Mid Sweden University

Since the beginning of the 1990‘s, Swedish parents have had the possibility of choosing schools for their children freely by taking publicly funded school vouchers to the chosen school. At the same time free schools started to develop, competing for the pupils and the school vouchers. Even though the free schools are a part of the school system, obligated to follow the same laws and curricula as the public schools, they describe themselves as something else, something “outside the system inside the system”.The aim of the paper is to identify, analyse and discuss the different communicative strategies of inclusion/exclusion in the educational system that are used in the self-descriptions of the free schools. The paper is theoretically and methodologically informed by Luhmann’s social theory, which allows to study how social systems (the free schools)describe – and establish – themselves in relation to other systems and society.The data for the study is based on official information that can be found on the three largest free schools‘ websites including introductions, welcoming words, presentation of the staff,teacher recruitment sites, statistics etc etc.The data is analysed using Luhmann inspired semantic-analysis which allows to study and discuss how meaning is made inside social systems. It will be discussed and compared how the different free schools describe themselves on the one hand as legitimate and worthy parts of the Swedish educational system at the same time as they – for reasons of competition and marketing – describe themselves as different from the public schools.

This paper is part of a larger ongoing study which is conducted in a mid-sized Swedish municipality where the students results lie behind the national average and lower than theirsocio-economic background would implicate. This makes the municipality in question quiteunique and the general question is, what makes this municipality so special, what are thereasons behind the deviant results? Earlier attempts to identify and eliminate causes have notyet been successful, maybe because they have been aiming at areas of development in a toogeneral way, such as leadership, study environments or student health.The study which is presented in this paper has the aim to identify more specific andcomplimentary areas of development and improvement to the above mentioned.This will be done by using an inductive research strategy with teachers as informants whohave moved to the municipality during the last two years with prior teaching experiencesfrom other municipalities. (School education is organized by the municipalities in Sweden.The local “school systems” can differ quite a lot, structurally and pedagogically.) Theseteachers are due to their professional history capable of comparing different municipalities,they contribute to the research with inductive comparisons. The study will be able to add apractitioners perspective to school development and improvement work. Structural andorganizational aspects are completed by practical ones. The research is conducted usingletter writing, interviews and focus groups. The paper will include a discussion ofmethodological and data collection challenges and how they could be addressed.

The aim of this study is to investigate discipline in German and Swedish classrooms and describe its cultural contexts. In countries with compulsory education, it must be assumed that not all students voluntarily attend classes. The mandatory presence of students combined with the ban on corporal punishment in schools means that classroom interaction has to be organized according to certain manners and rules which are understood here as discipline, meaning the organization and control of individuals and their actions over space and time. This study assumes similarities in the fundamental disciplinary mechanisms, although different contexts will create different concrete manifestations of the phenomenon.

Since the observation of cultural contexts is not as self-evident and direct as the observation of classroom interactions of teachers and students, the theoretical considerations here include a detailed discussion of methodology for observing culture. Starting with Alfred Schütz’ concept of ideal types and Niklas Luhmann’s theory on mass media, it is argued that culture can be observed through the products of mass media. The empirical data for this study therefore consists of classroom observations in Germany and Sweden as well as the examination of German and Swedish films and television series.

Comparing and combining the results from classroom and film/tv observations using the construction of different ideal types allowed conclusions to be made about correlations between disciplinary order and whether a teacher is considered “good” or “bad”. This review of the various types of order is the basis for the description of cultural contexts.

Keywords: classroom discipline, Sweden, Germany, film and television.

Themes from the call for papers that might fit:

(1) Innovative Research Methods

(2) Curriculum

Schools' legitimation as institutions can no longer be explained by the distribution of knowledge, but by the way knowledge is distributed. Aspects of classroom management and discipline is more and more getting into focus of educational research and teacher education. In many countries two ways of organizing teachers' work exist: class teacher on the one hand and subject teachers on the other. Even though this is a common phenomenon, the existing research literature on the subject is very limited.

In this paper it will be analysed and discussed to what extent class teachers' and subject teachers' classroom management and communication strategies differ. This paper's empirical data consists of classroom observations following two class teachers and two subject teachers in southern Germany. All teachers work at lower secondary types of schools where either subject teachers or class teachers dominate.

The two types of teachers have different educational and historic backgrounds, e. g. subject teachers have a long tradition of academic education, stemming from a grammar school tradition. Class teachers only recently became part of universitary education and go back to an elementary school tradition.

The amount of empirical data in this study is limited and must therefore be seen as exploratory and as starting point for further, more extensive research. The analytical approach in this study is based on a model for constructing empirically founded, multidimensional typologies (Kelle & Kluge, 2010)⁠ which answers to the study's mentioned shortcomings in empirical data and theoretical preconceptions. This model implements both inductive and deductive elements and permits theorizing based on relatively limited amount of empirical data. Aspects of subject respectively class teachers' role in the class, their relations to subject, profession and pupils as it appears in everyday classroom work will be analysed. Aim of this paper is to discuss and open for further research about in how far the differences between classroom and subject teachers are significant enough that they can be described as two different professions.

Literature

Kelle, Udo, & Kluge, Susanne. (2010). Vom Einzelfall zum Typus : Fallvergleich und Fallkontrastierung in der qualitativen Sozialforschung. Wiesbaden: VS, Verlag für Sozialwissenschaften.

The aim of this paper is to describe which types of order can be found in observations in Swedish and German classrooms and to discuss what effects these implicate for the work of teachers. Schooling on the one hand is a global phenomenon and the classroom is usually seen as an integrated part of it. School systems on the other hand are nationally different. Therefore it isinteresting to investigate whether, and to what extent, differences can be found in the classroom orders in different countries.

The concept of disciplinary order as formulated in Michel Foucault's book "Discipline and Punish" is the main theoretical framework of this study. Based on this concept an ideal type of "disciplinary classroom order" is formulated. This ideal type is the analytical starting point for constructing and describing different types of classroom order based on classroom observations. The study is based on participant classroom observations, following German upper secondary school teachers and Swedish compulsory school teachers during their work week and in their classrooms.

The results of these studies show that there can be found two different, and in many ways opposing, types of classroom order in the Swedish examples, whereas only one in the German.

In the German examples, the classroom is the unquestioned centre for teaching and learning activities at school; teachers and pupils are exclusively inside the classroom where teacher centred whole-class lessons are carried out. During the lessons the German classrooms are quite closed and the pupils are static on their places. In the Swedish classroom observations this type of order can be found as well, but there it alternates with another almost opposite type of order where pupils are studying individually with the teacher as supervisor or mentor. The classroom is one of many places for these activities and is therefore much more open for teachers and pupils during the lessons.

It will be discussed what possibilities and risks are carried along by either focusing on one type or shifting between different types of classroom order and what demands are put on the teacher in those different environments.

The aim of this study is to investigate discipline in German and Swedishclassrooms and describe its cultural contexts. In countries with compulsory educa-tion, it must be assumed that not all students voluntarily attend classes. The man-datory presence of students combined with the ban on corporal punishment inschools means that classroom interaction has to be organized according to certainmanners and rules (Luhmann, 2002a:108a). These rules are understood here as dis-cipline meaning the organization and control of individuals and their actions overspace and time (Foucault, 1987/1975). This study assumes similarities in the funda-mental disciplinary mechanisms, although different contexts (here Germany andSweden) will create different concrete manifestations of the phenomenon. Since theobservation of cultural contexts is not as self-evident and direct as the observationof classroom interactions of teachers and students, the theoretical considerationshere include a detailed discussion of methodology for observing culture. Startingwith Alfred Schütz’ concept of ideal types and Niklas Luhmann’s theory on massmedia, it is argued that culture can be observed through the products of mass me-dia. The empirical data for this study consists of field studies in the form of obser -vations in German and Swedish classrooms as well as the examination of Germanand Swedish films and television series about teachers and students. The classroomobservations were used to create ideal typical descriptions of different implementa-tions of disciplinary procedure. Based on the analysis of teacher figures in variousGerman and Swedish films and television series, several “good” and “bad” teachertypes were initially identified. Combining the two results allowed conclusions tobe made about correlations between disciplinary order and whether a teacher isconsidered “good” or “bad”. This review of the various types of order is the basisfor the description of cultural contexts. The results of classroom observations andfilm studies and their discussion in relation to prior Swedish research, gives thepicture of a cultural context in which various forms of classroom order are avail-able, in which they are critically discussed and also can exist in parallel to each oth-er. On the other hand, the German context seems to allow only one form ofclassroom order, both in actual school operations as well as in the mass media rep -resentation and scientific reflection.

Schools' legitimation as institutions can no longer be explained by the distribution of knowledge, but by the way knowledge is distributed.Aspects of classroom management and discipline is more and more getting into focus of educational research and teacher education. In many countries two ways of organizing teachers' work exist: class teacher on the one hand and subject teachers on the other. Even though this is a common phenomenon, the existing research literature on the subject is very limited.

In this paper it will be analysed and discussedto what extentclass teachers' and subject teachers' classroom management and communication strategies differ. This paper's empirical data consists of classroom observations following two class teachers and two subject teachers in southern Germany. All teachers work at lower secondary types of schools where either subject teachers or class teachers dominate. The two professions have different educational and historic backgrounds, e. g. subject teachers have a long tradition of academic education, stemming from a grammar school tradition. Class teachers only recently became part ofuniversitary education and go back to an elementary school tradition.

The amount of empirical data in this study is limited and must therefore be seen as exploratory and as starting point for further, more extensive research.The analytical approach in this study is based on a model forconstructing empirically founded, multidimensional typologies which answers to the study's mentioned shortcomings in empirical data and theoretical preconceptions(Kelle & Kluge, 2010)⁠. This model implements both inductive and deductive elements and permits theorizing based on relatively limited amount of empirical data. Aspects of subject respectively class teachers' role in the class, their relations to subject, profession and pupils as it appears in everyday classroom work will be analyzed.