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

does
accept that the teacher works 
for
a collective and does not put the teacher
above this collective concerning the choice of goals to be realized in the schools. But when he gives the
teacher the right to criticize the collective goals he also suggests 
what
position the teacher should take in his
criticism. Klafki (1985, p. 256) writes:
The general definition of an instructional goal can here be seen in the fact of helping learners to
develop their capacity for self-determination and solidarity, one element of which is capacity for co-
determination. Self-determination and solidarity include, as constitutive element, rational capacity for
discourse, that is, ability to justify and reflect, for developed emotionality and for ability to act, that
is, ability to influence actively one’s own relationships with natural and social reality in terms of
reasoned goalsetting.
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As distinct from the school didactic model, Klafki suggests which values should be guiding ones. The
school didactic model advocated in this study leaves the question of what the guiding values should be open
to the teacher. That this question is left open means that teachers are explicitly required to take a stand; as
critical and independent intellectuals, they must themselves decide what position should be taken with
regard to value-related questions. The present school didactic model may hopefully function as a thought
model or as an instrument in this process, but it does not suggest any solutions (see the later text on
descriptive models).
Wolfgang Klafki has presented his thoughts in the form of a scheme for instructional planning
(
Perspektivenschema zur Unterrichtsplanung,
1985, p. 215; 1991, p. 30). This model is very
comprehensive. It is difficult to find anything connected with teaching and learning that would not be
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SCHOOL DIDACTICS AND LEARNING

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included in the model. Here it differs from the present model, which is limited to understanding the TSL
process in the institutionalized school.
Functionally the use of that scheme and the present model are identical; and they are thought to be used
in the same manner. They do not offer checklists for teachers’ planning, rather they are what Klafki calls
Problematisierungsraster,
instruments to investigate educational practice. In other words the model is
helpful in making different aspects of this reality visible by asking certain questions. Phenomenologically we
may talk of using didactics to structure our pre-scientific pedagogical experiences. The theory may thus help
us to specify our noematic aspect of the pedagogical object of our consciousness (Uljens, 1995c).
The process through which a teacher makes a didactic conceptual system his own personal property
reminds us of the dialectic relation offered by Klafki’s 
Kategoriale Bildung
. In this process, the theory of
didactics as a conceptual system may remain unchanged; it may be experienced again. To express it
differently, one may construct one’s experiences a second time with the help of the model. But it is also
possible to claim that the teacher’s original pedagogical experience remains to some extent unchanged. The
evidence for this is that the teacher may change their understanding of the pedagogical reality; a theory used
for organizing one’s experiences may be abandoned after having been accepted for a while. What makes
this possible is the individual’s ability to relate an original experience to the new conceptual system. This is
one of the main roles educational theory can have for the teacher.
However, even though we may identify a kind of functional similarity between the models, the difference
is, as mentioned, a difference concerning normativity. The present model is to be understood as an analytical
tool to be used by the teacher (a thought model) as well as to function as a research model. The teacher in
his turn decides what values should be realized.
Like Klafki’s (1985), the model presented in this study does not discriminate between didactics in the
narrow and the wide sense. The choice of goals and contents, as well as the choice of methods and forms of
representation, are questions to be considered in relation to each other. Yet the intentionality concerning
goals is given a more important role compared with the other dimensions. Thus Klafki’s position concerning
the primacy of goal decisions is supported. In fact the structure of the present model conceives of
intentionality on the individual and on the collective level as a fundamental concept. This means that even
though an interdependent relation between the goals, content, methods and media is accepted, the goal of
the pedagogical activity is of fundamental importance.
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However, the school didactic model presented in this study does not comprise curriculum theory; it is
more limited in its approach. Although it is not always easy to clarify how curriculum theory should be
defined, it may suffice to say that the present model takes the teachers’ perspective into account in
investigating institutionalized education.
A final difference is that the school didactic model emphasizes the evaluative phase of teaching. The
result of the TSL process is considered important, since teaching cannot guarantee that learning will occur.
This is a fundamental reason why the evaluative phase must be included in a model emphasizing teaching
and studying as intentional activities.
THE BERLIN MODEL
The school didactic model will be briefly compared with the so-called Berlin model of didactics developed
by Paul Heimann and later by Wolfgang Schulz (Heimann, 1962, 1976; Schulz, 1980, 1991). When I speak
of the Berlin model, I refer primarily to Paul Heimann’s