ERIC Number: EJ1178205
Record Type: Journal
Publication Date: 2018
Pages: 15
Abstractor: As Provided
ISBN: N/A
ISSN: ISSN-0268-0939
EISSN: N/A
Nuancing the Critique of Commercialisation in Schools: Recognising Teacher Agency
Journal of Education Policy, v33 n5 p617-631 2018
This paper investigates the commercialisation of Social and Emotional Learning (SEL) in Australian schools. Specifically, it focuses on understanding why teachers value commercial resources, and how they enact these in their classrooms. Theorising around teacher agency suggests teachers are now choosing to use a range of commercial resources and view these as important additions to their pedagogical toolbox. Teachers want high quality resources, and they prefer resources that are easy to import, scaffold and modify according to their specific needs. Teachers did not readily see the benefit of a prescriptive SEL program. Instead, they wanted multiple resources that they could pick and choose the best bits from. Our data suggests that teachers are not being seduced by commercialisation and the 'easy fix' it promises, but are in fact presenting as agentic professionals who care deeply about students' social and emotional wellbeing and are working to tailor bespoke learning experiences to meet the needs of their students within their specific school contexts. We argue that it is worth nuancing the critique about commercialisation offered in the literature to date, and suggest that commercialisation is not inherently bad, rather it is the 'intensity' of commercialisation that needs to be regulated and further investigated.
Descriptors: Criticism, Educational Policy, Commercialization, Social Development, Emotional Development, Teacher Attitudes, Teaching Methods, Educational Quality, Educational Resources, Scaffolding (Teaching Technique), Professional Autonomy, Well Being, Student Needs, Learning Experience, Foreign Countries
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Publication Type: Journal Articles; Reports - Research
Education Level: N/A
Audience: N/A
Language: English
Sponsor: N/A
Authoring Institution: N/A
Identifiers - Location: Australia
Grant or Contract Numbers: N/A