Classroom-cultural-shift: Implications for curriculum, socio-constructivism, and teaching

This dissertation is an attempt at analyzing the reciprocal interaction between meaning making and cultural environment. To this end an epistemological and curricular framework is proposed to explain the outcomes of learning in a changing classroom culture. Changes in the classroom culture cause cognitive changes and vice versa. These changes can be: (1) Conservative, in that values that characterize the culture do not change. (2) Non-conservative in the sense that values undergo some form of transformation, leading to changes in cultural elements, such as the forms of interaction, power relations, forms of presenting knowledge and so on. This kind of change is what is referred to as "classroom-cultural-shift" and is the focus of the dissertation.;In the shaping of the socio-constructivist epistemological framework based mainly on the Piagetian and Vygotskian thought, attention is drawn to three issues that may that elaborates socio-constructivist and curricular thinking These are: (1) The effectiveness of mixed power relations in the classroom in contrast with the purely egalitarian approach advocated by Piaget and the dominance of the 'more capable other' asserted by Vygotsky. (2) The influence of cultural values on the directions that members of the culture follow in pursuit of meaning making. (3) A "two-layered zone of proximal development" that links teacher and student development to common but student-initiated problematics.;An operational curriculum, labeled the "emergent curriculum of classroom-cultural-shift," is spawned by classroom-cultural-shift. This curriculum is formed in the two-layered zone of proximal development initiated by student interests and supported by teacher colleagues.;The data that support the shaping of the theoretical framework is drawn from a program for underrepresented freshman engineering students. This program employs small-group, cooperative-learning that concentrates on problem solving. Classroom-cultural-shift was not a norm in this program, but it did occur when two teachers attempted to pursue problematics raised and owned by the students. The data were collected by naturalistic enquiry methods. Classroom observations, and separate interviews with teachers and students served to 'triangulate' and 'member-check' the data recorded as field notes, video transcripts and audio transcripts.