Lärarkunskapens uttryck : en studie av lärares självförståelse och vardagspraktik

Sammanfattning: This study departs in the question of what teachers really know. In cooperation with practising teachers I have investigated the knowledge that teachers develop and use in their daily work. The aim is to interpret, understand and portray this largely unformulated knowledge. From a pragmatic and interactionist perspective, the concepts teacher knowledge, teacher person and teacher practice are formulated in the study. The empirical part of the study investigates how the teachers express their knowledge in words and in actions. The outcome is interpreted in relation to teacher knowledge at a general level and the teacher's knowledge at a contextual level.In the study a qualitative and interpretive perspective is used. Ten teachers were interviewed and the material is accounted for in teacher portraits. Further, four teachers were observed and this material was portrayed in the form of school photographs. The two sets of data were combined, and the knowledge expressed in words and actions by the four teachers is, together with each teacher's specific knowledge, described in condensed form.The variation and the consistency in the teachers' expressed knowledge are regarded as the major results of the study. My contributions to teacher research are, thus, a presentation of central concepts in the form of thick descriptions, a diversification of the concept pedagogical tact, in relation to person and practice, and discovery of a consistency between words and actions. The results are unexpected and challenge research which sets out to describe the teacher's knowledge, teacher culture, and teachers' classroom behaviour in general terms. The results should be viewed in relation to changes in the social context and in the control of schools. In a pluralistic society where responsibilities are decentralized the teachers' task can be described in terms of coercion of action and interpretation. A diverse teacher knowledge has its rational base in a multiform school where teachers are faced with the demand to interpret and handle the conditions for the performance of their own work.