Building and Using Common Knowledge as a Tool for Pedagogic Action: A Dialectical Interactive Approach for Researching Teaching

Abstract

Focusing on the nature of culturally responsive pedagogicPedagogicaction, this chapter takes a dialectical interactive approach to understanding children's learningLearningand developmentDevelopmentand is broadly framed by Hedegaard's attention to planes of analysisPlanes of analysisand the relevance of demandsDemandin institutional practicesInstitutional practiceswithin that framing. Based in a dataset generated over 6 months in a Digantar schoolSchooland its community in rural Rajasthan, the study used Edwards' conceptualisation of `common knowledgeCommon knowledge' and the Vygotskian concept of `social situation of developmentSocial situation of development' to understand how teachersTeachersaligned their pedagogicPedagogicmotivesMotivewith those of their pupils, while negotiating the object of activityActivityin lessons. The analysis of classroom data revealed how the teachersTeachersbuilt common knowledgeCommon knowledgein and outside the classroom. This common knowledgeCommon knowledgeconnected: (i) knowledge of content of one's own mind, i.e. the subjectivities of the teachersTeachersand the children; (ii) knowledge of the content of others' minds, i.e. teachersTeachers' pedagogicPedagogicengagements with children, parents and other teachersTeachers; and (iii) knowledge of the shared environment and publicly validated knowledge. The chapter then discusses how this common knowledgeCommon knowledgewas used as a pedagogicPedagogicresource by the teachersTeachersin their work with pupils, as they enabled children's constructions of their social situations of developmentDevelopment.