Creative and performativity practices in primary schools: a Foucauldian perspective

A number of policy texts are present in educational settings at any one time and each influences the power and significance of others. Policy discourses are one of the main means whereby policy texts, in the settings in which they operate, influence the value, the implementation and the embedding of those policies. However, a number of discourses operate at the same time in any given context and they also they influence the interpretation and implementation of them through the way in which practitioners manage policy processes. This research focuses on two such discourses in education, that of performativity and creativity and investigates how primary teachers manage these policies and how they are influenced by them

Institutional embrace and the postmodern professional

The post-modern teacher is one that has been fashioned over the last 20 year. S/he belongs to a 'greedy institution' in which teachers embrace its values and reproduce them as well as adding value by contributing to a continuous reinvention of it. Their professional identity is now one that is isomorphic with the school, one in which status and professional expertise are bound up with the image of the institution in the glo-na-cal environment of global, national and local. Web sites proclaim the character of the school but also celebrate their local status while national league tables pin point their level of achievement locally and nationally. Their global responsibility is mirrored in their commitment to raising achievement for the labour market and the national economy. The post-modern professional teacher is now a total teacher taking on everything and anything that policy demands as well as their own interests and values, for example contrasting performative and creative pedagogies. The commitment of the postmodern professional has been gained through the development of team work and collaboration, the necessity to improve performative targets and the survival of their institution in a market orientated environment. Economic imperatives drive education policy and they now include creative and entrepreneurialist market approaches, team cultures and a discourse of performativity. The Total Teacher has to ensure the raising of achievement by reaching targets based on external testing, support the institution in maintaining its market position and status, use team strategies and develop creative learners. This paper examines the life of the total professional who plays a major role in the development of the embracing institution

Creative and Performativity Policies in Primary Schools

Primary schools face a new situation, one in which policies promoting creativity no longer have to be fought for but are being promoted at government and national educational level alongside policies that focus on the assessment of school performance in inspections and national tests and encourage target setting. We sought to ascertain how these policy discourses, the contents of which have been perceived as conflicting (Jeffrey and Woods 1998), were affecting primary school management, teachers and learners. In this climate of accountability schools appeared to embrace performance and act innovatively and creatively. Our professional primary school teachers were team players who contributed to the presentation of the school as a unified, creative, inclusive and effective managerial organisation. The merging of the two policies was not pervasive across schools or within schools but there were some examples involving cross-curricular projects. More prominent was a ‘bolt on’ activity of creative teaching and learning such as special creative curriculum weeks or days. Schools found it necessary to ensure success in national tests by institutionalising lengthy SATS preparation for, in some cases, the whole of the Spring term. However, performativity as a progression from one achievement to the next was valued. Teachers, learners and parents considered it beneficial to have information about levels because, in a spirit of openness, all knew what to expect. Professional Identities The stress levels found in the 1990s, (Menter, Muschamp et al. 1997; Osborn, McNess et al. 2000; Troman and Woods 2001) appear to have dissipated along with any resistance from teachers who appeared to be more focused on coping strategies such as team building and appropriating testing and target setting for their own professional benefit. The performativity imperatives were internalised and sometimes generated guilt if they were unrealised but teachers sought to ameliorate these tensions or to resolve them. Where resolution was not possible they accepted the tension and lived with it, (Jones, Pickard et al. 2008) facing daily dilemmas, tensions and constraints but acting creatively with colleagues to manipulate the situation. Conclusion The creativity and performativity policies were integrated at an organisational level through the construction of a school culture of performance and institutional positioning in an open market but less integrated at the level of pedagogy. Where the merging of the two pedagogies did take place – as in 'smart teaching' - teaching creatively was the preferred form over teaching for creativity. The progression narrative was a major feature around which curriculum and pedagogies were organised but where external performativity dominated such as national testing creative teaching was marginalised to ‘bolt on’ fun time slots

The effects of restructuring on primary teachers' work : a sociological analysis

Whatever the exact form the restructuring of education systems takes, it means a fundamental re-definition of the work of teaching. In the restructuring process not only does the nature of work change but also school organisation and teacher culture. This study seeks to understand the teachers' experience of work in the restructured school. Restructuring is considered at three levels: 1) a cross-national and educational system macro-level; 2) a school organisation meso-level; and 3) an interpersonal and personal micro-level. The prime orientation is to explore ~he impact of a range of restructuring policies in these various sites and to describe and analyse the changes which have taken place in teachers' work. This is done through the use of qualitative data which are derived from original ethnographic research in a primary school. The aim here, using an interpretive approach, is to understand the effects of restructuring through the experiences and perspectives of the headteacher and teachers and to discover the meanings which they hold for the changes. These, it is argued, are of significance for the teachers' sense of self and their experience of roles. The social processes attending the restructuring of teachers' work are viewed through three analytical frameworks - symbolic interactionist theory, intensification theory and policy trajectory theory. The data generated facilitated the 'grounding' of the policy process and provided a test in new circumstances for the intensification thesis. The study concludes that the implementation of policy did not involve a simple linear and mechanical process. Policy was implemented according to actors' interpretations and motivations and resistance, as much as compliance, was a feature of the teachers' responses. With respect to theories of deprofessionalisation and intensification it was found that while many aspects of the teachers' work were contributing to intensification, the experience of intensified work was, in some cases, resulting in the teachers experiencing enhanced professionalism rather than becoming deprofessionalised

Processes of typification and allocation in a 9-13 middle school.

This study is concerned with three related issues, the ideology and practice of middle schools, the perceptions middle school teachers have of their pupils and the allocation of their pupils to subject sets. The account provided is ethnographic in nature, although case study data are supplemented by evidence derived from repertory grid technique and large scale surveys. The ideology of middle schooling is contrasted with the reality of life in 9-13 middle schools, as indicated by data derived from large scale surveys and previous ethnographic studies. The development of Midway, the case study school, from a secondary modern school to a middle school is described. This development is then related to the perceptions held by the present staff of the school. Teacher constructs and the teachers' perceptions of their pupils are located in teacher biography and different traditions of schooling. These teacher perspectives are in turn related to the allocation process in which first year pupils are allocated to ability groups (sets) for Mathematics. The findings of this study are, firstly, that there is a gulf between the ideology and practice of middle schooling, which is revealed by the internal organisation of the 9-13 middle school: this does not reflect egalitarian concerns, but rather provides for the early selection of pupils for different routes through schooling, secondly, that this selection is found to take place at an early stage, and, thirdly, that teachers' perceptions of their pupils are highly influential in this process

The impact of New Labour's educational policy on primary schools

About the book: Michael Fielding looks at what the Labour Government has achieved in the last four years with its policy of 'education, education, education'. There has been widespread disappointment in New Labour's education policies, which on the whole have not steered too far wide of those put in place by Margaret Thatcher, including issues of marketisation, testing and performativity. Michael Fielding has called on the key policy thinkers in education to offer their opinions on what has happened in education over the first three to four years of the New Labour Government. Education policy is a controversial subject and with a General Election expected within the next few months, this book will be read widely by people within education, politicians and journalists and by others anxious to get to facts and avoid the spin. The subject matter and the presence of so many high profile educationalists make this an essential read