Skip to main content

School Learning as Compliance or Creation

  • Chapter
  • First Online:
Constructivist Education in an Age of Accountability

Abstract

In light of educational reforms in recent years, there has been a de facto recasting of the aims of school learning. With heightened emphasis on students correctly answering questions posed to them, using prescribed methods, as well as rigid guidelines for teachers’ lessons and strict performance goals for schools, schooling has come to emphasize compliant performance. This is contrasted with a constructivist emphasis on nurturing each student’s thought to its fullest potential. In this view, the goal is not performance on a test, but individuals who ask questions, pursue their own answers, and engage in discourse with their peers about such matters. It is argued that this has important implications for democratic societies and personal fulfillment.

This is a preview of subscription content, log in via an institution to check access.

Access this chapter

eBook
USD 24.99
Price excludes VAT (USA)
  • Available as EPUB and PDF
  • Read on any device
  • Instant download
  • Own it forever
Softcover Book
USD 32.99
Price excludes VAT (USA)
  • Compact, lightweight edition
  • Dispatched in 3 to 5 business days
  • Free shipping worldwide - see info
Hardcover Book
USD 109.99
Price excludes VAT (USA)
  • Durable hardcover edition
  • Dispatched in 3 to 5 business days
  • Free shipping worldwide - see info

Tax calculation will be finalised at checkout

Purchases are for personal use only

Institutional subscriptions

References

  • Alexander, M. (2010). The new Jim Crow: Mass incarceration in the age of colorblindness. New York: The New Press.

    Google Scholar 

  • Arievitch, I. M. (2017). Beyond the brain: An agentive activity perspective on mind, development, and learning. Rotterdam, Netherlands/New York: Sense Publishers.

    Book  Google Scholar 

  • Arievitch, I. M., & Haenen, J. P. (2005). Connecting sociocultural theory and educational practice: Galperin’s approach. Educational Psychologist, 40(3), 155–165.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Au, W. (2009). Unequal by design: High-stakes testing and the standardization of inequality. New York: Routledge.

    Google Scholar 

  • Berk, L. E., & Winsler, A. (1995). Scaffolding children’s learning: Vygotsky and early childhood education. Washington, DC: National Association for the Education of Young Children.

    Google Scholar 

  • Bourdieu, P., & Passeron, J. C. (1977/1990). Reproduction in education, society and culture. Thousand Oaks, CA: Sage.

    Google Scholar 

  • Brown, L. M., & Gilligan, C. (1992). Meeting at the crossroads: Women’s psychology and girls’ development. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press.

    Book  Google Scholar 

  • Bruner, J. S., Jolly, A., & Sylva, K. (1976). Play: Its role in development and evolution. New York: Basic Books.

    Google Scholar 

  • Cole, M., & Wertsch, J. (1996). Beyond the individual-social antinomy in discussions of Piaget and Vygotsky. Human Development, 39, 250–256.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Deresiewicz, W. (2014). Excellent sheep: The miseducation of the American elite and the way to a meaningful life. New York: Free Press.

    Google Scholar 

  • Dewey, J. (1916/1997). Democracy and education: An introduction to the philosophy of education. New York: Free Press.

    Google Scholar 

  • Duckworth, E. (1973/2006). “The having of wonderful ideas” and other essays on teaching and learning (3rd ed.). New York: Teachers College Press.

    Google Scholar 

  • Edwards, C., Gandini, L., & Forman, G. (1993). The hundred languages of children: The Reggio Emilia experience in transformation. Westport, CT: Ablex.

    Google Scholar 

  • Elkind, D. (1981/2001). The hurried child: Growing up too fast too soon (3rd ed.). Cambridge, MA: Perseus.

    Google Scholar 

  • Foucault, M. (1977). Discipline & punish; The birth of the prison. New York: Vintage.

    Google Scholar 

  • Freud, S. (1920/1972). A general introduction to psychoanalysis. New York: Pocket Books.

    Book  Google Scholar 

  • Galton, F. (1904). Eugenics: Its definition, scope, and aims. American Journal of Sociology, 10(1), 1–25. Retrieved January 10, 2017 from http://galton.org/essays/1900-1911/galton-1904-am-journ-soc-eugenics-scope-aims-htm

  • Gardner, H. (1983). Frames of mind: The theory of multiple intelligences. New York: Basic Books.

    Google Scholar 

  • Gardner, H. (1991). The unschooled mind: How children think and how schools should teach. New York: Basic Books.

    Google Scholar 

  • Garvey, C. (1977/1990). Play. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press.

    Google Scholar 

  • Goncu, A., & Gaskins, S. (2011). Comparing and extending Piaget and Vygotsky’s understandings of play: Symbolic play as individual, sociocultural, and educational interpretation. In A. Pellegrini (Ed.), Oxford handbook of the development of play (pp. 48–57). New York: Oxford University Press.

    Google Scholar 

  • Gould, S. J. (1981). The mismeasure of man. New York: Norton.

    Google Scholar 

  • Gould, S. J. (1996). Full house: The spread of excellence from Plato to Darwin. New York: Three Rivers Press.

    Book  Google Scholar 

  • Greene, M. (1995/2000). Releasing the imagination: Essays on education, the arts, and social change. San Francisco: Jossey-Bass.

    Google Scholar 

  • Grigorenko, E. L., & Sternberg, R. J. (1998). Dynamic testing. Psychological Bulletin, 124(1), 75–111.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Hirsh-Pasek, K., Golinkoff, R. M., Berk, L. E., & Singer, D. (2009). A mandate for playful learning in preschool: Presenting the evidence. New York: Oxford University Press.

    Google Scholar 

  • John-Steiner, V. (1985/1997). Notebooks of the mind: Explorations of thinking. New York: Oxford University Press.

    Google Scholar 

  • Kozulin, A. (2005). Learning potential assessment: Where is the paradigm shift? In D. B. Pillemer & S. H. White (Eds.), Developmental psychology and social change: Research, history, and policy (pp. 352–367). New York: Cambridge University Press.

    Chapter  Google Scholar 

  • Kritt, D. W. (1993). The subjective meaning of shared representations: Television characters and self. Unpublished doctoral dissertation, City University of New York Graduate Center.

    Google Scholar 

  • Kritt, D.W. (2000). Loving a virtual pet: Steps toward the technological erosion of emotion. Journal of American and Comparative Culture, 23(4), 81–87.

    Google Scholar 

  • Kritt, D. W. (2004). Strengths and weaknesses of bright urban children: A critique of standardized testing in kindergarten. Education and Urban Society, 36(4), 457–466.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Kritt, D.W., & Winegar, T. W. (2007). Technological determinism and human agency. In D. W. Kritt & T. W. Winegar (Eds.), Education and technology: Critical perspectives, possible futures (pp. 3–29). Lanham, MD: Lexington.

    Google Scholar 

  • Langer, E. J. (1997). The power of mindful learning. Cambridge, MA: Perseus.

    Google Scholar 

  • Lave, J., & Wenger, E. (1991). Situated learning: Legitimate peripheral participation. New York: Cambridge University Press.

    Book  Google Scholar 

  • McCarthy, C. (2006). The road. New York: Vintage.

    Google Scholar 

  • Mills, C. W. (1967). The sociological imagination. New York: Oxford University Press.

    Google Scholar 

  • Nussbaum, M. (2010). Not for profit: Why democracy needs the humanities. Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press.

    Google Scholar 

  • Oyler, C. (2006). Learning to teach inclusively: Student teachers’ classroom inquiries. Mahwah, NJ: Lawrence Erlbaum Associates.

    Google Scholar 

  • Paley, V. G. (1986). Mollie is three: Growing up in school. Chicago: University of Chicago Press.

    Book  Google Scholar 

  • Passmore, C., Gouvea, J. S., & Giere, R. (2014). Models in science and in learning science: Focusing scientific practice on sense-making. In M. R. Matthews (Ed.), International handbook of research in history, philosophy and science teaching (pp. 1171–1202). Dordrecht, Netherlands: Springer.

    Google Scholar 

  • Piaget, J. (1945/1962). Play, dreams, and imitation in childhood. New York: W.W. Norton.

    Google Scholar 

  • Piaget, J. (1971). Genetic epistemology. New York: Norton.

    Google Scholar 

  • Postman, N. (1982/1994). The disappearance of childhood. New York: Vintage Books.

    Google Scholar 

  • Renninger, K. A., Kensey, C. C., Stevens, S. J., & Lehman, D. L. (2015). Perceptions of science and their role in the development of interest. In K. A. Renninger, M. Nieswandt, & S. Hidi (Eds.), Interest in mathematics and science learning (pp. 93–110). Washington, DC: American Educational Research Association.

    Chapter  Google Scholar 

  • Riegel, K. F. (1976). From traits and equilibrium toward developmental dialectics. In 1975 Nebraska symposium on motivation (pp. 349–407). Lincoln, NE: University of Nebraska Press.

    Google Scholar 

  • Rogoff, B. (1990). Apprenticeship in thinking: Cognitive development in social context. New York: Oxford University Press.

    Google Scholar 

  • Rogoff, B., & Wertsch, J. (Eds.). (1984). Children’s learning in the “zone of proximal development”. San Francisco: Jossey Bass.

    Google Scholar 

  • Roth, M. S. (2014). Beyond the university: Why liberal education matters. New Haven, CT: Yale University Press.

    Google Scholar 

  • Salomon, G. (Ed.). (1993). Distributed cognitions: Psychological and educational considerations. New York: Cambridge University Press.

    Google Scholar 

  • Scribner, S. (1984). Studying working intelligence. In B. Rogoff & J. Lave (Eds.), Everyday cognition; Development in social context (pp. 9–40). Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press.

    Google Scholar 

  • Stetsenko, A. (2017). The transformative mind: Expanding Vygotsky’s approach to development and education. New York: Cambridge University Press.

    Book  Google Scholar 

  • Stetsenko, A., & Arievitch, I. M. (2004). The self in cultural-historical activity theory: Reclaiming the unity of social and individual dimensions of human development. Theory and Psychology, 14(4), 475–503.

    Google Scholar 

  • Strauss, S., & Stavy, R. (Eds.). (1982). U-shaped behavioral growth. New York: Academic Press.

    Google Scholar 

  • Taubman, P. (2009). Teaching by numbers: Deconstructing the discourse of standards and accountability in education. New York: Routledge.

    Google Scholar 

  • Uttal, D. H., & Perlmutter, M. (1989). Toward a broader conceptualization of development: The role of gains and losses across the lifespan. Developmental Review, 9, 101–132.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Vygotsky, L. S. (1934/1987). Thinking and speech (N. Minnick, Trans.). In R. Rieber & A. Carton (Eds.), The collected works of L.S. Vygotsky: Volume 1, Problems of general psychology (pp. 39–285). New York: Plenum.

    Google Scholar 

  • Vygotsky, L. S. (1967). Play and its role in the mental development of the child. Soviet Psychology, 5(3), 6–18.

    Google Scholar 

  • Vygotsky, L. S. (1978). Mind in society. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press.

    Google Scholar 

  • Weber, M. (1904/2008). The protestant ethic and the spirit of capitalism. New York: Norton.

    Google Scholar 

  • Wells, G. (1999). Dialogic inquiry: Toward a sociocultural practice and theory of education. New York: Cambridge University Press.

    Book  Google Scholar 

  • Werner, H. (1926/1948). Comparative psychology of mental development. New York: International Universities Press.

    Google Scholar 

  • Wolf, D. P. (1989). Portfolio assessment: Sampling student work. Educational Leadership, 46(7), 35–39.

    Google Scholar 

  • Wood, D. J., Bruner, J. S., & Ross, G. (1976). The role of tutoring in problem solving. Journal of Child Psychology and Psychiatry, 17(2), 89–100.

    Article  Google Scholar 

Download references

Author information

Authors and Affiliations

Authors

Editor information

Editors and Affiliations

Rights and permissions

Reprints and permissions

Copyright information

© 2018 The Author(s)

About this chapter

Check for updates. Verify currency and authenticity via CrossMark

Cite this chapter

Kritt, D.W. (2018). School Learning as Compliance or Creation. In: Kritt, D. (eds) Constructivist Education in an Age of Accountability . Palgrave Macmillan, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-66050-9_17

Download citation

  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-66050-9_17

  • Published:

  • Publisher Name: Palgrave Macmillan, Cham

  • Print ISBN: 978-3-319-66049-3

  • Online ISBN: 978-3-319-66050-9

  • eBook Packages: EducationEducation (R0)

Publish with us

Policies and ethics