The quest for high-level knowledge in schools: revisiting the concepts of classification and framing^**

Abstract

This article centres on the problem of raising the level of school knowledge, particularly science knowledge, for all. The article describes studies in science education developed in Portugal by Morais and Neves and collaborators. These studies are mainly based on Bernstein’s model of pedagogic discourse (PD), and on his theorisation on knowledge structures. The concepts of classification (power) and framing (control) are revisited to highlight their potential to characterise educational code modalities, through an extensive external language of description. Examples of instruments are presented in order to discuss the potential of using classification to analyse the status and the conceptual level of school knowledge (the what of PD) and also of using classification and framing to distinguish power and control relations between subjects, discourses and spaces (the how of PD), in educational texts/contexts. Educational code modalities which encourage school success are discussed in terms of their implications for greater equity.

Keywords:

• Knowledge
• classification
• framing
• code modalities
• conceptual demand
• science education

Acknowledgements

The authors wish to dedicate this particular article to the memory of Basil Bernstein, who gave to all of us the theoretical basis for sound research in education. The authors are grateful to Sílvia Ferreira for her comments on the manuscript and to Madeleine Arnot for providing editorial help for the English translation.

Notes

1. The ESSA Group is a research group of the Institute of Education, University of Lisbon.

2. According to Bernstein (1996), the external language of description is the means through which a theory (internal language of description) is activated, functioning as the interface between the empirical data and the concepts of the theory.

3. The pedagogic knowledge refers to knowledge related to teaching methods.

4. Indicators refer to parts of texts and contexts that may be separated for analysis purposes. In the case of curricula, the following indicators have been used: ‘Knowledge’; ‘Aims’; ‘Methodological guidelines’; and ‘Evaluation’. In the case of classroom contexts, indicators differ according to the specificity of the sociological characteristic to be analysed and may be grouped into macro and micro levels of the context under analysis.

5. A fact is constituted from ‘data that result from observation’ (Brandwein, Watson, and Blackwood 1958, 111), corresponding to a very concrete situation based on observations, as for example ‘the pure water boils at (or close to) 100 °C’ or ‘common salt dissolves in water whereas chalk does not’ (Millar, Tiberghien, and Maréchal 2002, 13).

A concept is a ‘mental construct; it is a grouping of the common elements or attitudes shared by certain objects and events’ (Brandwein et al. 1980, 12) and represents an idea that arises from the combination of several facts or other concepts. Simple concepts correspond to ‘concepts that have a low level of abstraction, defining attributes and examples that are observable’, as are the concepts of tree and insect, and complex concepts ‘are those that do not have perceptible instances or have relevant or defining attributes that are not perceptible’ (Cantu and Herron 1978, 135), as are the concepts of photosynthesis and cellular respiration.

Unifying themes are structural ideas and correspond, in science, to generalisations about the world that are accepted by scholars in each subject area (Pella and Voelker 1968), as is for instance the case of the theme ‘the living things interact with the environment, by changing matter and energy’.

Scientific theories, such as the cellular theory and the electromagnetism theory, correspond to explanations of a wide variety of related phenomena which were already submitted to a significant test (Duschl, Schweingruber, and Shouse 2007; Hickman, Roberts, and Larson 1995).

6. A balance should exist between simple and complex knowledge because no complex knowledge can be understood without the acquisition of the simple knowledge involved.

7. Substantive knowledge (associated with theory), also called declarative knowledge, corresponds to the knowledge of terms, facts, concepts and theories specific for a given discipline. Procedural knowledge (associated with practice) corresponds to the knowledge of how to do something, of techniques and methods specific to a given discipline, but also to the knowledge of scientific processes (Roberts, Gott, and Glaesser 2010).

8. See note 5.

9. In the particular case of this study, the empirical evidence of the situations analysed did not allow for a deeper discrimination.

10. Retrieval involves the activation and transfer of knowledge from permanent memory to working memory and it is either a matter of recognition or recall. Comprehension is responsible for translating knowledge into a form appropriate for storage in permanent memory. Analysis involves the production of new information that the individual can elaborate on the basis of the knowledge she/he has comprehended. The more complex level of the cognitive system – knowledge utilisation – implies the knowledge utilisation in concrete situations.

11. See, for example, Ferreira and Morais (2014), Morais and Neves (2001), Morais, Neves, and Pires (2004), Morais, Neves, and Afonso (2005), Neves and Morais (2001), Neves, Morais, and Afonso (2004) and Silva, Morais, and Neves (2013).

12. The characterisation of pedagogic practices using the instruments constructed was based on both audio (and in many cases video) taping, and its full transcriptions, and researchers’ observation.

13. A unit of analysis is an excerpt of the text with one or more periods which together have a particular semantic meaning (Gall, Gall, and Borg 2007).