Inclusive and Supportive Education Congress International Special Education Conference Inclusion: Celebrating Diversity? 1st - 4th August 2005. Glasgow, Scotland

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A Dialogical Pedagogy for Inclusive Education

David Skidmore (University of Bath, Bath, UK, D.Skidmore@bath.ac.uk)
Deborah Gallagher (University of Northern Iowa, Cedar Falls, USA, deborah.gallagher@uni.edu)

Introduction

Drawing mainly on the theoretical ideas of Bakhtin on the dialogic nature of language (Bakhtin, 1981, 1984; Voloshinov, 1986), a number of authors have stressed the educative potential of teacher-pupil interaction which enables students to play an active part in shaping the agenda of classroom discourse. Examples include: dialogic instruction, characterised by the teacher’s uptake of student ideas, authentic questions and the opportunity for students to modify the topic (Nystrand, 1997); dialogic inquiry, which stresses the potential of collaborative group work and peer assistance to promote mutually responsive learning in the zone of proximal development (Wells, 1999); dialogic teaching, which is collective, reciprocal, cumulative and supportive (Alexander, 2004); and dialogical pedagogy, in which students are invited to retell stories in their own words, using paraphrase, speculation and counter-fictional utterances (Skidmore, 2000). These proposals share a common concern with the ritualistic nature of the predominant patterns of teacher-student interaction exposed by empirical observation studies, and an emphasis on the importance of maximising active student participation in classroom talk as a means of enhancing intersubjective understanding.

With their emphasis on offering students the opportunity to construct meaning in their own words, there is an affinity between these dialogic conceptions of pedagogy and the constructivist approach to education. From a constructivist perspective, learning does not take place apart from the active intellectual, moral, and social engagement of the learner. To recognize this point is to acknowledge the essentially transactional nature of teaching and learning: teaching is not a unidirectional act, something teachers do to students; rather, constructivist theory implies the need for a democratisation of the traditional power relationships between teachers and students, built on a view of students as intellectually autonomous meaning-makers.

In this paper, we will explore the ways in which a dialogical pedagogy aimed at enabling the co-construction of knowledge between student and teacher may contribute to the development of an inclusive educational praxis (Gallagher, Heshusius, Iano, & Skrtic, 2004; Skidmore, 2004). We will discuss the changes to prevailing instructional frameworks which are needed if schools are to make substantive progress toward an inclusion that goes beyond mere physical co-presence in classrooms, and ask what conditions might support the development of a pedagogy in which students are invited to articulate an actively responsive understanding in the course of their learning.

Dialogic instruction

In Opening Dialogue, Nystrand (Nystrand, 1997) draws on the Bakhtinian contrast between monologic and dialogic discourse, together with Gutierrez’s concept of instructional scripts (Gutierrez, 1994), to develop the notion of dialogic instruction. In monologic recitation, classroom talk is closely controlled by the teacher, with the aim of transmitting knowledge which students are required to remember. Dialogically organised instruction, on the other hand, is based on a different kind of relationship between teacher and students, in which students are asked to think, not simply to remember. For Nystrand, the study of classroom discourse is important because different modes of interaction place students in different positions as learners (p. 29):

Specific modes or genres of discourse engender particular epistemic roles for the conversants, and these roles, in turn, engender, constrain, and empower their thinking.   The bottom line for instruction is that the quality of student learning is closely linked to the quality of classroom talk.

Opening Dialogue reports the findings of a large-scale study of the effects of patterns of classroom discourse on student learning in 400 English lessons in 25 US high schools. The major source of evidence was structured classroom observation in which teacher questions were coded on a series of dimensions. The research team also tape-recorded lessons and used this evidence to explore unexpected findings from the coded observations in more detail. They also interviewed participating teachers, and tested student learning outcomes by a written examination, scored against a number of criteria. Their results support the hypothesis that dialogically organised instruction is superior to monologically organised instruction in promoting student learning. Recitational patterns of talk were found to be overwhelmingly prevalent, and to have a negative effect on learning; they were particularly strongly concentrated in lower-track classes. Important aspects of the alternative, dialogic approach to instruction highlighted by the study were: the teacher’s use of authentic questions (where what counts as an acceptable answer is not prespecified); uptake, where the teacher incorporates students’ responses into subsequent questions; and the extent to which the teacher allows a student response to modify the topic of discourse, a strategy which Nystrand terms ‘ high-level evaluation’. He identifies a number of specific classroom methods which may help to promote the development of dialogic forms of understanding, including the use of learning journals, position papers drawn up and presented by students to the class, and peer response conferences (where students meet in small groups to review each other’s work).

Nystrand makes a particular contribution to our understanding in his discussion of the relationship between patterns of classroom discourse and the nature of the pedagogic contract established between a teacher and his/her students. As we have explained, the findings of his study do document that particular styles of interaction have an effect on student learning, for better or worse; but he goes on to argue that understanding this relationship cannot be mechanically reduced to measuring the relative proportion of authentic vs. ‘display’ questions over the course of a lesson, for example. He quotes transcripts of extracts from lessons by two teachers with contrasting styles to illustrate that the inappropriate use of authentic questions can be counter-productive; and that the skilful use of a lecturing style can on occasion be effective. For example, if the teacher asks many authentic questions which are unrelated to the topic of the lesson, then this is unlikely to help develop students’ understanding fruitfully; whereas a concise, clear exposition by the teacher may be the most efficient way of explaining the nature and purpose of a task before the class moves on to a new activity. Dialogic instruction will be supported by an increased use of authentic, topic-relevant questions on the part of the teacher, but more fundamental is the quality of the interaction which surrounds those questions. What matters most is not simply the frequency of particular exchange-structures in classroom discourse, but how far students are treated as active epistemic agents, i.e. participants in the production of their own knowledge.

Nystrand’s work marks the first sustained attempt to explore the significance of the Bakhtinian theory of dialogism for our understanding of the language of classroom instruction. His study demonstrates that choices made by the teacher can influence the conditions for learning established in the classroom, and in particular that the teacher does exert a measure of control on the structure and organisation of classroom discourse. He goes on to show that the preferred mode of interaction adopted by the teacher carries consequences for the epistemology of the classroom: broadly, the teacher can orient towards controlling what knowledge is produced, or towards structuring the activities through which students produce knowledge. The study is impressive in scope and makes a strong case for the superior effectiveness of dialogically-organised instruction: students taught in this way tend to do better in written tests than those taught using a monologic, recitational approach.

One drawback of the methodology used in the study is that the central plank of evidence is a record of the coding of classroom interaction made by observers in real time. Although simultaneous tape recordings were made of the lessons observed, these are treated as supplementary evidence rather than the chief source on which the findings are built. Consequently, with the exception of a small number of short transcribed extracts, the original discourse which was spoken cannot be reconstructed; rather we have a global summary of the tendencies in the data (e.g. the preponderance of test questions from teachers and the infrequency with which authentic questions are used). However, as Nystrand’s own findings indicate, in understanding how the structuring of classroom discourse operates, the devil lies in the detail. For example, he notes how the research team’s initial coding of the data threw up some unexpected results, such as the fact that the use of group work appeared to have a negative effect on student learning. When the research team inspected the data more closely, including checking their coding against the recordings they made, it emerged that activities which had been coded as group work were often, in practice, individual work by students who were merely seated in groups. A re-analysis of the data showed that group work was effective when the activity required genuine collaboration, and when the teacher specified the goals clearly, but gave groups autonomy in carrying out the task. Whilst Nystrand makes a convincing case for this general interpretation, putting the flesh on the bones of a theory of dialogic instruction will require closer attention to the detailed analysis of transcripts of the discourse actually spoken by participants in classroom exchanges, since it is at this level of granularity that we can see talk at work in shaping the learning process that students experience. A further question which his study raises, and which future research in this area needs to explore, is why recitational approaches to teaching continue to be so prevalent, given their apparent ineffectiveness in engaging student interest or in securing improved outcomes in attainment. Since it seems unlikely that the majority of teachers would choose to rely on a pedagogic style calculated to depress student learning in the absence of strong constraining factors, we need to investigate the structural conditions which reproduce monologic patterns of instruction on a social scale.

Dialogic enquiry

In Dialogic Inquiry, Wells (Wells, 1999) draws on the twin sources of Leont’ev’s activity theory and Halliday’s systemic functional linguistics to formulate the concept of dialogic enquiry, in which knowledge is co-constructed by teacher and students as they engage in joint activities. Bringing together insights from the two theoretical traditions, he offers the following definition of discourse (p. 174):

the collaborative behaviour of two or more participants as they use the meaning potential of a shared language to mediate the establishment and achievement of their goals in social action.

He illustrates what the practice of dialogic enquiry might look like by a detailed examination of transcripts of classroom discourse, chiefly discussions between the teacher and small groups of students, recorded in Canadian primary school classrooms. Discussing the relationship between discourse and the development of knowledge in schools, he posits the idea that classes of students can form ‘communities of enquiry’, in which the dialogic nature of discourse is exploited to enable knowledge to be co-constructed. Through discussion, ideas can be refined and clarified, in a process which Bereiter calls ‘progressive discourse’, in which contributions refer to and build upon what has gone before (by agreeing, disagreeing, adding, qualifying etc.), thus enabling an advance in the collective understanding of the topic in question. From this point of view, schooling can be seen as a ‘semiotic apprenticeship’ (p. 137), in which students gradually appropriate the technical register of, for example, science, by trying out new concepts and vocabulary in the course of discussion. Wells puts forward a model of an enquiry-oriented curriculum, in which a class theme is selected by the teacher, such as ‘energy’ within the science curriculum (though the choice of theme may also be constrained by external mandates e.g. government policy prescriptions). Within this broad theme, in Wells’s model groups of students have considerable latitude to choose their own specific topics and methods of enquiry, in negotiation with the teacher. The relationship thus constructed between teacher and students is dialogic, but is ‘not a dialogue between equals’ (p. 242): in the advance planning of classroom activity, the teacher retains leadership responsibility for selecting themes and associated activities; but once student investigation is under way, the teacher adopts a more responsive and consultative role, in which his/her interventions are contingent upon student progress.

One particular contribution that Wells makes in this book is his re-evaluation of the IRF (Initiation-Response-Feedback) sequence, a characteristic structure of classroom discourse which previous research has often criticised (p. 167 ff.). In an analysis of a series of episodes from a science investigation, he argues that this exchange structure can be put to different uses. As much previous research has documented, the follow-up (F) move is often used to provide an immediate evaluation of the student’s response (e.g. ‘Correct!’), producing a pattern of teacher-led recitation which tends to reinforce the teacher’s authority as the transmitter of received wisdom and severely restricts the possibilities open to students to contribute thoughtfully to classroom talk. However, Wells shows that the teacher’s follow-up move can also be used to clarify, exemplify, expand, explain, or justify a student’s response; or to request the student to do any of these things. When this kind of exchange is found in classroom discourse, therefore, it may indeed result in a quiz which requires students to do little more than display their recall of knowledge got by rote; but it can also be used by the teacher to help students plan ahead for a task they are about to carry out, or to review and generalise lessons learnt from tasks they have already performed. Wells’s point is that, within limits, teachers have the discretion to choose between alternative modes of interaction which affect the climate of learning in the classroom, for example by adopting a style of speaking which minimises or maximises the social distance between participants.

Wells’s account of the concept of dialogic enquiry is both theoretically sophisticated and informed by evidence of possible forms of pedagogic practice gathered under naturalistic classroom conditions. His work undoubtedly helps to advance thinking beyond the sterile dichotomy between ‘traditional’ and ‘progressive’ concepts of education which has bedevilled much of the debate in this area. His model of an enquiry-oriented curriculum provides a welcome alternative to the rigidity of the centrally-prescribed, content-based model which has dominated government policy-making in the UK since the 1988 Education Act. Whilst his nuanced analysis of examples of classroom discourse sets the standard for work in this field, however, the theoretical position he sets forth in this book raises certain questions which merit further exploration.

For example, we would ask whether, in his concern to rehabilitate the IRF sequence, Wells has not been led to exaggerate the centrality of teacher-led discourse and to underestimate the educative potential of student-student talk. He argues that the IRF sequence can be seen as ‘the prototypical action structure for the achievement of the overarching goals of education’ (p. 206). Yet, much of the early work on classroom discourse was concerned to show how structured group work could provide a site for exploratory dialogue betweenstudents(Barnes, 1976); sometimes this tentative, probing sharing of ideas was better facilitated by the absence of the teacher than by their presence. If this is so, it seems paradoxical to suggest that an enquiry-oriented curriculum should rely on the IRF sequence to the exclusion of talk between students which is unmediated by the teacher. A more balanced conclusion would view triadic dialogue led by the teacher as one moment in a dialectical process of enquiry, which may shift at different times along a continuum between the poles of teacher direction and student self-activity depending on the degree of understanding and competence evinced by student performance.

Secondly, we might ask how far the concept of enquiry developed by Wells is appropriate to other areas of the curriculum which do not share the same epistemic base as the natural sciences (e.g. the language arts and humanities subjects). A key characteristic of Bereiter’s notion of progressive discourse, as Wells notes, is that it is concerned with ‘expanding the body of collectively valid propositions’ (p. 112). At this point, the theory of dialogic enquiry seems limited by being based on a science-led model of the curriculum. If we consider the case of creative writing in first language teaching, for example, then this seems to share the exploratory character of enquiry-based activities in the sciences, but not to be geared towards producing a set of verifiable hypotheses as its outcome. We would argue that we need to expand the concept of enquiry to include areas of learning like these, in which student development is better seen in terms of increased confidence in handling a repertoire of expressive genres. The texts students produce in creative writing can certainly be treated as ‘improvable objects’ in the same fashion as, say, the report of a science investigation, but there are other kinds of understanding which education aims to develop besides the scientific, such as the affective understanding of social experience. Discussion and revision of student work in this context may be progressive in the sense of achieving an enhanced collective understanding of the topic being explored, even though this knowledge may not be expressible in terms of ‘valid propositions’.

Dialogic teaching

In Culture and Pedagogy, Alexander (Alexander, 2000) presents and interprets evidence from a large-scale comparative study of primary school teaching in five countries (India, Russia, France, England and the United States). The project sought to explore how national cultural traditions influenced the processes and practices of teaching at the classroom level. The analytical core of the book lies in a discussion of 17 transcripts of extracts of lessons from different schools in the various countries. On the basis of this analysis, Alexander sets forth a typology of classroom discourse, distinguished along the dimensions of: classroom organisation (whole class, group, individual); pedagogic mode (direct instruction, discussion, monitoring); pedagogic function (rote learning, instruction, scaffolding, assessment, information sharing, problem solving, scaffolding, supervision); and discourse form (interrogatory, expository, evaluative, dialogic). The evidence of the study suggested that interrogatory whole class direct instruction is ‘probably the dominant teaching method internationally’ (p. 516). However, there are moments in the data where the talk takes a different form and the teacher treats the students as fellow discussants, striking a ‘less unequal’ relationship between them for the time being. In a formulation indebted to the theoretical work of Bruner, Alexander proposes the following definition of ‘scaffolded dialogue’ (p. 527):

Scaffolded dialogue [is] achieving common understanding through structured and sequenced questioning, and through ‘joint activity and shared conceptions,’ which guide, prompt, reduce choices and expedite ‘handover’ of concepts and principles.

Citing Bakhtin, he draws a distinction between dialogue and conversation, arguing that dialogue possesses a greater degree of structure, and is differentiated from conversation by the purposeful use of questioning in the pursuit of enquiry. Despite the ubiquity of transmission styles of teaching demonstrated by the study, he argues that macro-sociological theory tends to underestimate the potential autonomy of teachers to reshape classroom discourse along dialogic lines. For Alexander, such dialogic discourse is the main method for fostering a ‘pedagogy of mutuality’, which treats students not as empty vessels to be filled with received wisdom by the teacher, but as competent thinkers in their own right.

The concept of scaffolded dialogue adumbrated in Culture and Pedagogy is developed in a later booklet which elaborates a model of ‘dialogic teaching’ (Alexander, 2004). Alexander describes the principles of this approach as teaching which is: collective; reciprocal; supportive; cumulative; and purposeful (p. 29). He goes on to specify a lengthy list of indicators which can be used to identify dialogic teaching in the classroom (pp. 31-34). The first 14 of these refer to contextual conditions rather than to characteristics of the discourse per se (e.g. lesson transitions are managed economically). The remaining 47 indicators relate to more concrete properties of classroom interaction, and are grouped under seven headings: teacher-pupil interaction; pupil-pupil interaction; teacher-pupil monitoring; teacher questioning; pupil responses to questioning; teacher feedback on responses; and the functions served by pupil talk. For example, Alexander suggests that dialogic teaching is indicated by teacher-pupil interaction in which turns are managed by shared routines rather than through competitive bidding. In the final section of the booklet, he summarises the interim findings from development projects aimed at promoting the use of a dialogic style of teaching in two Local Education Authorities in England. The findings indicate that shifts in the prevailing styles of interaction had taken place in some classrooms, and there was evidence of improvements in oracy among students. In particular, where these shifts had taken place, the classroom climate had become more inclusive, as the changed dynamics of teacher-student interaction furnished greater opportunities for less able students to participate competently in lesson activities. Against these positive outcomes, the projects also demonstrated the ‘staying power’ of recitation as the default mode of pedagogy, as there were many classrooms where little or no change in the conduct of discourse had taken place.

One of the most significant insights to emerge from Alexander’s work is that the kind of communicative competence which students are required to display in the classroom is culturally specific, since different norms of interaction are valued in different countries. For example, his analysis shows that in Russia and France it is more common for one student to participate on behalf of the class in a conceptually complete cycle of exchanges with the teacher, whereas in England and the United States whole class discussion tends to be managed by students bidding competitively for each turn, with the teacher rotating turns by nominating the next speaker, each successive response slot typically being allocated to a different student. For Alexander, these differences in the management of classroom discourse are linked with different cultural traditions in the philosophy of pedagogy: a central European tradition of collectivist pedagogy, on the one hand, which encourages a convergence of learning outcomes whereby the whole class moves forward together; and, on the other hand, an Anglo-American tradition which treats the class as an aggregate of individuals, and fosters a divergence of learning outcomes within the group. These observations lead him to make a welcome critique of the concept of ‘interactive whole class teaching’, which was heavily promoted in government policy in the UK in the 1990s, for its failure to distinguish between the cognitive pace of teaching and the pace of interaction exchange. Quick-fire questioning around the class may appear to lend pace to a lesson, but since it typically elicits a sequence of short, undeveloped responses from students, it may do little to extend their thinking. Alexander commends instead the development of discourse strategies aimed at encouraging students to ‘think aloud’ and develop their ideas at greater length, for example by the teacher pitching a question at a particular, named individual (managing turn-taking by nomination without competitive bidding), and the use of follow-up questions directed at the same student (extending the teacher-student exchange on a given topic rather than rotating successive turns around the class). He emphasises that speech should not be seen as an inferior, less developed form of language use than writing, but that the development of oracy is an important goal of education in its own right, and that increased competence in oracy accompanies and contributes to the development of competence in literacy rather than being in competition with it.

The trans-national scope of Alexander’s study enables him to compare the norms which govern teaching in different countries. This comparative approach is helpful in defamiliarising the taken-for-granted rules and rituals of classroom life in the national contexts which classroom discourse research has most often examined (England and the United States). This draws attention to the fact that teacher-led, whole-class discussion can be managed in ways which depart from the characteristic ‘recitation script’ which studies have found to be prevalent in these countries (for example by the teacher directing a sequence of questions towards one student rather than rotating successive turns around the class). By analysing several examples of classroom discourse from different schools within the same country, he also warns us against the risk of stereotyping national pedagogical traditions by portraying them as monolithic – he finds considerable variation at work in US primary school practice, for instance. Finally, he locates extracts of discourse within summaries of the whole lesson from which they are taken, reminding us of the importance of sequential context for understanding the educational import of a particular exchange. Granted the international significance of his study, however, some questions remain to be resolved by future enquiry in this area.

First, the elaborate typology of learning discourse proposed in Culture and Pedagogy masks the central fact that interrogatory, whole-class direct instruction is ‘probably the dominant teaching method internationally,’ according to Alexander’s own findings (Alexander, 2000, p. 516). In multiplying the dimensions along which the theoretically possible permutations of classroom discourse can be categorised, there is a danger that we lose sight of the wood for the trees: on the evidence of a series of independent studies, teacher-led recitation is the preferred mode of classroom interaction, at least in England and the United States, and moments of dialogic exchange are rare (Applebee, Langer, Nystrand, & Gamoran, 2003; Mroz, Smith, & Hardman, 2000; Skidmore, Perez-Parent, & Arnfield, 2003). This interpretation is confirmed by Alexander’s later work on dialogic teaching, which leads him to remark on ‘the sheer staying power of recitation as the default mode of British and American pedagogy’ (Alexander, 2004, p. 47). There seems to be a tension between this conclusion and the sanguineness of his earlier affirmation of teachers’ ability to ‘interpose their own “critical pedagogies” between the child and the transmission pedagogy of the state’ (Alexander, 2000, p. 553). Again, we are brought back to the question of why recitational approaches remain so prevalent, in spite of evidence that more dialogic modes of managing classroom discourse help students learn better. Here, we think Alexander’s model of dialogic teaching runs into limits imposed by its own empiricist foundations. The list of 47 indicators set out in Towards Dialogic Teaching seems too complicated to be useful as a tool for teachers to monitor their real-time decision-making in the classroom, and there is a risk that the quest for an exhaustive catalogue of the measurable properties of dialogic teaching will mirror the fetish for arbitrary checklists of factors produced by the tradition of school effectiveness research in the 1980s and 1990s.

Secondly, the feasibility of some of Alexander’s preferred discourse strategies is surely affected by features of school organisation which lie beyond the control of the individual teacher. For example, in the primary schools in which his research was conducted, the teacher normally remains with the same class for all or most of their lessons over the course of a school day (and year). However, in secondary schools, one teacher is typically responsible for teaching many different classes, and during the day classes move from teacher to teacher for lessons of a determinate, relatively short period defined by the school timetable; it would not be unusual for a teacher of English in a UK secondary school to see 250 students in a week. This means that the task of pitching a question to an individual student places considerably greater demands on the teacher under the normal conditions of secondary schooling than in primary schools. We would suggest that those who advocate a shift to more dialogic modes of classroom interaction should not under-estimate the powerful constraints placed on possible forms of practice by the structural conditions of schooling and by state education policy, of which the use of educational assessment as a political weapon to stigmatise schools serving disadvantaged catchment areas is one of the most insidious forms. The struggle for a dialogical pedagogy is not reducible to a formulaic set of techniques; rather, it is concerned with the quality of the human relationship established between a teacher and his or her students, and the limits placed on this by prevailing social circumstances.

DEVELOPMENT OF INCLUSIVE EDUCATIONAL PRAXIS

The seeking of intersubjective understandings through dialogue is integral to constructivist approaches and supports inclusive education in several ways. First, and perhaps foremost, dialogical pedagogy offers an alternative to the traditional school discursive practices that result in the initial pathologizing of student differences. Because the origins of exclusion are found in the creation of individual pathology (i.e., some students as individuals have differences that are understood as inherent disability), we might begin by examining through a constructivist framework how the very creation of individual pathology is accomplished through the largely invisible disabling discourse practices of schools.

Drawing on the work of Gergen (1990) and Freedman and Combs (1996), Dudley-Marling (2004) illuminates how “learning problems dwell in activities and cultural practices situated in the context of social relations rather than in the heads of individual students” (p. 482). In two contrasting examples of teacher-student exchanges, Dudley-Marling demonstrates how “smartness,” “learning disabilities,” or any other student identity “emerges in the discursive space between people” (p. 485).   In the first exchange, the teacher employs a didactic “guess what I’m thinking” mode of questioning a student who is labelled as having a learning disability. As one might anticipate, the student emerges from this interaction looking every inch the incompetent, disabled student his teacher and school understands him to be. The second exchange takes place among a teacher and a small group of students who have been identified as having special learning needs and/or who are English as second language learners. Employing dialogical pedagogy, this teacher facilitates the students’ deeply engaged and complex analysis of a challenging text. What emerges from this exchange is an image of these students as intelligent and competent learners. “In the end,” Dudley-Marling (2004) concludes, “no student can have LD [learning disabilities] on their own. It takes a complex system of interactions performed in just the right way, at the right time, on the stage we call school. And, as it turns out, this is precisely what is required to construct students as ‘smart’” (p. 489).

The point here is that there is no driving need to categorize, rank, and label students when learning is centred on their interests, understandings, culture, language, and so on.  This is so because dialogical pedagogy obviates the need for prescribed curricula and normative standards, both of which substantiate perceived student pathology and subsequent rationales for segregated schooling. Instead, constructivist approaches such as dialogical pedagogy create learning contexts in which students and teachers experience a sense of connection and mutual respect (see: Noddings, 1992). Proposing an alternative narrative of teaching, Miller (1993) incorporates Noddings’s ethic of caring to draw four conclusions that portray teaching as a moral rather than technological act: “(1) everyone is taken to be smart and capable of learning; (2) everyone is seen to be motivated by unique and often different things; (3) individual variation is accepted as normal, not as a disorder; and (4) discovering each person’s individual story is the starting point for designing meaningful and relevant instruction” (p. 75).

Constructivist pedagogy engenders competence by creating an understanding that students are adept in learning something they value. As Barton and Hamilton (2003) note, “Socially powerful institutions, such as education, tend to support dominant literacy practices. These dominant practices can be seen as part of whole discourse formations, institutionalized configurations of power and knowledge which are embodied in social relationships. Other vernacular literacies which exist in people’s everyday lives are less visible and less supported” (p. 12). When students’ “vernacular literacies” are supported, a climate is created that provides for enhanced meaning and favourable dispositions toward learning.

Finally, constructivist pedagogy cultivates cooperation and an ethic of social reciprocity. Cooperation is entirely at odds with and resists the competitive ethos, thus undermines the “winners versus losers” ideology of schools as sorting and selecting mechanisms (see: Bowles & Gintis, 1976; Chapman, 1988; Spring, 1989). In essence, constructivist pedagogy advances a “noncompetitive conviction that all people are equally and uniquely valuable, and have the same claim on respect of their fellows and the benefits of society” (Watt, 1994, p. 227).

CONDITIONS SUPPORTING INCLUSIVE PEDAGOGY

If schools are to make substantive progress toward authentic inclusion, the kind of inclusion that goes beyond the mere physical presence of students in classrooms, fundamental changes must take place in the instructional framework of those classrooms. For us, the active, continual engagement among students and teachers integral to constructivist pedagogy is essential for inclusive education to occur. Having made the case that constructivist pedagogy not only promotes, but is an essential element of inclusive schooling, we now turn the discussion to a far more difficult issue. How might the conditions supporting this kind of inclusive pedagogy be achieved?

The answer to this question poses a significant challenge because constructivism itself is not uncontroversial. As a conceptual and philosophical framework, constructivism involves, among other things, a shift in understanding away from knowledge as objective, and teaching as technical, to an understanding of knowledge as values-laden and teaching as a moral, therefore political, undertaking. Becoming a constructivist teacher thus requires a complete epistemological shift in one’s fundamental beliefs about the nature of knowledge and the act of teaching (Gallagher, 2004).

Moreover, such a shift inevitably requires a reckoning with the political ideologies that maintain the current instructional status quo. In recognizing this state of affairs, Purpel (1993) calls upon educators to “forge a moral vision” to confront the destructive ethos of traditional educational practices. This, he acknowledges, will not be easy and will require a political mobilization of the profession. “Teachers, as other educators,” he contends,

must confront some of the painful and anguishing dimension of current educational practice. They, as the rest of us, are caught up in a system in which individual achievement, competition, success, and aggressiveness are essential and central elements. It is a system in which education becomes an instrument in legitimizing and defining hierarchy; in which schools are a site where people are sorted, graded, classified, and labelled, hence giving credence to the tacit social value that dignity is to be earned. Teachers are asked to prepare students differently – some are to be given the encouragement and skills to be leaders, whereas others are taught to endure their indignities quietly and proudly. It is a system that helps sustain and legitimize a society revelling in consumerism, jingoism, hedonism, greed, and hierarchy. (p. 282)

In short, this means coming to terms with conflicts between educational ideas and ideals often thought to be compatible.

Efforts toward inclusive education cannot be sustained if educators continue to embrace the concept of ability as innate and normally distributed (see: Brantlinger, 2004; Davis, 1995). Nor can inclusion succeed within the framework of the medical model of disability and its attendant scientific models of remediation (Blomgren, 1993). Yet, as Giroux (1993) points out, confronting the ideologies that maintain educational hierarchy, competition, and stratification is increasingly difficult in the current political climate. Now, perhaps more than ever, the press is on to intensify efforts toward the technification of teaching in the interests of these ideologies. That notwithstanding, it is possible for educators to find their collective voice and “work together to transform our traditional commodifying and hierarchical educational structures” (Brantlinger, 2004, p. 497). Change is possible; but it first requires that educators become articulate how they want to teach, and why.

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David Skidmore & Deborah Gallagher

Wednesday, 17 August 2005

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