Education Policies, Foreign Language and (Mobile ... DE APRESENTACAO... · Education Policies,...

Education Policies, Foreign Language and (Mobile) Technology in the field of Critical Applied

Linguistics

Cláudia Hilsdorf Rocha – Unicamp

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Critical Applied

Linguistics & Policies

Critical and alternative directions embrace the

notion of (local) practice and distrust the grand

gestures of imperialism, language rights and

globalization

Pennycook (2010)

ICCAL 2015 - Cláudia Hilsdorf Rocha

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Critical Applied

Linguistics & Policies

From a Critical Applied Linguistics perspective

we can orient towards a form of politics that is

grounded in local language (and educational)

activities and that allows us to develop more

sophisticated, open, discontinued, situated

geographies of linguistics happenings and,

therefore, also policies

Pennycook (2010)

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Globalization &

Critical Education

Globalization is disform (Capella, 2000)

It is complex and not uniform or universally imposed

by a colonial power upon the colonized, but rather is

something that affects people and nations (as far as

language, education and policies are concerned,

as well) in varied and different ways

Rizvi (2000), p. 222

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The framework of judgments concerning the

impacts of globalization needs to be not simply

matters of whether globalization is really

happening or not, but of globalization in what

respects and on whose terms

Burbules e Torres (2000, p. 17)

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From a more neoliberal standpoint,

globalization affects educational policies,

practices and institutions by imposing market

approaches and rational management and by

favoring meritocracy, consumerism, uniformity

and homogenization

Burbules e Torres (2000)

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.

From a critical and postcolonial

perspective towards language and

education (Andreotti & Menezes de

Souza, 2012), within the globalized and

digital society, it is important to distrust

technology (Selwyn, 2014), as well as

every kind of authoritarian discourse, in

favor of epistemic breaks

(Kumaravadivelu, 2012).

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Policy as Ideology

Policy is about intentions and effect, it is

action-oriented and is a system of

organized decision making. Values (and

power) play an important part in the

definition and enactment of policy. Policy is

then guided by value or ideological systems

Adams (2014: 25)

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Policy as Ideology

Hélot & Laoire (2011)

Today, language policy is being

reconceptualized as a complexity

of human interactions,

negotiations and productions

mediated by interrelationships in

sites of competing ideologies,

discourses and powers.

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Policy as Ideology


More recent approaches to language (and

educational) policy conceptualize it as a

process in which a variety of social actors

struggle to achieve authoritative

contextualization (Silverstein & Urban,

1996): they actively engage in planning,

interpretation, modification and/or (selective)

implementation of policy, in accordance with

existing institutional practices, external

pressures and individual differences

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Language Policy as Local Practice :

Communities of Dissent

Hornberger (2006)

At the heart of post-structuralist and

more post-modern approaches to

language policy, one finds three

crucial concepts, which help to

advance our understanding, that is,

agency, ideology and ecology

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Language Policy as Local Practice :

Communities of Dissent

Medina (2006)

Agency is thought as discursive by

nature (Medina, 2006) and, therefore,

cannot be owned, but enacted within

social relations (of power)

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From language education policy to a

Pedagogy of the Possible (Localities)

Language and educational policies are created

and lived locally within

communities of dissent (Barnett, 2004, p. 64),

which reveal aporetic, heteroglossic spaces

(Blackledge et al 2014), that is, critical,

creative and dynamic spaces of crises or

dissent, from which epistemic breaks

(Kumaravadivelu, 2012) and transformation

can occur


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Importance of the interrelationship between

language policies and public bodies, on the one

hand, and local reality of ordinary people involved,

on the other, so that the agency of subalternized

communities can be validated and that policies can

be negotiated in a critical and creative way.

Such interrelationship and negotiation should allow

for more local and horizontally based actions to take

place, so that there could be breaks with

authoritarian policies, which either swipe or

romanticize linguistic and educational rights

Quoting Canagarajah (2005, p. 418), Severo (2013, p. 469),

emphasizes the:

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Education policy as an academic area of

study has found its niche in the last 30 or

so years. Because education seeks to

better the education of individuals and

groups in society and because it desires to

effect social change, it is a subject of

social policy and it is therefore an

ideological site of struggle

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Monolingualism

There is still a lingering tendency in

most language classrooms to approach

the teaching and learning of languages

as if monolingualism were the norm,

overlooking diversity (whether linguistic,

cultural, ethnic or social)


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Monolingualism

Ricento (2006)

Language policies as they emerged

in post-colonial (sociolinguistic)

situations have best served the

interests of the former language of

colonization rather than the

languages and rights of minorities.

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Monolingualism

Garcia (2009)

Even when education

systems are said to be

multilingual, most (linguistic

and educational) models are

still characterized as

monoglossic and intended

only for the elite and

dominant languages

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Educational Technology Policy

Educational technology policy can be seen as a

formalization of state intent to guide the implementation of

digital technologies throughout national education systems

The integration of digital technology into education systems has

been a growing feature of state education policymaking over the

past three decades

Nowadays educational technology can be said to be a major

policy concern across all nations, regardless of a country’s

global prominence or relative economic wealth

Selwyn (2013)

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Policies exist in context: they have a prior history, linked to

earlier policies, particular individuals and agencies

Rizvi and Lingard (2010: 15)

Educational technology policies need to be considered from a

more historical and critical standpointSelwyn (2013: 65)

We need to consider and reflect critically upon the

commodification of educational technology and its

consequences for the way in which power is

distributed through the material conditions of individual

nations and peopleMansell (2004: 102) 20


Commodification

Selwyn (2013) - Zhao et al (2006)

During the 1980’s and 1990’s policies revolved largely around

provisions of computers in classroom and the development of

computer literacies among teachers and students, targeting at a

limited set of measurable outcomes

Brazilian Proinfo Integrado

Main goal: promote the use of technology within public schools

Such policies reveal the unchecked fear of missing the fast ICT

train to global prominence and have resulted in a (blind) global

chase after e-learning and a limited focus on market rationale

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Nowadays infusing national education systems with

digital technology still follow an essentially

deterministic expectation of technological change

leading to substantial educational improvement

Educational technology policymaking tends to be

linked to the idea of economic success in the

globalized knowledge economy

It could then be described as a techno-centric,

utopian and economic-driven

Selwyn (2013) - Zhao et al (2006)

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Technology-based education is presented by national

governments as a generic solution to common policy

problems arising from the knowledge economy,

information age and other recent global shifts

It is tempting to see policy expressions of

educational technology as forming a global hyper-

narrative (Stronach, 2010), that is, a shared

discursive means that nation states turn to in an

attempt to normalize the economic and societal

changes associated with globalization

Selwyn (2013, p. 82)

GENERALIZATION – NORMATIZATION- HOMOGENEITY

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Yet while all educational policies and practices are

internationalized to some degree, their apparent

similarities cannot be seen to represent a global

educational culture (Spring, 2009), for what has taken

place “on the ground” has proven to be very

different and diverse

State technology policies work like a relay

between certain administrative and political

practices and a diversity of local initiatives and

do not have homogeneous and predictable

effects, since they cannot be controlled

Selwyn (2013, p. 83)

EDUCATIONAL TECNHNOLOGY POLICY AS LOCAL PRACTICE

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Selwyn (2013: 83)

While the comparative education approach may well

encourage an interest in the similarities across national and

global settings (Samoff, 2007, p. 49), we need to remain

mindful of the many differences and discontinuities that persist

within national and global borders when it comes to

educational technology use and policies

We should turn our attention to the importance of

“local politics, (policies), culture and tradition

and the processes of interpretation and struggle

involved in translating these generic solutions

into practical policies and institutional practices

(Ball, 2006,p. 76)25


In Brazil, there have been many discussions and

proposals for using the computer (and digital mobile

technologies) for transforming pedagogical practice

instead of just using it as another medium for knowledge

production and dissemination (Castro, 2000).

According to Proinfo (National Program for Computers

in Education) the main condition for achieving success

is the availability of good teachers, who must be

qualified at two levels: as educator and trainers

Fidalgo Neto et al (2009)

26


In Brazil, Casa Thomas Jefferson iPads for

Access initiative set out from the start to

integrate English language and digital literacy

learning opportunities for socioeconomically

disadvantaged youth

The success of the Brazilian approach can be

seen in student’s growing independence and

creativity, as evidenced in the English-medium,

digitally enabled work they have been

empowered to produce, and which can be

publicly viewed online

Pegrum (2013, p. 36)

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Ipad for Access Project

Language: English

Focus:

Language & Digital Literacy

Recipients:

Students from low-income

backgrounds

Key partners:

US Embassy/US State Dept

Timeline: 2012 - ongoing

Pegrum (2014)

http://thomas.org.br/pratique-ingles/blog/?tag=mlearning#ipads-in-the-english-classroom

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Projeto Educação Digital-Políticahttp://www.fnde.gov.br/programas/programa-nacional-de-tecnologia-educacional-proinfo/proinfo-tablets

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http://www.fnde.gov.br/programas/programa-nacional-de-tecnologia-educacional-proinfo/proinfo-tablets

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Pegrum (2014: 35)

It is important to question anew in every context

whether mobile technologies are being used to

promote empowerment and equality rather than

(merely) serving economic or corporate imperatives

It is necessary to develop a critical mobile literacy,

for it offers a lens through which to focus on finding a

balance among competing interests and to help

students open up spaces for growth amid the multiples

discourses clamouring for their ( and all of our)

attention in contemporary society33


Pegrum (2014: 35- 39)

Language, literacy and 21st century skills can be

critically and simultaneously dealt with to great effect

To do so, we should distrust educational

technology (policies and discourses)Selwyn (2014)

We should break with “imagined” and authoritarian discourses34


Distrusting Policies and

Discourses

Digital natives simply do not exist and

research debunks the notion of a

homogeneous, technically able generation

Digital society faces serious problems

regarding access and social inequalities –

Liquid Modernity can be very heavy

Pegrum (2014)

35


Technology cannot, on it is own, save education or the

world from inequalities, intolerance, hatred and all

sorts of violence and prejudice 36


Living and practicing linguistic and technology educational policies, from a critical point o view, is a process of ideological becoming within

the bakhtinian public sphere, which invites us to be aware of and to care about difference and about the presence of the other.

Living and practicing linguistic and educational technology policies in such a public space (Biesta, 2014) involves taking

social responsibility within plurality towards policies, strategies, words, gestures, thoughts and actions of

everybody around us, caring and worrying about the collectivity and acting in the interest of the public, so that

such policies can become public37


É preciso (re/des)aprender a viver (políticas)

• Somos unidos pelo tempo e pelo espaço. [...] A chave é viver no tempoespaço, no cronotopo, é reconhecer sua inseparabilidade.

[...] Aprender com a vida é a chave. Nós não pulamos, de crise em crise, sem aprender como ter mais controle de nossas vidas. Nós não vivemos desatentos ao mundo ao nosso redor, conscientes

somente de nossas próprias vontades e necessidades. Ao contrário, nós vivemos no mundo – atentando para como as forças

passadas fizeram de nós quem somos, conscientes de que, ao longo de nossa jornada, podemos crescer, aprender e mudar, primeira e principalmente a nós mesmos e, assim, também o

mundo,

• Shields (2007, p. 15), 38


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