“Liberty to do it our way”: Exploring contested discourse and educational spaces with fifth graders

• Main Author: Vander Zanden, Sarah
• Format: Dissertation
• Language: English
• Published: ProQuest Dissertations & Theses 01.01.2011
• Subjects: Curriculum development; Educational Change; Educational Policy; Elementary education; Elementary school students; Grade 1; Grade 5; Grade 6; Language arts; Pedagogy; Perceptions; Public schools; Standardized Tests; Student Surveys; Teaching Methods
• ISBN: 9781124662541; 1124662545

Pressure to standardize curriculum, assessment, and instruction is rapidly whittling perceptions of what counts as literacy in public schools. Educators risk fostering compliance and cementing preconceived categorization of students, rather than critical thinking when orderliness supersedes deep thinking and negotiation. Research on space, discourse studies, and critical sociocultural studies frame this investigation of how discourse is co-constructed in contested educational spaces. My questions are: How do discourses of categorization and compliance become normalized in a public elementary school? What happens when discourses of categorization and compliance are interrupted? How do students in mixed ability inquiry groups co-construct educational spaces in an alternative, multimodal, literacy curriculum? What are the structures and related ideologies, such as policies and beliefs about authority, in one elementary school that shape or constrain students' school experiences? Using ethnographic and practitioner inquiry research methodologies, student knowledge about the ways in which discourses and educational spaces shape their educational experiences is foregrounded. Immersed in an urban elementary school with rigid structural procedures, I facilitated student-negotiated literacy inquiry projects with fifth graders. Our projects highlight the complex strategies students use to perform in contested educational spaces. I assert that cultivating flexible spaces for literacy and a range of participation opportunities is necessary for democratic schooling. Heightened attention to the possibilities for talk in school spaces enables educators to co-construct spaces for inquiry. Additionally, renewed awareness of the impossibility in applying one 'right' approach for literacy engagement or school trajectory demands thoughtful implementation of educational policies in schools.