the curriculum as contested narrative by paul prinsloo

The curriculum as contested narrative

By Paul Prinsloo

Some see Service learning as…

In this paper, we will explore…

•The context of Service-learning.

• The curriculum as emerging narrative of/for the future.

• Learning as negotiating/negotiated narratives.

Different angles to Service-learning

Learning theories

• Experiental learning

• Situated cognition

• Apprenticeship learning

Higher education

• The ivory tower

• Applying theory to practice

• Community service

Market demands

• Skills

• Graduates should land on their feet

• Commercialisation

Government

• Skills shortages

• Through-put concerns

• Unemployed graduates

Students

• Need for work experience

• Unemployed graduates

• Un-prepared…

Seems like a good idea, but…

• How do you prevent Service-learning to be an add-on?

• Where do you find employer-partners for 14 000 Economics 101 students in an ODL institution?

• How do you prevent them becoming cheap labor?

• How do you address the high expectations – of the market, the students, the government, Higher education?

• At present there is very little in the curriculum of Economics 101 that students will be able to apply…

• Outstanding credits and the through-put rate – all dressed up and nowhere to go…

• Practice does not make perfect (Britzman)

• Requires a team approach to curriculum development – power-games

• If it does not carry any credits – why will they do it?

Feeling sheepish about Service-learning?

A possible way forward…

Learning as negotiating/ negotiated narratives

• Enactivism

• Participatory networks of learning

• Seven layers of engagement…

• Four ways of coming to know

The curriculum as emerging narrative of/ for the future

• Planning for impact

• Kellogg’s Model meet Activity theory

The curriculum as contested space…

The market• Skills.

• Performativity.

• Consumption.

• Neo-capitalism.

The government

• National imperatives.

• Agents of capital.

• The end of the welfare state.

The academy• The death of theory.

• The survival of the discipline.

• Certification.

• Standardisation.

• The market as master.

Actions

Problems

Contexts

Roles

Tools

Rules

Stakeholders

SelfPeers

Texts

IMPACT

…a transitional, emergent, temporal space in which learners have integrated, authentic, multidimensional learning-experiences. A curriculum results in the transformation of the individual and society.

A curriculum flows from, perpetuates and results in socioeconomic and political belief-systems and structures.

The curriculum as…

The curriculum as…

1. An occasioned, noisy agora.

2. A dynamic, interdependent and interrelated system within systems.

3. Multilayered and multi-dimensional spaces for engagement.

The curriculum as…

1. An occasioned, noisy agora

Learning cannot be caused but can be occasioned.

• Not all learning I plan for, will happen…

• Some of the learning I plan for may happen…

• There is also learning I did not plan for …

2. A dynamic, interdependent and interrelated system within systems

The group of learners as systems within a system within a system – interrelated, interdependent.

• Change in one…

• Different loci of control.

• Learners-in-relationships-in-contexts.

3. Multilayered and multidimensional, transitional space for engagement.

• Participative networks of learning in context.

• Not Moses coming from the mountain…

but as negotiated and negotiating narratives.

“coming to know” is the result of participative networks of action in which the identity of the learner and the environment co-emerge “in enactments of cognition.

(Varela, Thompson and Rosch 1991)

Dynamic ecologies of learning where…

Such a curriculum results in…

Enactivism in a nutshell

• The relationship between an entity and its surroundings.

• Within these dynamic relationships and interactions, ->autopoeisis.

• These continuous changes in the entity to stimulation from its surroundings = learning.

• Constant modification of the entity’s structure.

• The entity and its context continuously co-emerge.

Towards an ecology of learning…

Learner

Him or herself

Peers

Textsresources

Facilitatorsof

learning

CommunityInstitution

Discourse

Conceptual

Practical

Perceptual

Affective

Four ways of coming to know…

An ecology of learning…

Learner

Him or herself

Peers

Textsresources

Facilitatorsof

learning

CommunityInstitution

Discourse

Teaching as banking education

Educator

Learner

Aim: A fulfilled individual, e.g.Obedient civil servantsSkillful technicians

Manager’s story

Other manager’s stories

Academic concepts and theory

Negotiated narrative

Group learning

Negotiating/negotiated narratives

Adopted from Watson 2001:388)

An ecology of learning…

Learner

Him or herself

Peers

Textsresources

Facilitatorsof

learning

CommunityInstitution

Discourse

Paul Prinsloo

Institute for Curriculum and Learning Development (ICLD)

TVW 04-069, Unisa

prinsp@unisa.ac.za

+27 12 429 3683

+27 82 3954 113

Thank you.