In This Project, I Intend to Study Teachers Practical Knowledge in Their Work with Pupils

May Line Tverbakk

SUMMARY

In this project, I intend to study teachers’ practical knowledge in their work with pupils’ reading skills at lower secondary schools in the subjects of Norwegian, Natural Sciences and Social Sciences. Given the research that has already been done and which I build my research on, I expect to find out something about the teachers’ reflections upon the expertise in the role; what they see as important, what kind of consciousness is prominent when reading in the different subjects, and in which ways there is a connection between teachers’ thinking about practice and the actual practice. Can there be traced any limits for deep learning in the reading practice, and in that case, where? With this project, I want to study which connections and discrepancies there are between the teachers’ intentions and practice, and pupils’ experience ofteachers’ adjustments.

The subject, Norwegian, has still a responsibility for the following basic language skills: oral, writing and reading (LK06, 2013:3). To look after this responsibility and contribute to create connections in pupils’ training in reading in all subjects, it is important to have an awareness of what this responsibility consists of for the teachers in Norwegian and for the teachers in the other subjects. This is also important for the organization of this work in teacher education. In the project, one dimension is to develop knowledge about boundaries which decide the practice in the classroom. Another dimension is to develop knowledge about how teachers’ thinking about the role and its influence in pupils’ literacy.

The interaction between teachers’ choice and adjustments of the reading-situations in the different subjects and pupils’ participation in and understanding of the work, which I describe as "the dynamic reading skill", are central. The current title of the project is: “How do teachers understand, practice and interpret their role as organizers of teaching reading, and which experience do pupils have?”To answer the question of this thesis, I have chosen to divide the project into three different problem areas:

-Subject teachers' thinking of their role as literacy teacher. What do subject teachers in the subjects of Norwegian, Natural Sciences and Social Sciences understand with the notion of “reading as fundamental skill”? What do they think about the role? What is involved in the role, and what kind of nuances is possible to see in these subjects?

-Subject teachers’ practice.What are the frames that decide practice? What are the choices anchored in the work methods, teaching aids, and how and when are the work methods adjusted? How are the knowledge and information about teaching processes carried out by the pupil, especially when the subject texts are read out loudly?

-The pupils’ experience of the organization.How do pupils understand the organization? In what ways and in what degrees do they think that the organization support their needs in the process to become functional readers in the subjects? What could increase their benefit?

The methods that are used will mainly be analyses of videos from teaching-sessions/ situations before and after interviews of teachers, and after interviews of pupils.

Source:

LK06. (2013). “Læreplan i norsk”. In: Læreplanverket for Kunnskapsløftet. Utdanningsdirektoratet. Download:23.02.2015 from