Getting Back to Basics: Is the Knowledge of School Geography Powerful in Chile?

Abstract

The study on which this chapter is based provides evidence that pedagogical knowledge and everyday knowledge are the mediating elements which can influence the way geography is understood and taught in Chile. This can be interpreted, in the words of Stengel (1997), as a discontinuous relationship between the two spheres, i.e. the academic discipline and the school subject, in which the school subject is structured as polysemic disciplinary knowledge and is perceived by teachers as fragmented. Geography teachers’ subject knowledge would appear to contradict what Young (2008) defines as “powerful knowledge” and sheds new light on the relationship between the academic discipline component and its function for school geography. This is assessed in relation to Chilean teachers’ conceptualisations of Geography, how Geography is understood in Chile, and how these conceptualisations are reflected in what is eventually taught.