School Didactics And Learning: a school Didactic Model Framing An Analysis of Pedagogical Implication of Learning Theory

Unterricht,
the Swedish word 
undervisning,
and the Finnish word 
opetus.
2. Fenstermacher and Soltis (1986, p. 38) conclude: “It makes no more sense to require learning in order to be teaching
than it does to require winning in order to be racing, or finding in order to be looking.”
3. The reason why Yrjönsuuri (1994) has reached another conclusion in his definition of teaching may be that he
problematizes teaching generally speaking while I limit my attention to the TSL process in institutionalized
education. In other respects we seem to represent quite similar positions in the way we understand the
pedagogical process. I especially appreciate the fact that Yrjönsuuri and Yrjönsuuri (1994) also emphasize the
learner’s intentional study process as a key-concept.
4. Hopmann (1992) has suggested that the word “didactics” should be written with a “k” also in English instead of
with a “c” following the German spelling, i.e. “Didaktik” instead of “didactics” in order to indicate the
continental tradition from which it stems. This spelling is however not used in this study. Instead it is hoped that
a renewed usage of the English word will gradually change the general sense and understanding of it.
5. Overviews of the contemporary traditions of didactics have been presented, for example, by Kansanen (1989,
1992, 1995a), Arfwedson (1995a, b) and Gundem (1980, 1991, 1992a, b). In German numerous overviews are
available, e.g. Menck (1975), Blankertz (1987), Adl-Amini and Künzli (1991), Knecht-vonMartial (1985) and
Jank and Meyer (1991). An investigation of the theory of science of didactics has been carried out by Knecht-
vonMartial (1986), see also Hopmann and Riquarts (1995).
6. “In ihrer weitesten Fassung kann Didaktik definiert werden als Wissenschaft vom Unterricht” (Schröder, 1992,
p. 60).
7. • die bildungstheoretische Didaktik im Rahmen kritisch-konstruktive Erziehungswissenschaft (Klafki);
• die lehrtheoretische Didaktik (Schulz);
• die kybernetisch-informationstheoretische Didaktik (v. Cube);
• die curriculare Didaktik (Möller);
• die kritisch-kommunikative Didaktik (Winkel).
8. In October 1991 an international symposium addressing the theme was arranged in Aarau, Switzerland. In 1992 a
symposium on this theme was arranged at the AERA conference in San Francisco (Hopmann, 1992). On October
5–8, 1993, the international symposium 
Didaktik and/or Curriculum
was arranged at the IPN at the Christian
Albrecht Universität Kiel by Dr. Stefan Hopmann and Dr. Kurt Riquarts, bringing together researchers from
North America, the Nordic countries, Britain, Germany and Switzerland. This symposium was followed up with
a conference in Oslo in August 1995.
9. Isberg (1994) has neatly summarized (in Swedish) a large body of recent relevant empirical research findings
which fall within research on teaching. Chapters 
2
, 
3
and 
4
of Isberg’s report are explicitly devoted to research
findings on the planning, carrying out and evaluation of teaching. A great many of these research findings could
well be included in the present study but are deliberately left out in order to avoid a too extensive report. For a
comparable overview see Arfwedson (1994b). I also refer to Wittrock’s (1986) 
Handbook on Research on
Teaching
for an overview of empirical findings.
10. Umriss pädagogischer Vorlesungen (1835), see Herbart (1993).
11. Vorlesungen über Pädagogik (1826), see Schleiermacher (1957).
12. Über die Möglichkeit einer allgemeinen pädagogischen Wissenschaft (1888), see Dilthey (1958).
13. “Erziehung kann beschrieben warden als eine Einwirkung auf die Individuelle Entfaltung der Person zur
Persönlichkeit. In dieser Definition wird sowohl der Prozess als auch das Ziel der Erziehung angesprochen. Der
Prozess der Erziehung wird gekennzeichnet als Einwirkung. Diese kann von Mitmenschen…, von sich selbst…,
aber auch von Kulturgütern, Werten u.ä. ausgehen.” (Schröder, 1992, p. 85)
14. In this view psychology has been considered a science and teaching an art (see e.g. Skinner, 1954).
15. I am grateful for discussions with Ference Marton on this topic in October 1993.
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SCHOOL DIDACTICS AND LEARNING

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3
A Model of School Didactics
FORMS, LEVELS AND CONTEXTS OF PEDAGOGICAL ACTIVITY
A very general model of human intentional activity, of which teaching and studying are examples, is
constituted by the concepts of intention, action and reflection. In teaching this is taken to mean (a) that
teaching activities are considered as intentional, (b) that these activities or the results of them must be
reflected upon in order to determine their pedagogical meaningfulness and (c) that the result of such
evaluative reflection normally affects the subsequent intentions. On a general level many researchers on
teaching and learning accept this point of departure (e.g. Bennett, Carré & Dunne, 1993; Bereiter &
Scardamalia, 1989; Gudmundsdottir & Shulman, 1987; Kansanen & Uusikylä, 1983; Kaufmann, 1966;
Klafki, 1994a; Kolb, 1984; Koskenniemi, 1968; Norman, 1980; Shulman, 1987; Winne & Marx, 1977).
This general position must therefore be specified in order to communicate the features of the model to be
advanced.
Pedagogical Intentionality
The view presented suggests that in order for something to be pedagogical it must be intentional in terms of
being goal-directed (Stenbäck, 1855). However, when mentioning the concept of intentionality, we must
make a distinction between its phenomenological use denoting the fundamental feature of the human mind
as always being directed towards something. Pedagogical intentions are always oriented towards something
considered meaningful in the pedagogical process (e.g. the student, context, content, resources, curriculum,
etc.). When we discuss teachers’ intentions in relation to a future or ongoing pedagogical process, it may be
valuable to try and determine the teacher’s type of purposiveness and degree of awareness.
Type of purposiveness refers to what the teacher is directed to in the pedagogical process. The type of
purposiveness may partly be understood in terms of the choices a teacher has to make before, during and
after a pedagogical situation. In making these decisions the teacher may be directed towards the goals, the
content, form of representation, instructional method, the students efforts to reach competence of some
kind, working methods used, resources available, organization, curriculum, different contexts and many
other things. However, the expression “type of purposiveness” is also related to notions like the teacher’s
personal view of education and knowledge, rights and obligations towards the individual and collective i.e.
ethical reasoning, view of mankind etc.
Given that teaching is a purposive activity in the above described sense, being directed to a variety of
factors of importance in the pedagogical situation we may ask about the extent to which the teacher is aware
of the content of his own awareness. This may be called degree of awareness. Degree of awareness means

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that individuals are not always equally aware of their own understanding as well as of their motives or
reasons for doing something. In other words this awareness varies. These two aspects, i.e. the type of
purposiveness and degree of awareness of pedagogically relevant questions, are fundamental features of the
teachers’ pedagogical intentionality.
However, as teaching is purposive in nature it also represents a kind of teleological activity. As teaching
thus includes some idea of a future state, the goals have a special role in pedagogical intentionality in
relation to other issues. This immediately calls to mind von Wright’s (1971) model of explaining intentional
acts by referring to an individual’s intentions. An intention is the internal aspect of an act and constitutes its
cause. This refers more or less equal to the conative dimension of activity. Consequently, in order to
understand instruction, we must have knowledge of these intentions, i.e. knowledge about what the teacher
intends to reach through their acts and why these acts are considered necessary (not only sufficient) in order
to reach what was intended (von Wright, 1985, pp. 51 ff.). An Aristotelian, teleological model of explaining
instructional activity is thus accepted as a fundamental point of departure. Intentionality as goal-
directedness may thus be considered as a special case of the phenomenological use referring to
intentionality as directedness in general. 
In this study I will not, however, discuss the different aspects constituting the concept of teachers’
pedagogical intentionality in greater detail or how this type of intentionality is related to the general
structure of human consciousness. I only emphasize that if one wants to structure teachers’ pedagogical
reflection, it is obviously necessary to relate the concept of intentionality to how the structure of
consciousness is understood (Uljens, 1995c).
The most fundamental reason why teaching requires evaluative reflection is that this activity as such does
not guarantee learning. Therefore pedagogical planning and teaching are rather meaningless without
evaluation. This being the case, every model, theory or paradigm of teaching must include these three
fundamental phases of the pedagogical process. However, a model aimed at structuring the pedagogical
process as a whole must simultaneously acknowledge the learners’ intentions. Only by acknowledging two
intentional subjects in the above mentioned sense may we understand the interactive nature of the
pedagogical process.
Levels of Pedagogical Activity
The second fundamental assumption accepted as a point of departure is that the pedagogical activities
indicated above may be planned, carried out and evaluated on different levels (Klafki, 1994b, pp. 35–36). We
can distinguish a collective level, an individual teacher level, an interactional level, and a student level.
The collective level may in turn be divided into a societal-national level, a community level, and a school
level (Dahllöf, 1967). There are also other ways of characterizing what is here identified as the collective
level. For example, Gundem (1993, p. 130) has divided the collective dimension of the curriculum level into
five levels: a national, regional, community, institutional, and classroom level. Leino (1985) again pays
attention not only to levels but to different constituents of the curriculum in discussing its levels. He
distinguishes between an ideal or intended curriculum, the official and written document, the curriculum as
realized by teaching materials and, finally, the curriculum as experienced by the students. We thus see that
all divisions of the collective level are relative; 
how
the collective level is structured must be understood in
relation to the actual culture. The only distinctions valid for every culture are: (a) the division between the
individual teacher’s intentional planning and the regulating collective frames or contextual factors, and (b)
the division between the individual teacher’s intentions and the interactional process carried out by teacher
and students together.
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SCHOOL DIDACTICS AND LEARNING

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The individual teacher level of the pedagogical planning refers to the individual teacher’s planning. Also
the fact that teachers’ planning itself can be temporally differentiated in various ways supports the idea of a
fundamental division between planning on a collective and on an individual teacher level. Teachers plan their
teaching in various temporal perspectives, from planning specific operations during a lesson to planning a
school year. For example, Clark and Yinger (1979) differentiate between eight different types of temporal
planning. In the present model the main distinction concerning teachers’ planning is laid on planning before
an educational situation and planning during the pedagogical process. This is not contradictory to Clark and
Yinger’s (1979) findings, quite the contrary, but it is again argued that as we are probably able to discern
teachers’ temporal planning in an even more detailed fashion than Clark and Yinger (1979), this road has no
end. It is considered more important to focus attention on the distinction already made between planning
before an educational process and during such a process. In making this distinction we also enhance the
possibility of handling the distinction between what is called individual teacher planning, and interactional
planning done by teachers and students together. Secondly, as this reality is complex, it is wise to pay
attention only to the main distinctions in a model comprising so many different aspects.
The interactional level of planning is constituted by the pedagogical meeting of at least two individuals, a
teacher and a student (learner). This level is different from the other two levels in that the pedagogical
activity is realized here. It is the kernel of pedagogical reality.
The individual Student level. When discussing how the curriculum is realized in the Finnish
comprehensive school, Uusikylä and Kansanen (1988) distinguish between three levels of the curriculum;
the curriculum made up in advance, the activities carried out to realize the curriculum and finally the
curriculum as experienced by students. This division is supported here. The only difference is that
concerning Uusikylä and Kansanen’s first point, planning in advance, the difference between collective
planning in advance and an individual teacher’s planning in advance is explicitly emphasized here. The
similarity between the present division and Uusikylä and Kansanen’s (1988) division is the emphasis on the
curriculum as experienced. In the present model it is considered relevant to point out this individual level as
the learner ultimately controls what is intended to be learned. According to this structure, the individual
teacher’s intentionality is in a mediating position between the collective curriculum and the students’
intentions.
However, even though the individual learner often is seen as responsible for how the curriculum is
realized, i.e. for what is learned, the learner has usually very limited freedom to plan and evaluate their own
study activities and success. Given this, the position taken in this study is that the learner is not made solely
responsible for the learning results. The teacher and the instructional system must share this responsibility
as they also have the right to decide upon the aims, content and evaluation of the TSL process.
We have thus identified different forms of pedagogical activity and different levels on which these
activities may take place. These two fundamental aspects of pedagogical reality, forms and levels of activity,
are illustrated in 
Fig. 3.1
.
The number of X’s in the figure indicates where the emphasis is laid on each of the four levels. On the
collective level the focus is on planning and evaluation. This level is only indirectly related to the TSL
process. Even though the ultimate responsibility of the planning for e.g. the Nordic comprehensive school
system may be seen as a formal responsibility, it is still on the collective level that the degrees of freedom
are spelled out.
The responsibility for the realization of the pedagogical process, on the other hand, is to be found on the
individual teacher level (on the level of pedagogical activity). Although the teacher is concerned with
planning and evaluation as well, i.e. with a kind of curricular work, these activities usually, though not
necessarily, take place within the boundaries specified on the collective level. 
Figure 3.1
shows that the
3. A MODEL OF SCHOOL DIDACTICS
43

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teacher’s freedom to plan is subordinated to the collective level but superordinated with respect to the
individual student’s interests. The same relation holds true for evaluation; the degrees of freedom for how
teachers should evaluate the process and results are explicated on the collective level while the individual
student is in a weak position with respect to the teacher.
On the other hand, with regard to the realization and carrying out of
FIG. 3.1. The forms and levels of pedagogical activity. Number of X’s indicates the emphasis on each different level.
Forms of activity
Levels of activity
Planning
Teaching-Studying-Learning in the Classrooms
Evaluation
Collective level
××××
×
××××
Individual teacher level
×××
××
×××
Interactional level
××
×××
××
Student level
×
××××
×
the pedagogical process, the collective level is weak for understandable reasons. The teacher has an
unquestionable role to play in this respect. The reason why the interactional level and the student level are
emphasized is naturally that this interaction 
is
the pedagogical process but also that the individual student is
the one ultimately doing the learning through intentional study activity.
One could thus say that teaching in the institutionalized school system must be understood both in
relation to the task every single teacher has been given by the community, and in relation to the individual
student’s needs and interests. This mediating role of the teacher is a specific landmark when discussing the
teacher’s work as a profession.
1
It is thought that the levels of pedagogical activity presented are consistent with Egglestone’s (1977) view
of how the curriculum is related to the teacher’s work. Egglestone distinguishes between a received
perspective on the curriculum, a reflexive perspective and a restructuring perspective. The received
perspective is handled by maintaining the distinction between the teacher’s and the community’s planning
in advance. The very same distinction enables us to discuss the reflexive perspective considering that
different teachers interpret the same document differently and have different ideas of how it may be realized.
Finally, the restructuring perspective is acknowledged by including the interactive and student level in the
model above. In other words, the present model offers a framework for understanding and analysing
different perspectives on how a collective curriculum is related to the pedagogical work in schools.
The third point of departure in the model to be developed is that the TSL process in a school is to be
understood in relation to the cultural and historical context in which it exists and which it partly constitutes.
This will be discussed in more detail in the next section.
A SCHOOL DIDACTIC MODEL
Having actualized the three different assumptions indicated earlier (forms of activity, levels of activity and
contexts of pedagogical activity), we are ready to introduce a model that is thought to reflect the main ideas
of the school didactic model I want to put forth.
2
The following presentation refers to the visual model in
Fig. 3.2
.
The reasons for identifying the model as a school didactic model have been touched upon previously but
will be explained in detail later in this chapter.
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SCHOOL DIDACTICS AND LEARNING

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The figure consists of four main components. They refer, respectively, to the planning, realization and
evaluation of the pedagogical process, as well as to the contexts providing the framework for the
pedagogical activity. The model thus identifies the constitutive elements of the teachers’ pedagogical work
(planning, teaching and evaluation). Concerning the context, a major distinction is the one between the
school as context and the local society as context for the pedagogical work.
Before a more detailed discussion of the model the following points should be noted:
FIG. 3.2. The levels and forms of pedagogical activity in terms of a reflective model of school didactics.
3. A MODEL OF SCHOOL DIDACTICS
45

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1. Intentionality is a key concept in the model. The model acknowledges both the learner and teacher as
intentionally acting and reflecting subjects. Only by accepting two authentically acting, intentional
subjects makes it possible to discuss pedagogical