Porto Edito ra. SANTOS, Lucío la L. C. P. (2003) Bernstei n e o campo educacional : Relevância, inf luênc ias e Incompreensõ es. Cadernos de P esquisa , n. 120, novembro/ 2003. Federal Universi tie s Restr ucturi ng and Expa nsion Pr ogram ( REUNI ) Silv eira, Ana Paula ( a_sil veirapaul [email protected] ); Univ ersi dade Es tadual de Campina s – UNICAMP , B razil The Program of Restruct uring and Expanding the Federal Universi ties (REUNI) was implemented in Brazil by the federa l gov ernm ent in 200 7, w ith the obje ctive o f incre asing the num ber of enrollm ents in Brazilia n pu blic hig her education. So, it increased the num bers o f gradu ated in dividuals . REU NI allow ed th e deve lopm ent of a cadem ic mobi li ty progr ams betwee n the fe der al unive rsi t ies that joi ned it; the arti cu lat i on bet ween under gra dua te and graduate; proport ional relat ionship of one universit y professor for each eighteen students; hiring new workers and universit y professors to w ork in the federal universiti es that have joined the R EUNI, especially in those who were created concom itantly with R EUNI; the inclusion policy for pe ople with sp ecial needs in the university and curriculum restructuring. REUN I follows the internalizati on logic of Brazilian U niversit ies, i.e. the New Universities are creat ed mostly in remote areas of large urban centers, allowing the soci oeconomic development of certain Brazi lian re gion. New universities have their pedagogical approach, based on curricular flexibil ity in the exchange of knowledge among univers ity st udents in t he same instit ution or with other insti tuti ons. For t he students t o join t he top Bra zilian public ed ucation i n federal universities that have joined the REUNI, they have to take the National High Schoo l Exam (ENEM) and to achieve the requir ed score to the chosen cour se, make its entry in the Unifie d Select ion System (SISU), by which the federal univers iti es proff er their vacancies. o perform this article the systematic revi ew of the literat ure was use d, based in the m aster's thesis which w ill be presented by the author at the S tate Un iversity of C amp inas (U nicam p). In this s ense th e data presen ted are part of a c o nsolidat ed research. Introd uction This articl e is the result of the master' s research, titled " REUNI : here com es the story ...", held at the State Unive rsi ty of Campi nas (Uni camp) , Campin as - São Paulo, under the guidance of Professor Deborah Mazza, having Polici es 115 REUNI as the subject of this res earch a nd the proposa ls ra ised in th is article are part of th e master s' research in p rogress . For the r ealization of this arti cle , there was a data collecti on in electronic sites of Brazilian Federal Universiti es and the M inistry of E ducatio n and C ulture. T here w as the u se of Arc Giz platfo rm for m aking th e illustrative map of universit ies that have joined REUNI . In th is article , there is a brief a nalysis of w hat REUNI is , unable to deepen the discussion at thi s moment . REUNI In 2003 , with th e ris e of the Workers Party (PT), repres ented by th e Pre sident elected Luiz Iná cio Lula da Silva, the access to higher education is no longer exclusive to the a fflue nt ones , d ue to th e e nactm ent of P roject Law s, L aws, Dec rees and E ducationa l program s by the fe deral go vernm ent tha t facilitated th e acce ss to the lower c lasses : Year \ decree \ law Legislati on Decree of Oct ober 20, 2003 Intermin isterial Wo rking Gro ups Decree No. 48 75 of November 11, 2003 Establi shes the "Milt on Santos Project " for Access to Education, the Minist ry of Educati on (Pr omisaes) Law No. 10.861, of April 14, 2004 Nation al Syst em of Hi gher Educat ion As sessment ( Sinaes) Law No. 10973 of December 2, 2004 Technological Innovati on President ial Decree No. 5205 200 4 Partners hips between Federal Instit utions of Higher Educat ion and the Private Law Foundations (Revoked by Decree No. 7423, of December 31, 2010) Law No. 11079 of December 30, 2004 Public - Pr ivate Partner ship Decrees 5.296 / 2004 and No. 5. 626 / 2005 establishes the Incl usion Program Law No. 11.096 / 2005 Univer sity for All Progr am (PROUNI ) Bill No. 7200 2006 Reform of Hi gher Educati on Presidential Decree nº6096 2007 Program of Support to the Restructur ing and Expansi on of Federal Univer siti es (REUNI) 2007 Education Development Plan ( PDE) Law No. 10801 of April 14, 2009 Nation al Sy stem of Hig her Edu cati on Ass essment ( SINAES) Decree No. 72 34 of July 19, 2010 Establi shes Nati onal Plan fo r Studen t Assi stance (PNAES) Table 12 : Decrees, La ws, Bills. Source: Prepared by the author from dat a col lected between Oct ober an d November, 2014 Polici es 116 In the first P residen t Lula 's term , there had be en the convening of an Inter - Mi ni st er ial Worki ng Group (I WG) , in 2003 , to poin t out the n eeds of the Br azilian hig her ed ucation . The Decree of O ctober 20, 2003 , es tablishes the IWG , in orde r to asce rtain the current situation and to outli ne a plan of act ion, to re structur e, dev elop and democratiz e the Federal Establ ish ments of Higher Educati on (I FES). The final report produced by the group show ed the need to expand t he teachi ng st aff and the places f or st udents, to imp leme nt distan ce ed ucation , universit y funding and the inte nsificatio n of un iversity auton omy. The interventi ons proposed by the Int er - mini st er ia l Wor kin g Gro up wer e: a. to f ormulate and implement guidelines of an emergency plan in confronting and overcoming the progressive debt wit h suppli ers, combined with the i ncrease in resources for operational costs. b. o pen contests for filling v acanc ies o f fac ulties and public workers , ca used by layoffs , retire ments and dismissals, unfi lled over the past ten years, a nd to re place professors hired on a temporary basi s for effecti ve ones . Ensure fu rther fun ds to co ver de ficits in ma intenan ce and investm ent. c. g rant autonom y to ensure the federal universities a m ore rational u se of resourc es, gre ater effic iency in its m anage ment a nd free dom to c apt u r e and apply extrabudgetar y funds, a s well as didactical - pedagogical aut onomy. d. ensure new jobs: (i) guaranteeing useful regionalization g rants for h iring docto rs who wish to dev ote to te aching, especiall y in degrees such as physics, mathematics, biology, chemistry, gi ving emphasis to the places lacking personnel with higher education, (ii) adopting regionaliz ation and inter nalizat ion crit eria in the policy of opening pl aces for new contests , along with an aid for imp lantatio n of new lines of research for these ne w hire s , a nd (iii) re integratin g retired profes sionals to the activities of fede ral univers ities, through t he i mp leme nt ati on of a specia l pr ogr am of r ese arc h exc el len ce. (BRASIL, 200 3) In this sense , to contemp late analyz es arising from the IWG , it was establ ish ed in 2007 the Progra m of Support to the Re structurin g and Expansion of Fede ral Universi ti es ( REUNI ) , throug h Presid ential De cree no . 6096 , 2007 . T his progr am was restr icted only to Federal Univer siti es. The Restructur ing and Expansio n Program of the Brazi lia n Federal Univer sit ies ( REUNI ), established by the 2007 Presi denti al Decr ee no. 6096 , aims to "[ ...] create condi tions for the expansion of acc ess and permanence in higher education , at the undergraduate level, and for better use of physical structure and human resources exist ing in the federa l univer sities " (B RASIL, 2 007) . Federal Inst itut ions of Higher Education (I FES) tha t joined RE UN I ha ve rece ived fun ding by su bmittin g re structuri ng plans. These features are t o enable the expansion in general , as outl ined in Art icle 3 rd of the Presi denti al Decree : I - construction and readjustment of infrastructure and equipm ent ne cessary to achieve the program's objecti ves; II - purchase of goods and services requir ed for the f unctioni ng of t he new academic regimes; and III - personnel and operating expenses associated with the expansion of the activit ies result ing fro m t he restructurin g plan(BR ASIL, 200 7) . Polici es 117 But from the enac tment of the new 2007 Pres identia l D ecree no . 6096 new IF ES we re created to respond to the characteristi cs presented by the final report of th e IW G. P ublic un iversities, newly created e xceed 40 u niversities , being nam ed New Universi ties for bringi ng in their curriculum an innovation, the interd isciplinarity , through the Interdis ciplinary Bachel or' s Degr ees that contemplates the g enera l formatio n . Recentl y, it has a m embership of 72 universit ies, divided into Federal Higher Education Establi shment s , in cluding the new ly crea ted a nd th e exis ting o nes. Thes e pie ces o f inform ation was obta ined from REUNI websi te on the Interne t , link ed to th e we bsite of the Ministr y of Education and Culture. The followin g map is for the identific ation of proporti onality of REUNI memb ers hi ps. Map 1 : Adherence to REUNI - visual proport ions. Source: Prepared by the author from dat a col lected between January and March, 2015. REUNI made it possible to increase enrollment in public universities with the creati on of new federal universities; facilitated th e intern ationaliza tion pro cess of B razilian hig her ed ucation th rough th e curricu lum sim ila ri ties w ith the Bologna Process - which est abli shed in the cu rrent E urope an H igher Ed ucation Sce nario the general ist education at higher education and contributed indirectly to the expansion of Brazilian Universiti es in the private - commodity dependence. The re are other fede ral pro grams that offer vaca ncies with schola rship g rants in p rivate e stablishm ents, s uch as the U niversity fo r All Pro gram (P ROU NI) an d Stud ent Fina ncing P rogra m (FIE S). Admission into the Brazil ian Federal Universi ti es who have joined t he REUNI is through the realization and approval i n the National Secondary Educati on Examination (ENEM). Each course offered in IFES requi res a minimum score to apply for posit ions throug h the Unified Selectio n System (SISU), w hich registe rs scores of can didat es and t he posit ions of fered by the Feder al Univer sities . Polici es 118 The survey results show that the pedagogical proposals embedded in REUNI do not present a curricul ar innov ation, s ince this p ropos al appe ared in th ree diff erent tim es w ith differe nt settin gs i n the history of Brazilian higher educat ion, th at are the Tech nologica l Institute A erona utics , in the decade of 1947 ; in the prepa ration o f the Unive rsi ty of Bras il ia , in 19 61 P roject done by D arcy Ribe iro ; and Design of the University of Campinas in 1961, prepared by Fausto Casti lho. In addition to this historical percep tion, it can b e co nclude d tha t ther e wa s an incre ase of 73% in enrollm ent in private higher education profi ting establi shments in t he period fro m 2003 to 2008, compared with growth of 12.10% in the public dependency in the same period. Given t he abo ve , it is not eworth y th at REUNI provi ded young peopl e with the entry to higher education, but it permitted the comm ercializat ion of hi ghe r educatio n in private dependency. Refer ences Decreto de 20 de o utubro que Institui o G rupo de Trab alho In terminis terial., (200 3). Decret o nº 6.096. Insti tui o Programa de Apoio a Planos de Reestr utu ração e Expansão das Univers idad es Federais. , (2007) . Integ ral Ed uca tion C urricu lu m i n Br az il : op por t uni t ie s an d cha l le nge s 16 Bitt encour t, Zoraia Aguiar ( zoraiabitt [email protected] ); Univers idad e Fe deral d a Fr onte ira Sul ( UFFS) , Brazil Mor os i ni , Ma rí lia Co st a ( mar il ia.mo ros i ni @puc rs .b r ); Pont ifí cia Univ ersi dade Ca tóli ca d o Rio Grande do Sul (PUC RS) , Bra zil Integra l Ed ucation in Brazil h as been in duced by a series o f go vernm ent initiatives, a mon g w hich the More Educa tion Progr am stands out. Since 2007, it aims at extending the length of stay and the learning opportunities of public school students who have a low success rate in Basic Educational Development Index (IDEB). This program understands Integral Education not only as an increase in study time, but also as the integr ation between school knowledge and local knowledge stem ming fr om students reality, which directly i mpacts the idea of a traditional curriculum still present in many schools. In this perspective, Int egral Education requi res a signifi cant change in concepts, and even in paradigm, related to many traditi onal practices and space s still existing in the B razili an public education. Besides being focused on serving the working - class children – whic h has beco me a rea li ty in the country – , th e Prog ram M ore E ducatio n prop oses h iring colle ge stud ents a nd reg ular com mun ity peo ple to w ork after school. Thus, this scenar io creates problems for the teachi ng profession and the relationshi p between school and local kno wledge , quest io ning the hie rarc hies , inc lud ing soc ial clas ses, esta bli shed i n these spaces . In t his sense, thi s paper presents the concept of curricul um used in the guiding docum ents f or the program, conceiving it 16 Th is paper was s upport ed by CAPES, T raini ng Coo rdina tion Higher Educa tion Person nel – Brazil. Polici es 119 as an opportunity to improve the ways of learning that have been present for a long time i n the school. These finding s are illustra ted b y the ana lyses made based on t he state of knowledge (Morosini & Fernandes, 2014) of 54 abstracts of theses and dissertati ons written between 2011 and 2012. These abstracts are available in the CAPES Theses Port al ( Traini ng Coordi nation Higher Educati on Personnel ) and they refer to the challeng es and imple men tation experie nces resultin g fro m sc hool t ime e xtens ion in differe nt reg ions o f Bra zil. Th e resu lts of these s and dissertati ons analyses, after content analysi s (Bardin, 2009), converged to the fact that Integral Education Polic y at this moment does not bring sig nifi cant changes when it comes to the organiza tion of school curri cula . The curriculum int egration o cc urs in an unsystemati c way, and time and space are not so different from those used by main st rea m regul ar time scho ol s, having as a di ff er ent ia l onl y the time spent insi de scho ol . Thus, accor di ng to publicati ons, diff erently from what is expected, there ha s b een a doubling of the formal curriculum of the regular shift, what makes the other shif t a moment of “more of the same”. It is possible t o conclude that this issue i s directly related to teacher education, because there is a need for m ore dialogue about integrat ed proposals between teach ers and mon itors as w ell as to a lso con sider stu dents' k nowle dge. Key word s: Cur ri culu m; I nt egral Ed uca tion; Teac her ed ucation ; Brazil 1 Introduct ion The curr ent pub lic policies for social inc lusio n, whi ch rever berated in school incl usion policies, have been creati ng opportunit ies for a lot m ore people to have access to spaces that until then were only occupied by a few people. The recent G overnment ini tiatives are gea red towa rds caring for individu als who nee d th e s upport of the State in order for their basic needs to be met, including access to education. In this sense, many parents are now having the oppo rtunity to g o to w ork a nd leave their childre n in E lemen tary scho ols when sm all or k eep childre n f ull tim e in midd le schoo l get t ing thr ee meal s a day . The se pr act ic al issu es, li ke whe re to leav e the ir chi ld in saf et y and how to have them fed, are part of the planning of these government initi atives, wh ic h serve a s a basis for crit icism as to its social services character. Nevert hel ess, under the educa tio n sector, publ ic school has been affir ming its posit ion as the nucl eus of imple men tation of th ese po licies, sinc e its acc essed by peop le of diffe rent s ocial classes and with di ffer ent knowledge, which, increasingly, are a lso questioning the education conceptions constituted since the invention of this institutio n. M any of the histo rically transm itted kno wledg e in sch ool spac es e xclude dis cussion s o r disr egard real life expe riences, not conside ring the m va lid, wha t impac ts the learning of th ese c hildren, s ince the y don 't see the relation ship betw een their reality and scho ol w orld. In this direc tion, fo llowing thes e sc hool inclusio n po licies, are initi ative s to question/ discuss what will then be understood a s school curriculum, so that not only school access is tak en into cons ideratio n, but also m ean ingful le arning , whic h wo uld req uire th at the re be a dialog ue be tween school knowledge and knowledge ac quired from real life experie nces. Followi ng this trai n of thought, thi s work presents the concepti ons of curri culum used as a guide in the "More Educati on Program" , which can be understood as the opport unit y to improve the ways that have existed for a l ong time in educ ational institutions . The c urricula r integr ation p ropose d by these do cume nts w ill b e con fronted with reports o f experience s of implem entation o f the program in different reg ions of the co untry from the analysis of 54 Polici es 120 abstracts of theses and dissertations of the years 2011 and 2012 available at the CAPES Theses Portal ( Training Coordination Higher Education Personnel ), perform ed through of the state of kno wledge (M orosini & Fernandes, 2014), whic h focused on the chal lenges pr esent i n this process. 2 The current policy of Integr al Educa tion in Br azil At various times in Brazil ´s histor y was always present , the idea to extend school hours as a possibil ity to give social su pport to econom ically underprivileged children or as a way to b roaden their know l edge, as a curricular enrichment activi ty after school, like music lessons, sports, languages, which is already part of financial ly privil eged children´s routine. These initiati ves gave great v isibil ity to Brazilian educators, such as Anísio Teixeira, Darc y Ribei ro for present ing c oncr ete integ ral s peci ali zed educat ion proj ects ( Par k School and CIEPS) in publ ic s chool s. Twenty years af ter this las t initiative, (re s) arise in the year 2007, in a context of various governmental interventi ons in a q uest fo r socia l equity throu gh red istributiv e polic ies to c omba t pove rty, the idea o f inves ting in a single projec t at a national level to consider these pioneering ideas about Integral education in Brazil, as well as more recent local a nd reg ional p rojects s ucces sful in this field . It is there fore introd uced b y the Inter minister ial Norm ative Ins truction nº 17/2007, the "More E ducation Program", which seeks to dial ogue the possibi li ty of Int egra l educati on extendin g the lengt h of time child ren stay in s chool (minim um 7 hours per day) with an understanding that these hours m ust be used to work knowledge that promotes integr al train ing, su ch as learn ing ph ysical, artistic, sports and cultura l l ac tivities. T he s ocio - politi cal base of the "More E ducation Prog ram" unders t ands that the a rticulation betw een educa tion, S ocial A ssistan ce, cu lture a nd sp orts, a mong othe r public policie s may ar is e as an impor tan t inter ve nti on for soci al pro te ct ion , preven ti ng the si tu ati on s of the viol ati on of rights o f children and a dolesce nts, and also for i mproving school perf ormance and permanence in school, especiall y in t he most vul nerable terri tories ( Bras il, 2009 , p. 25) . In addition , this pro gram, as state d, u ndersta nds Integr al ed ucation as no t on ly th e in crease in daily stud y h ours, bu t also as an integration b etwee n school know ledge a nd studen ts real life e xperien ces, which d irectly impa cts on the idea of a traditiona l c urriculum still present in many schools. Integral educa tion, therefo re requires a significa nt change of conceptions, and even paradi gm, in relati on to many of the t raditi onal spaces and practic es still prevaili ng in t he Brazili an public education. In addi tion t o being devoted to caring for children of popular classes – which has become a real it y in th e count ry – , pro pose s h iring stu dents st ill atte nding university and regular people from the com mun ity to wo rk on s chool s hifts after h ours, im pactin g profe ssional te aching and th e relatio nships between school knowledge and real life exper iences, and questioni ng the hierarchi es, incl uding social classes, establis hed in t hese spaces. 3 The Integr al Education Curriculum The curricul um is not an innocent element and a neutr al, disinterest ed transmissi on of social knowledge. The curriculum is implicated in power relationships, tr ansmitting private interest social visions and producing particular individ ual and social identities. The curriculu m is not a transce nden t an d tim eless ele ment – it ha s a history , link ed Polici es 127 Mato s , Sh eila Cristina Monte iro ( 2011). Prog rama Mais E ducaç ão/ Mais Escola : Av anços e de safios na prática educativa em Duque de Caxias. Retrieved June 10, 2014, from the CAP ES Theses Portal website: http:/ /www.capes.gov.br Mecc a, Marc ia Di Giaimo (2012 ) Educ açã o Int egr al : Text o e conte xt o na rede públ i ca de ensi no do Est ado de São Paulo. Ret riev ed Jun e 10, 2014, f rom th e CAPES Th eses Portal w ebsite: http: //www.capes. gov.br More ir a , A ntonio F lávio, & Silva , T oma z Tade u da (Orgs ). (2011). C urrículo , C ultura e S ocieda de. São P aulo: Cort ez. Moro si ni, Maríl i a Costa , & Fern and es, Cleoni Maria Barboz a (2014 ). Estado do Conhe ci ment o: concei to s, finalida des e in terlocuç ões. Ed ucaçã o Por E sc rito, 5 (2), 15 4 - 164. Necyk, M arc ia Teresa Campos (2012). Senti mentos de profes sore s e de alu nos de duas escola s pública s de temp o in tegral no Es tado de Sã o P aulo. Re trieved Ju ne 1 0, 2 014, from the CA PES Th eses Po rtal w ebsite: http:/ /www.capes.gov. br Nunes, Grei ce Cer quei ra (2 011). Tempo, espaç o e cur ríc ulo n a Educa ção I nteg ral : Est udo de c aso em uma e scol a do Guará - Distri to Federal . Retrieve d June 10, 2014, from the CAPES Theses Portal w ebsite: http:/ /www.capes.gov. br Rocha, Rozane de Fatima Zaio nz da (2012) . Educaçã o em te mpo integ ral : Estudo sobre o rendimen to escol ar das crianças. Retri eved June 10, 2014, fr om the CAPES Theses Portal website: http: //www.capes. gov.br . Saboya, Mart a Goncal ves Franco de (2012). Programa Mai s Educa ção: Uma propost a de educação i ntegr al e suas orientações curriculares. Retrieved June 10, 2014, from the CAPE S Theses Portal w ebsite: http:/ /www.capes.gov. br Santos, Áurea An drezza Silva dos (2013 ). A ges tão peda gógic a do Progr ama Mais Educa ção: Um ol har a par tir da experiência da escola Teodora Bentes. Retri eved March 11, 2014, from http:/ /ppged.bel emvirtual. com.br/ar quivos/Fi le/aurea_mest2013_pdf The competence approach in the ha nds of the Education Authori ty Rossel ló, Mar ia Rosa ( mros a. ro ss el lo @uib .e s ); Univ ersi ta t d e l es Il les Balear s , Spain Pinya, Car me ( carm [email protected] ); Univ ersi tat d e l es Il les Balear s , Spain The term “basic competenci es” spearhead s a movement that over the last few years has been calling for the need to review the sch ool curri culum in the light of the changes and challenges posed by the knowledge and information society and by globalisat ion. In fact, it has becom e a centr al concern for the OECD, picked up on by the UNESCO and expressed in the European Competence Framework as ke y for lif elong learning. Under this inf lue nce, many count rie s have made basi c compet enc ies the core of their educ ati on pol ici es. In Spain , the Sta te includ ed bas ic c ompe tencies th rough th e Orga nic Law o f E ducatio n (LOE ), e ntrustin g th eir spec ification to t he autonomous communities, as well as t he coordinat ion of measures and resources to tr ain t eaching st aff. [Document text truncated for crawler view.]