Investigating rule-based competencies in teaching
Jukka Husu & Riikkalotta Toivonen
Department of Applied Sciences of Education/
Centre for Research on Teaching (CRT)
University of Helsinki
Finland
Paper presented at the 11th Biennial Conference of the European Association for Research on
Learning and Instruction (EARLI) in symposium
Moral Competence and teachers’ behaviour,
August 23–27, 2005, Nicosia, Cyprus.
Rule-based competence in teaching implies that teachers rely on
rules, and therefore the rules are justified, because their values are proven
and therefore approved. Teachers think, both implicitly and explicitly, that
their rules of practice work. And because they work, teachers apply the rules
accordingly. Rules structure how teachers see their professional tasks,
possibilities, and limits. By locating events in a system of teacher
knowledge, rules define what teachers perceive as ‘real’ and important. This
study aims to clarify 1) what is the content of rule-based competency in
teachers’ knowledge?, and 2) how teachers’ rule-based competency
functions in teaching situations? Within this task, the study tries to combine
moral competence with action competence in the teacher knowledge
framework. In order to analyze their use and function, this study employs
the concepts of recognition rules and realization rules. The aim was to
investigate how the rules the teachers reported (recognition rules) were put
into practice in their teaching (realization rules). By distinguishing among
different kinds of rule-governed practices may help teachers to respond in
ways that recognize and realize both their personal and professional needs
and those of their pupils in classrooms.
ABSTARCT
1. Introduction
Educators are called upon to mediate many private and public interests that pertain to
personal, professional, organizational, and societal values. This plurality of
understandings is an integral part of the teaching profession. It is one of the teachers’
professional tasks to discern how the competing interests can be served practically.
The purpose of this study is to shift focus on the scene where the conditions and
contingencies of these competences may be found. This means by exploring day-to-day
details of pedagogical encounters to see what they might offer in putting forth an
understanding of teachers’ moral competence in concert with their pedagogical action
competence. To explore this idea necessitates interpreting teaching encounters for the
way they promote or prohibit conditions for competent professional action.
This study investigates teachers’ professional action as a rule-governed action
(cf. e. g. Elbaz, 1983; Boostrom, 1991; Jordan et al.,1995; Kansanen et al., 2000;
Weber, 2002). The stance presupposes that rules are not merely teachers’ instrumental
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tools, but rather that they are structures of meaning used by teachers to make sense of
their professional world. This study aims to clarify
1) What is the content of rule-based competency in teachers’ knowledge?
2) How teachers’ rule-based competency functions in teaching situations?
This study aim is to shift from individuals to social practices of teaching in
which both teachers and students participate. This study seeks to look at the character of
the rules used and their relation to the classroom setting in which they take place. In this
paper we investigate how teachers use their knowledge of rules as a means for gaining
control and creating meaning in their professional settings. Preliminary findings of
interview and observational studies presented in this paper suggest that rules are not
merely instrumental tools of classroom management, but they are also structures of
meaning teachers use in order to make sense of their professional action.
2. Combining moral competence with action competence in the
teacher knowledge framework
Teacher knowledge as phronesis
This study uses the concept of phronesis as its starting point. The term phronesis comes
from Aristotle’s texts in the Nicomachean Ethics (N.E., 1140a24-1140b12). Phronesis
refers to deliberation about values with reference to practice. It is variable and contextdependent. The stance focuses on the question “What should I do in this situation?”
Therefore, in order to understand what phronesis means, we must look at persons who
perform their activities in real-world situations.
The different interpretations of this question are indicative of the different
directions that the educational applications of phronesis can go. Next, we present three
philosophical interpretations and their educational applications: the rationality code, the
situational code, and the moral character code (Noel, 1999).
Rational code
Within the rationality interpretation, the teacher approaches the problem of what to do
in a given situation with actions based on reason. When examining how a teacher
explains her/his actions, we are interested in the rationality evident in them. According
to Audi (1989, pp. 6-7), we must take into account at least two questions: 1) What does
it mean for a teacher to act for a reason?; and 2) Is there a pattern of reasoning by which
her/his actions can be explained? This approach can be called the ‘reasons giving’
approach to the analysis of teacher behavior. This is because “actions are based on at
least one proposition (major premise) which is held as a guiding principle” (Audi, 1989,
p. 25). This provision of reasons makes the action sensible to the teacher. This kind of
rationality interpretation seeks to structure teachers’ experiences and actions.
Moral dilemmas can also be viewed from this rational and rule-based perspective.
The approach “judges educational decisions according to implicit and explicit rules and
duties owed,” and the focus tends to be “on the policy decisions (means) and on the
educator’s conformity to an ethical principle or a set of rules” (Walker, 1998, p. 298).
The rationality relies on implicit and/or explicit accounts of appropriate guidelines of
how to act. The stance provides a general guide to action, a certain authority in
decision-making. Rationality code provides the standards by which ethical actions and
decisions are made.
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Situational code
Within this interpretation, the phronetic question “What should I do in this situation?” is
answered by focusing its primary attention on the circumstances. The stance addresses
to perceive all that is involved in the situation. Teachers need practical perception to
determine what type of circumstances they are in and what type of actions they are
actually doing. Pendlebury (1990) calls this “situational apperception.” Pedagogical
situations requiring actions are often full of possibilities, and the teacher should be
capable of perceiving those possible actions.
Instead of merely perceiving what is present, the situational code focuses on how
things appear to teachers. Here, “both emotions and imagination play an essential part
of the proper grasp of situations” (Pendlebury, 1990, p. 147). It is through perception,
that teachers discern an event in the school context as something that requires their
practical concerns. The situational code allows teachers room for flexibility and even
improvisation. It is largely based on experientially developed ways of thinking and
acting. Due to their experiences and personal relationships, teachers have their unique
insights into the practical situations they face. What they perceive can be something that
may not be at all apparent to others who are also present in the situation but do not have
an ‘eye for it,’ i.e. they are not in the same position or they do not share the same
experiences.
Moral character code
The circularity between phronesis and character is evident. According to Sherman
(1989), this circularity aims “to capture the way in which the sentiments and practical
reason together constitute character … [and] to demonstrate that character is inseparable
from the operations of practical reason” (p. vii). Thus, phronesis is not a concept that
can be used or determined separate from the individual. Rather, it lies in the person and
is part of the way that one goes about her/his everyday life.
Phronesis is not solely a cognitive capacity that a teacher has at her/his disposal.
Rather, it is closely bound up with the kind of person that the teacher is. The teacher’s
actions and her/his possibilities can only be found within particular situations, informed
by particular histories and school institutions. The actions of the teacher are made
strong by repeated encounters with those actions and possibilities. Consequently, the
teacher sees it not only as a way of behaving in particular contexts, but also as her/his
‘way of being’ that arises in those situations. As a result, phronesis for a teacher has “its
own personality which is rooted in a definite ethos with its own favored dispositions
and habits” (Dunne, 1993, p. 273). The way a teacher acts allows for the development
of her/his phronesis and moral character.
These three interpretations of pedagogical practice should not be separated from
each other. Rather, each interpretation is linked to the others. As a result, pedagogical
ethics mainly belongs to situations which cannot be mastered by linear rationality to
situations where teachers cannot exactly know in advance what will happen when they
start acting. That is why this study highlights the connection between teachers’ ethical
competence and action competence.
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The concept and practice of competence
The concept of competence is strongly associated with the ability to master complex
situations. According to Westera (2001):
“Competence is a highly-valued qualification that accounts for the effective
use of knowledge and skills in specific, usually complex, contexts: The
mastery of relevant knowledge and skills does alone is no guarantee of
successful performances in complex environments; individuals should be
able to select from their available knowledge and skills in such a way that
efficient and effective behavior occurs. (p. 79)
Consequently, competences are needed to engage situations involving intricate
dilemmas in which no straightforward approaches to problem solving are appropriate.
Kirschner et al. (1997) define competence as the ability to make satisfactory and
effective decisions in a specific setting or situation (see also Barnett, 1994). These
considerations about the nature of competencies invoke the idea of conscious and
intentional decision making rather than routine behaviors. From the theoretical
perspective, this may be the case.
However, from the practical perspective, competences seem to cover a broad
range of skills and behaviors that include knowledge, skills, and attitudes. Westera
(2001, p. 81) explains this “operational competence” as follows: every individual’s
cognitive capacity contains considerable theoretical and practical knowledge. This
knowledge base is made available to his/her behavior by means of various skills, or can
be supportive to the associated skilled behavior. Hence, competences have a mental
component representing thought (system of judgment) and a behavioral component
representing performance (system of action) – and competent behavior is always
associated with conscious and explicit thinking to some degree. In these situations,
competences are needed to combine knowledge, skills, and specific attitudes.
Competencies do not just refer to tasks, they must be associated with the
characteristics and backgrounds of the persons involved in them. As McCelland, (1998)
argues, “[p]eople agree more readily on who is outstanding than on what makes them
outstanding” (p. 332). The notion of competence goes beyond skills to include the
attitudes and stamina needed to carry action (even) through difficult circumstances. As a
result, this further complicates the use of competence as a frame of reference for human
behavior.
The competence approach focuses on what professionals can actually do. The
basic idea of the stance is the capacity of the practitioner to perform or deliver in realworld context - in the midst of uncertainty and conflicting priorities. It is assumed that
‘competence’ transcends the levels of knowledge and skills to explain how knowledge
and skills are applied in an effective way (Westera, 2001, p. 75). The approach implies
that what people do and the way they dot it can be specified in quite clear and specified
terms.
Squires (1999, p. 19) sees three advantages in its use: 1) ‘Competence’ places
emphasis firmly on professional field where it should be: on performance, rather than
on the often vague ‘knowledge’ and ‘understanding.’ 2) It can offer clear objectives for
professionals, and thus provides an explicit and a shared basis for working together. 3)
In terms of learning and professional development, it allows one to disaggregate large
blocks of learning into smaller more manageable units, and offers a way to recognizing
learning that has (perhaps not!) taken place.
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Action competence in teaching
The concept of action competence includes the capacity to act – both in its present and
future tense, and to be answerable for one’s own actions. Thus, “action competence is
not identical with acting, nor can action competence be described/explained by
describing the actions performed” (Jensen & Schnack, 1994, p. 13). However,
performing actions in their professional contexts help teachers to develop their action
competence - but this relation is complex. Due to this complexity, a discussion of some
components of action competence might be helpful.
Naturally, professional knowledge is regarded as a necessary component of a
competent teacher action. What we mean by teacher knowledge, however, is another
matter. Clark (1986, pp. 8-9) has traced the past development of teacher knowledge
research and has found three interconnected and partly overlapping phases in its
development: 1) The teacher as a decision-maker, in which the teacher’s task was to
diagnose needs and learning problems of students and to prescribe effective and
appropriate instructional treatments for them. 2) The teacher as a sense-maker, in which
decision-making was seen as one among several activities teachers performed. The
stance assumed that reflectively a professional teacher interpreted and skillfully applied
his/her knowledge to particular situations in which she/he performed. 3) The teacher as
a constructivist, who continually builds and elaborates her/his personal theory of
teaching and education. This third phase meant the widening of teachers’ problem
space: no more was it believed that teachers solely could define and resolve problems
they encountered in their work by themselves. In short, in teacher knowledge research
we have moved away from internally consistent and mechanical paradigms towards
more inconsistent, imperfect and incomplete ways of perceiving and analyzing teacher
knowledge (Husu, 2002).
The notion of commitment is central to how teachers reason and justify their
pedagogical ideas ad actions. Often, instead of using the concept of “commitment”,
teachers report the amount effort and energy they put in their work (Husu, 2000).
Teachers are not only committed to their pupils; they are also concerned with the
improvement of their school, and they strive to reach higher professional standards in
their work. Therefore, when teachers justify their pedagogical agenda and actions, their
personal strivings tend to serve as adequate justifications for their actions. Within this
process, ‘intuitive high hopes’ are often placed above the ‘reasoned facts’ (Elbaz, 1992).
The practice of teaching largely consists of habits, more or less routinized or
even automatic behavior. At first, it may seem odd, but there is nothing wrong with this
state of affairs. We cannot imagine a teacher’s daily job in his/her classroom where
there every single piece of his/her behavior is pre-planned. Bourdieu (1977) calls this
practical orientation as the habitus, the principle which negotiates between context and
practices. Regarding teaching, it is a complex and dialectical process where teachers
(and students) largely implicitly adopt certain ways to act in their practical settings. For
Dewey (1988), human conduct is mainly composed of and structured by habits.
Importantly, habits here mean neither “bad habits” to be corrected nor mere repetition
and routine to be avoided. Concerning teachers and teaching, Dewey (1988, p. 25)
argues that the teacher’s agency and efficacy – its ‘will’ – are located in and through its
habits, not in opposition to them. In a way, teachers are their habits; there is no thinking
of who the teachers are apart from the habits that they embody in their work. This is
because habits largely constitute teachers’ knowledge and, as such, provide them
agency in it. To acquire a habit is for teachers to learn a new behavior in their teaching,
one that opens up the meaning of teachers’ world and provides them with expanded
powers to act in their complex professional settings.
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In sum, teaching depends on teachers’ personal presence and their relational
perceptiveness of what to do in various contingent situations. It is a question of
teachers’ knowledge of their professional action possibilities - and their belief in their
influence, and teachers’ commitment to act. It is part of the teachers’ professional task
to be attuned to these experiential dimensions teachers face all the time in their work.
These “current concerns” (Fuller & Brown, 1975) do not wait. Instead, as Roth et al.
(2001, p. 185) postulate, they continuously unfold. Frequently, the teacher has not time
at all to reflect. The pressure for action is immediate, and it implies that to hesitate is to
lose (Jackson, 1968; Lortie, 1975). Due to this, some kind of an action is always
required even if that action is non-action. The whole teaching situation is far less under
control than we/teachers usually think of.
Moral competence in teaching
The moral aspects of teaching are pervasive in all central decisions of practice. For
example, during ordinary lessons, teachers make decisions about what subject ideas and
topics they explore with their students, the way those ideas are presented, as well as the
substance and style of their interactions with students. All of those decisions are value
laden and woven into the moral fabric of teachers’ classrooms, their pedagogical
decisions, and their practical actions (Hansen, 1993¸ Loewenberg Ball & Wilson, 1996).
An important starting place in learning to approach teaching from moral perspective is
to learn to recognize the moral content in everyday teaching practice. Everything a
teacher does has consequences that are important to students both directly and
indirectly. This is because even in “simple situations”, the complexities emerge quickly
as teachers contemplate what kind of action to take. (Ershler Richert, 2005).
According to Noddings (1984), a teacher has two major tasks: “[1] to stretch the
student’s world by representing an effective selection of that world with which she is in
contact, and [2] to work cooperatively with the student in his[/her] struggle toward
competence in that world” (p. 178). To steer students’ investigations and actions in
ways that are both effective and responsible is to act on teaching’s basic commitments:
care for students and for knowledge - both for pedagogical knowledge and subject
knowledge. Balancing the dual commitments to students and knowledge is never easy.
This is because, as Fenstermacher (1990) explains:
Nearly everything that a teacher does while in contact with students carries
moral weight. Every response to a question, every assignment handed out,
every classroom discussion on issues, every resolution of a dispute ... carries
with it the moral character of the teacher. The moral character can be
thought of as the manner of the teacher. (p. 134; original italics).
All this makes this triangle of teaching relationships –teacher, students, and the
subject matter – as a complex network. Also, there is a constant change taking place in
the teachers’ teaching: Depending on the issue and context, teachers know their subject
matters more and less well, their students more or less well, and (even) themselves more
a less well. But how do teachers choose how to act when there are so many competing
circumstances and possibilities for what they should do? According to teacher
knowledge research (Elbaz, 1983; Clandinin & Connelly, 1995; Husu, 2002), teachers
tend to turn to some set of core ideas to help guide them in their work. They are
procedures that typically outline how teachers “should” act in their work in schools.
As Eraut (1994) states, learning to become a teacher and cope in the classroom
involves developing and adopting “routines and short cuts, internalizing classroom
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decision-making and reducing the range of possible ways of thinking to manageable
proportions” (p. 70). As already stated, there are too many variables to take into account
at the same time – and the moral issues of teaching are particularly difficult area to
handle for teachers.
One of the central aspects of pedagogical decision-making that can be analyzed
through a moral lens are pedagogical rules that teachers employ in their teaching. Next,
we present generally the nature and functions of rules in teaching and then move to a
discussion of the moral aspects embedded in their use.
Rule-based competence in teaching
In practice, teaching often tends to become routinized activity where norms and rules
play an important part. This is because teachers tend to develop implicit ways of action
in order to make their professional life tolerable and more manageable. Simply, there
are too many variables to take into account at once, so teachers develop routines and
decision-habits (rules) to keep their mental effort at a reasonable level (Eraut, 1994, p.
31). Teachers’ conscious and intentional behavior largely focuses on selection,
combination, or adaptation of routines and rules-based actions to meet the situations
they face or have to deal with in their work. In practice, the importance of rules has to
do with how hey help teachers manage classrooms and maintain discipline. Their place
in instruction is incidental and their influence on learning often indirect (Boostrom,
1991, p. 196).
Rules are often seen as the necessary means of creating an orderly environment for
student learning. According to Elbaz (1983), the rule of practice is simply what the term
suggests: a brief statement of “what to do in a particular situation frequently
encountered in practice” (p. 132). Classroom rules such as “No talking while I am
teaching” and “Always follow teachers’ directions” are easily applied both to broader
situations and more specific incidents during lessons. Teachers largely establish their
pedagogical decisions on a set of If-Then rules which cover a vide range of possibilities.
Accordingly, these If-Then rule statements can be represented as follows:
If
Then
I allow (any) talking while I am teaching
I have to do it (all over) again
Teachers rely on rules, and therefore the rules are justified, because their values
are proven and therefore approved. Teachers think, both implicitly and explicitly, that
their rules of practice work. And because they work, teachers apply the rules
accordingly. Teachers justify this link by reasoning that there is a connection between
the rules of practice and their supposed or intended outcomes. As Fenstermacher (1994)
argues, the rules show that “an action is the reasonable thing to do, on obvious thing to
do, or [even] the only thing to do under the circumstances” (p. 44).
It is in the context of everyday classroom life that the significance of rules is
revealed (Boostrom, 1991; Jordan et al.,1995; Kansanen et al., 2000; Weber, 2002).
Rules structure how teachers see their professional tasks, possibilities, and limits.
According to Douglas (1973), rules provide “a recognizable epistemological viewpoint”
(p. 9). With the aid of this viewpoint, teachers construct reality by making meaning, and,
as Douglas emphasizes, “there can be no meaning without rules” (ibid.).
The construction of rules is a local affair: in different classrooms different rules
prevail – if not in content at least in measure. By locating events in a system of teacher
knowledge, rules define what teachers perceive as ‘real’ and important. As Boostrom
(1991) puts it: “It is as if they [rules] are saying, ‘Hang onto this, and you will go in the
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right direction’” (p. 202). The rules speak of aims whether or not teachers put them into
those terms. Also, a particular feature of teachers’ work is the need for confidence and
credibility: the teacher has to believe that s/he is doing ‘the right thing’ (Eraut, 1994, p.
47) – and rules serve that purpose, too.
As rules embody ways of thinking and working in classroom, the instrumental
vision and use of rules can become a danger for teachers. Believing their rules to be only
the tools for managing their classrooms, teachers can “separate within themselves the
means of their teaching from the ends of their teaching” (Boostrom, 1991, p. 210). And
consequently, can lose the power to reflect on what they are actually doing and why they
are doing it. The danger lies in the fact that teachers can employ classroom rules blindly,
without reflection. “Just do it”-kind of a way.
Regardless of how the rules are viewed, their influence cannot be limited to their
explicit, or even implicit, declarations. The rules present teachers’ practical know-how
which is inherent in their action and cannot be separated from it in propositional form.
They are stated within a social context of a school, put into effect by an individual
teacher or teachers, and often enforced with sanctions upon its violation (Turiel, 1983, p.
79). Therefore, the way we think of rules and the way we put them in action is
important. As Boostrom (1991) emphasizes, “it is not just a philosophical point, but a
practical one” (p. 212). This is because if teachers don’t see the meaning and
significance of their rules, a gap can open between what they are doing and the way and why - they are doing their teaching.
According to Ershler Richert (2005), being able to adopt moral competence
which includes rules and principles of “the best interest of a pupil” seems often
inadequate in real world pedagogical situations. This is because moral rules and
principles need to be exercised rather than being merely reproduced. The choices for
how to act are never clear, nor the consequences clear in advance of any action the
teacher takes during his/her teaching. In classroom, in the heat of her/his teaching, the
teacher needs to turn to her-/himself to decide what s/he believes would be
professionally “right thing” to do. This involves drawing on a core set of principles and
commitments that the teacher brings to her/his teaching in the first place. Thus, a
teacher’s pedagogical competence requires more than his/her behavior modification
according to some (set of) rules.
In sum, investigating rules is to look at them for what they are: a moral ordering
of the classroom for which teachers are mainly responsible. Here, the point is to see
rules as reflections of something that goes beyond themselves. They are part of the
teacher knowledge that can be organized in terms of separate, though overlapping
domains, each with unique characteristics. Next, we present a more elaborated
formulation of the concept of rules in order to approach their use in teaching practice.
Recognition & realization rules
Our study employs Bernstein’s (2000) theoretical concepts recognition rules and
realization rules adopted from his theory of pedagogical discourse. The concepts are
used for their capacity to analyze teachers’ rule-governed practices in a more detailed
manner. The concepts revolve around socially constructed meanings, which often go
unnoticed in classrooms but which play an important role in how successfully teachers
can perform their professional tasks. The basic idea of using the concepts of recognition
and realization rules is the hope that teacher competence could grow and change by
investigating pedagogical rules and habits within teachers’ educational experiences.
According to Bernstein (2000), the means of developing teaching are referred to as rules
that are distributive by their nature. The approach presupposes that in order to operate
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successfully within a particular context a teacher needs to posses both the recognition
and realization rules of that situation.
Recognition rules relate to the ability of teachers to recognize the context and
its’ relevant features in which performances are produced (Mutch, 2004, p. 440). If a
teacher has appropriate recognition rules of her/his professional practice, it is usually
seen in her/his successful orientation in her/his teaching. However, some teachers may
lack the ability to recognize some essential features of their contexts, or see the
difference from other contexts. As a result, they cannot recognize that something
different is required for a competent performance (see Daniels, 1995). In this sense, it is
possible to make conclusions of a teacher’s competence on how s/he navigates in
her/his teaching practice, and to determine the extent of the recognition rules s/he
possess.
Realization rules refer to a teacher’s skills to put her/his ideas into practice.
They refer to the abilities of a teacher to communicate what s/he knows is a manner that
is acceptable and understable to her/his students. A teacher may, for example, possess
recognition rules of her/his students’ classroom work and these rules may, in turn, give
her/him perception of what is happening in her/his classroom. Depending on the
recognition rules, different perceptions of ‘what is happening’ in the classroom take
place. However, situations vary: a teacher can recognize that something is required, but
lack particular means to deliver a competent performance. In these terms, teachers can
lack the knowledge and application of their realization rules to a various degree. Here,
Bernstein (2000) speaks about passive and active realization rules. Passive realization
rules enable teachers “to select the appropriate meanings” for their practice (Morais et
al., 2005, p. 417) but teachers fail to implement them successfully in their teaching. In
the active realization, rules are successfully put into teaching practice.
The implementation of realization rules (passive and active) for a given context
is fundamental for a teacher’s success in her/his work. However, as Berstein (ibid.) has
emphasized, in order that a teacher is capable of successful performance, s/he should
also have the socio-affective dispositions favorable to a situation and tasks at hand. That
is, s/he should have aspirations, motivations, values and attitudes adequate to the
production of that wanted (or needed, or even required) teaching act (Morais et al.,
2005, p. 417).
The basic conceptual and empirical unit of both recognition and realization rules
is not an individual subject but a pedagogical relationship through which a description
and an action emerges (Diaz, 2001, p. 95). Thus, the focus is on the contingency of
pedagogical relations of a classroom. This directs attention to the regulation of the
multiple pedagogical relations and draws interest in the relational logic of pedagogical
discourse.
3. Data and methods
Our theoretical analysis is illustrated with preliminary data from three intensive case
studies conducted during the spring 2005. The data contains investigation of three
student teachers by identifying their recognition and realization rules from reflective
interviews (system of judgment) and from related observational data (system of action).
Our analyses aim to examine pedagogical competencies embedded in teachers’ rulegoverned practices. The process of analyzing and interpreting the phenomena through
different frames (systems of judgment & system of action) provides a forum for further
developing the findings that emerge from different data sets and analyses. This process
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involves viewing the investigated phenomena from one lens and subsequently
reconsidering and completing the interpretation from another.
Our data gathering and data analyses were two-fold processes: 1) The procedure
started with videotaping two lessons from each student teacher; then 2) reflective
interviews were conducted afterwards the videotaped lessons. The interviews were
recorded and transcribed for the analysis. In interview, teachers discussed about the
lessons with the researcher. The aim of the interview was to bring to mind the authentic
situation as clearly as possible and to verbalize the teacher’s thought processes in
connection with her/his actions. In these reflective discussions, teachers described their
classroom events and gave reasons for their actions. Researcher made questions to the
teachers with a view to make explicit their notions and intentions during teaching. In
this first phase, the interview data was analysed with a purpose to explore teachers’ own
rule expressions and then interpret these recognition rules according to their content.
The second phase of the data analysis focused on the teachers’ videotaped
lessons with the intent of studying their recognition rules in their own teaching
(realization rules). This analysis covered the all the video-data. Next, in order to get a
more accurate picture of teachers’ realization rules, we chose two episodes from each
teacher’s video-data for closer examination. These episodes were transcribed for further
analysis to uncover active and passive realizations of the teachers’ classroom rules. The
research frame is presented in Figure 1.
SYSTEMS
S
Y
S
T
E
M
S
o f
Construction of
recognition rules
Investigation of
Reflective
Realization rules
interview
active
passive
Videotaped
lessons
o
f
A
C
T
I
O
J
U
D
G
E
M
E
N
T
N
Figure 1. The research frame of the study.
As Figure 1 presents, understanding of the relations between professional judgement
and action requires analyses of the teachers’ co-ordination of these different domains.
This is because many teaching situations calling for action also require (moral)
judgements that should influence on the teacher’s decision-making. Therefore, an
understanding of how teachers deal with the problem of co-ordinating different systems
is important to analyses of their judgement-action relations.
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4. Results
Recognition rules in teaching
In interview analysis, our aim was to reveal the practical action guides teachers relied
on in their videotaped lessons. The rules we were looking after were usually brief
statements of what to do or what should be done in particular situations the teachers
encountered during their videotaped lessons. Our major purpose was to uncover the
ways teachers justify or defend their educational decisions based on their rules of
practice.
Our analysis was based on Black’s (1962) presentation of classroom rules.
According to him, classroom rules can be classified into four categories related to their
nature in classroom context (cf. Boostrom, 1991). From the Black’s four categories, we
found three useful in our construction of realization rules: i) rules about how to do
classroom work, ii) rules about relationships with others in the classroom, and iii) rules
embedded in the subject matter. Table 1 presents the construction of teachers’
realization rules.
Table 1. The construction of teachers’ realization rules.
CATEGORIES OF
CLASSROOM
TEACHERS’ RULES EXPRESSIONS IN INTERVIEWS
(Teacher 1 = T1; Teacher 2 = T2; Teacher 3 = T3)
RULES
1. Rules about
how to do
classroom work
Students
 have to listen to the teacher (T1, T2, T3)
 have to be quiet (T2)
 have to concentrate on their work (T2)
 are not allowed to do anything with their hands while the teacher
teaches (T2, T3)
 are not allowed to walk around in classroom while the teacher
teaches (T2, T3)
 have to look at the teacher when she/he teaches (T2)
 have to raise their hands before talking/answering (T1)
2. Rules about
relationship with
others in the
classroom
Students
 are not allowed to argue with others (T2, T3)
 have to respect the teacher and one’s offered consult (T3)
3. Rules
embedded in the
subject matter
Students
 have to follow teacher’s instructions while working (the process of
teaching – studying) (T1, T 2)
 should reproduce/reconstruct the pre-planned aims of a teacher
(the product of teaching-studying) (T1, T3)
Rules about how to do classroom work
All the teachers expressed their concern of the order of their classroom work (see
category 1). They described how students should listen to the teacher while s/he
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talks/teaches. One teacher (T2) reported of pupils’ ‘unwanted activities while she
teaches. According to her,
A child can concentrate, yes, maybe, if she fingers something. Someone can and even needs to
have something in her hands that she can concentrate. But it disturbs my concentration if the
children can’t concentrate. And if you have twenty-four pupils in your class I think that,
especially with those seven-years-old children, that you have to be a little old-fashioned with the
rules of silence, otherwise so many will be disturbed by that. In this class, for example, there is
this habit to write those little notes to each other… or this group of girls does that, and then one
boy draws allways. So, I think, that disturbs others somehow.”(Teacher 2)
Teacher’s rule: It’s not allowed to do anything with your hands while teacher teaches
Another teacher reported the same: He does not allow pupils to move around in his
classroom while he teaches. He told that
I think that when I’m going to work in the school I’ll be able to control my own class. Because,
what I do in my own lesson, I have an experience about that, they know… They can work
autonomously and they’ve got to used to know my rules, that you can’t run around in the class at
the same time and there have to be tranquillity and all other things... (Teacher 3)
Teacher’s rule: It’s not allowed to walk in the classroom while teacher teaches
Among this category, teacher 2 highlights the rule of concentration. Her other rules of
this domain are closely related to it. According to them, “pupil have to be quiet”
(“otherwise pupil can’t concentrate”), and “pupils have to look at the teacher”
(“otherwise there’s a possibility that pupils don’t concentrate”).
Well, I don’ remember which part of the lesson it was, but the idea was that people were noisy
and there was kind of little hassling and they didn’t concentrate themselves. So I thought that I
don’t want to shout or raise my voice and I wanted that I could have other way for it… mainly.
Then I thought twice, even it’s not familiar to me, but I thought that otherwise it would take so
much time to that (to have a silence). So I thought that it’s kind of faster way to reach that.
(Teacher 2; describing her thoughts before using a whistle to attain a silence)
Teacher’s rule: Concentrate on your own work
Rules about relationship with others in the classroom
This second category represents relationships between members in the classroom:
relationships between pupils, relationships between pupils and teacher(s), or a
relationship with a particular student and a teacher. Our data contained three specific
rule statements related to this category. Teacher 3 emphasized the importance of the
“respect of the teacher” by the pupil. Also, she stressed the attitude that the pupils
should appreciate the teacher’s help. She had had a situation in her art lesson where she
had felt that the pupil didn’t respect the help she had offered. The pupil asked her help
because the pupil felt that she couldn’t make a good picture with the apple stamp which
they were practicing. The teacher tried her best to help the pupil. Howver, the teacher
felt that the pupil didn’t respect her advice but behaved rudely. She talked about these
feelings which had brought up in her mind during the videotaped lesson. According to
her, as an adult, she can understand the pupil’s non-respectfull behaviour. However, the
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pupil may harm another person by behaving that way. That’s why it is not acceptable to
despise someone or someone’s offered help. The teacher continued:
All of us are different from everybody else. We do mistakes but mistakes are for to learn. And
you have to think at first what you’ll say or else you can harm others. I’m an adult but if you talk
like that to your friend or to other student you can harm her a lot. And it could take effect a
lifetime…(Teacher 3)
Teacher’s rule: Respect the teacher (and one’s offered consult)
Rules embedded in the subject matter
This third category of recognition rules mainly focused on the teacher’s expertise in
subject matter issues. According to this rule category, in their studies pupils have to
work according to the teacher’s advice both in techniques and regarding the finished
product (see Table 1). For example, teacher 1 described her rule according to which
every pupil has to write down all the notes which were related to the work and tasks the
pupils were engaged in. In our data, the class was starting a study project concerning
national birds and the teacher had planned to use group work as a method. Thus, one
goal was to learn this studying method. Our example lesson was intended to be an
introduction to the following lessons in which the pupils were intended to work
autonomously. Due to this reason, the teacher wanted to make sure that every pupil
would know where they were heading at. In her intereview, she told that
… I could round and control even more that they all are really writing the instructions and
directions (to the note book). Because if someone from the group is ill and you are alone in the
group, you should know what to do next. So it won’t be your fault if the group(work) doesn’t
work. (Teacher 1)
Teacher’s rule: Everybody has to write the directions of this work to the note book
Within this category of teaching rules, their power guidance to teaching and
teacher perception was evident. For example, teacher 3 strongly argued for her rule
according to which pupils have to follow the teacher’s advice. She emphasized the
importance of the right and intended techniques as a means to a well-aimed result
(finished product). In our data, pupils were doing their mother’s day cards in art lesson
and the main goal was to learn a new technique with finger paints. In the interview, the
teacher repeatedly told that the aim was to “press the paint” to the cardboard, not to
paint in a free way with fingers. According to the teacher, that particular goal was not
reached because the pupils painted just as they wanted. However, she admitted that the
cards were fine, but they were not the kind that she aimed at. This was mainly because
she had not succeeded in following her rule (of technique) within this matter.
In sum, and as our data excerpts present, we found the categories of realization
rules in classroom contexts multidimensional. The categorization is, of course,
imperfect and tends to obscure the fact that rules cannot be neatly categorized. For
example, when a teacher tells that “I always tell my pupils not to raise their hand while
someone is already talking”, should we label the statement according to our first
category 1 (rules about how to do classroom work) or would the category 2 (rules about
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relationships with others) be more appriopriate. Upon analysis, these kind of
interpretative problems can be made visible only partially. Howver, as Boostrom (1991,
p. 195) argues, these kind of interpretative problems do to testify that the using of
categories is futile. Rather, these problems remind us that (even if well-done!) there is a
limit for the analysis of the languages of the rules. And that, in order to understand rules
better, we must examine them in practice.
Realization rules in teaching
After we had constructed the rules that prevailed in the teachers’ reflection on their
practice (recognition rules), we moved forward to analyze these rules more closely in
particular teaching practices from which they were constructed. Our aim was to
investigate how the rules the teachers reported (recognition rules) were put into practice
in their teaching (realization rules).
Here, we employed our video-data which included two lessons from the each
teacher. We used critical incidents (Tripp, 1993) as our focus and as our tool for looking
for the events for our analysis. We explored teaching episodes where the certain
teachers’ actions could be related to their reported recognition rules. We claim that these
episodes contain evidence of the teachers’ rule realization. Accordingly, a particular
incident was chosen by the researchers as it was interpreted meaningful on the basis the
teacher’s reported recognition rules. It is assumed that even this little incident can
include the basic elements of the teacher’s personal ways to think and act in her/his
pedagogical context. The results of this analysis are presented in table 2.
Table 2. The number of episodes of teachers’ realization rules
Classroom rules, categories
1. Rules about how to do
classroom work
2. Rules about relationship
with others in the classroom
3. Rules embedded in the
subject matter
Teacher 1
(T1)
9
Teacher 2
(T2)
21
Teacher 3
(T3)
6
Total
2
4
6
8
-
10
18
17
23
20
60
36
As Table 2 presents, the teachers’ profiles in their rule realization differ
considerably. For example, in his work teacher 1 emphasizes the importance of the
well-orderly classroom work together with the rules related to the subject matters in his
teaching. In his video-episodes, he constantly reminds his class of these rules and
behavioural aims in case some pupils don’t follow them. In such situations, he interrupts
his teaching and restates his rule to one particular pupil or to the whole class. Usually,
these remarks are related to the order of the classroom. Also, he uses many kinds of
comments and rule reminders: “Be quiet” or just “shh” are used in the midst of his
teaching if there is too much noise in his classroom. Teacher also names the pupils who
don’t act according to the rules and regulations. The name works as a reminder of the
hoped-for behaviour, but is also a message to all in the classroom.
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As we can see from the Table 2, teacher 2 emphasizes the rules of classroom
work. Nearly all her realization rule episodes belong to this first category. Difference
from the other teachers is the most remarkable within this category. In her realization
episodes, the teacher uses a lot time and effort to keep up the good concentration among
her pupils during the videotaped lessons. Comparing to others, the teacher 3 has a more
balanced profile. Her focus is on rules embedded in subject matters. She emphasizes
appropriate working methods (techniques) in the processes of making something (the
final product).
As already presented, realization rules refer to a teacher’s skills to put her/his
ideas into practice. They refer to the abilities of a teacher to communicate what s/he
knows is a manner that is acceptable and understable to her/his pupils. A teacher may,
for example, possess recognition rules of her/his pupils’ classroom work and these rules
may, in turn, give her/him perception of what is happening in her/his classroom.
Depending on the existence of recognition rules, different perceptions of ‘what is
happening’ in the classroom take place. However, situations vary: a teacher can
recognize that something is required, but lack particular means to deliver a competent
performance. In these terms, teachers can lack the knowledge and application of their
realization rules to a various degree. Here, passive and active realization rules come into
play. Passive realization rules enable teachers “to select the appropriate meanings” for
their practice (Morais et al., 2005, p. 417) but teachers fail to implement them
successfully in their teaching. In the active realization, rules are successfully put into
teaching practice. In order to describe these distinctions, we present two preliminary
examples from our data set.
An example of the active realization of classroom rules
In active realization both the teacher and the pupils are active: they talk about the rule or
teacher’s regulation. For example, pupils can question teachers certain instructions
about the classroom work. Also, a pupil can propose alternative way to do a task which
may be given or she can only comment or ask other questions regarding teacher’s
guidelines. In active realization teacher takes these viewpoints into account and tries to
address them. According to the stance, teacher takes into account pupil’s personal needs
and intentions.
In our example of active realization (episode 1) we look at in a more detailed
manner the realization of the classroom rule “it’s not allowed to argue with other
students” (category 2: rules about relationship with others, see table 1).
In this episode two girls are arguing about drawing pens during their mother
tongue lesson. Pupils are making their own books and they are illustrating them. The
arguing starts when a boy in a group puts the box of colour pens in the middle of the
table and both girls try to grab it. The teacher (2) pays attention to their arguing and
tries to clarify the situation. She listens to both parties and questions about what has
actually happened. After that she criticizes the pupil who broke the rule in question (the
teacher’s conception of the situation). Then she moves the box of pens in the middle of
the table so that both girls can use them. Teacher restates her rule and then she moves
on to other pupils in the group desk. However, she doesn’t notice that the arguing
between the two girls continues. (Later, when she notices that, she intervenes the
situation again and tries to solve it. This latter part of the situation is presented in the
next episode dealing with passive realization of the classroom rules. See episode 2).
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Episode 1. Mother tongue lesson (Teacher 2).
Elisa holds a box of pens in her hand. A boy in a group takes them and moves them to the
middle of the table. Minnie grabs the box at the same time she puts her own box to the
middle (chances the boxes). Elisa tries to take her box back. Teacher comes to the table.
Teacher: Okay… Hey! You have many pens there, Minnie and Elisa! You have many pens
there. It will fare well (sharing the pens). Elisa says something to her (mumbles).
Teacher: What?
Elisa: She took them from my hand.
Teacher: Minnie? (Minnie: but he gave them to me…) Why did you take them from
Elisa’s hand?
Minnie: But he gave them to me!
Teacher: Who?
Pupil, boy: I gave them to Elisa at first. (Teacher listens to him and gazes at Minnie)
Teacher: Well, yes, and it’s not nice to take them of one’s hand. Do you remember what
the police man said yesterday? What it’s called if you take things from someone’s hand
without permission?
Minnie: ohh... from the hand?
Teacher: like… or take from someone’s hand. (Pupil, boy: stealing)
Minnie: Stealing.
Teacher: That’s right or at least it’s not nice.
Pupil, boy: Yeah, you must share them!
Minnie: But he gave them to me!
Teacher: Shh! (Asking for silence)
Pupil, boy: Stupid! You must share them! Teacher looks around in the class a little while
and starts to speak to another boy in the group.
----------------------------Minnie sits beside another girl and they start working. Drawing pens are middle of them
on the table. Only Minnie selects pens from the box:
Minnie: I’ll draw with this.
Teacher is speaking to another pupil in the group while girls are drawing. Minnie moves
a box to her own side and holds on to it. Elisa opts for a pen from the box and moves the
box a little bit more her side. Minnie hangs on to box and pulls the box briskly.
Minnie: Don’t rip!! (Rejoins) Elisa moves the box to the middle of them:
Elisa: Here, to the centre. Minnie takes it back to her side. Elisa mumbles.
Minnie: …but these are my colour. There are more colours.
She points to another box which is in Elisa’s side. Elisa takes a pen from that box and
moves it more to her side of table. (Another girl in the group moves it back to the
middle.) Elisa holds a pens but still speaks (insists on colours) to Minnie.
Minnie: There is enough colours to both of us!
Teacher’s rule: It’s not allowed to argue with other students
Rule category 2: Rules about relationship with others in the classroom
The active part in the realization in this particular rule is in the consideration of
every participant and action based on negotiation. From the pupils’ point of view, the
both girls try to tell to the teacher what caused the problem. Elisa says that Minnie took
pens from her hand. Also the boy in a group strengthens this viewpoint (“I gave them to
Elisa at first”). Reacting to that, Minnie defends herself many times (“He gave them to
me”). The boy admitted that, too. Both girls try to give a view about the situation to the
teacher.
In this episode, the teacher finds a guilty party and had words with her
regardless. Teacher reminds her about the common rules using yesterday’s teach by the
police: it’s not allowed to take things from other without permission or it can be called
17
stealing. Minnie doesn’t argue with this remark and she takes it calmly. In this situation,
however, she holds on her wisdom to have a right to hold those pens by acting the way
she does: she dominates the using of colours and holds them in her side (even Elisa tries
to move them). The arguing continues and girls don’t follow the teacher’s rule (don’t
argue with other pupils).
An example of the passive realization of classroom rules
In passive realization of the classroom rules teachers are usually able to perceive the
situation in question and even to select some appropriate meanings in it. However, for
some reason(s), teachers fail to handle them successfully in relational terms.
Our example of passive realization (Episode 1b) is related to the previous
episode (of active realization). In this part of the episode the teacher notices that her
restated rule (It’s not allowed to argue with other students) does not work – the arguing
between two girls continues. Then, she takes firmer actions:
Episode 1b. Mother tongue lesson (Teacher 2).
Minnie moves a box to her own side and holds on to it. Elisa opts for a pen from the box and
moves the box a little bit more her side. Minnie hangs on to box and pulls the box briskly.
Minnie: Don’t rip!! (Rejoins) Elisa moves the box more to her side:
Elisa: Here, to the centre.
Minnie takes it back to her side. Elisa mumbles.
Minnie: …but these are my colour. There are more colours. She points to another box which is
in Elisa’s side. Elisa takes a pen from that box and moves it more to her side of table. (Another
girl in the group moves it back to the middle.) Elisa holds a pens but still speaks (insists) to
Minnie about the colours.
Minnie: There is enough colours to both of us!
Teacher notices the continuing arguing.
Teacher: Do you still have a problem?
Elisa: Minnie doesn’t give that colour.
Teacher: Yes, okay, you must share them… She moves the box back to the middle of the table.
Teacher: … and if you don’t… Now you keep them in the middle and both of you can use them!
Teacher looks around in the class and walks away.
Teacher’s rule: It’s not allowed to argue with other students
Rule category 2: Rules about relationship with others in the classroom
The passive realization of this rule appears in teacher’s and pupils’ action. In
first part of episode teacher tried to solve the problem with the different viewpoints of
pupils (even she made an ambiguous decision). After that her attention was directed to
other pupils and she didn’t notice the arguing was continuing. In the video-episode, both
girls acted the way which could take effect to continuing arguing: also Elisa, who
blames Minnie in this part of episode (“Minnie doesn’t give that colour”), did some
moves which can cause the arguing on her part. She tries to move the box a few times
and keeps on with a dispute about the pens. Minnie pushes Elisa with her elbow quite
aggressive when Elisa tries to move the box of pens more to her side or in the middle of
the table. Teacher doesn’t see that but when the arguing continues she notices it. This
time she doesn’t ask what has happened or try to listen to everyone’s viewpoints.
18
Instead, she solves the problem by using her single-handed decision making: she moves
the box to the middle of the table and tells them to keep it there (“and both of you can
use them!”). Either of the girls doesn’t try to comment this restated rule. The teacher
leaves the girls and goes to help another pupil. The arguing between the two the girls
has ended.
5. Possible implications
As presented, rules are everyday part of teachers’ professional life, and their knowledge
– both explicit and especially implicit knowledge. Thus, rule-governed practices give
structure to teachers’ intellectual life. According to Boostrom (1991), this broader
vision of rules brings together the means and ends of pedagogical action and makes
possible for teachers to reflect on what they are actually doing – and how they are doing
it.
Also, we believe that the use of the concepts of recognition rules and realization
rules can provide valuable insights to aspects of teacher behavior. An understanding of
these concepts can help us to broaden our awareness of teacher action in classrooms.
Using these concepts, it becomes apparent that teachers’ knowledge and actions are
determined by complex relational issues.
In common classroom incidents one domain of rule-governed practices may
stand out, but other domains tend to overlap, too. However, distinguishing among
different kinds of rule-governed practices may help teachers to respond in ways that
recognize and realize both their personal and professional needs and those of their
pupils in classrooms.
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