Making a curriculum : A study of knowledge in Swedish School geography

Making a curriculum : A study of knowledge in Swedish School geography

Geographical knowledge in schools can be represented and experienced in different ways in different aspects of the curriculum for compulsary school – from policy documents to teaching in schools. This subject-specific knowledge has been theorized, discussed, and taught in different ways in schools, often with selective traditions. Thus, the relation between school geography and academic discplines (human and physical geography) is complex. In this thesis, geographical knowledge is studied in a curriculum research setting; that is, the governance arena and the classroom arena. In focus are the recontextualization of geographical knowledge in making the curriculum at the governance arena, and in reproducing the geographical knowledge in the classroom arena (in years 7–9). A specific term – subject-specific abilities – is followed in the arenas; it was introduced in 2011 and refers to the aims for each subjects. The syllabus in geography is also studied in matter of a content analysis, grasping geograhical knowledge and learning progression in the subject. Qualitative methods have been used to accomplish this research, through semi-structural interviews, filmed lessons used as stimulated recall, and content analysis of documents. The study can be placed within the category of geography education and shows that there is geographical knowledge in terms of thinking geographically, and that geographical advantage and spatial thinking are implicit in the syllabus. The learning progression in geography is splintered in both a spiral way (as content comes back several times) and in a divided way (as content is divided into different levels depending on complexity). In the the writing of the syllabus, five different zones of conflict can be identified that form and affect which geographical knowledge ends up in the syllabus and how this knowledge is organized. The teachers’ experiences of the subject-specific abilities reveal a mixture of interpretations. Teachers experience the abilities in several subject-specific ways and also several generic ways – and in a mixture of subject-specific and generic ways. The teachers’ choices and interpretation of the syllabus are crucial for which geographical knowledge is taught in school, but also dependent on in-built problems in the syllabus and a result-oriented school. To help teachers handle this, a professional compass for geography teachers in Sweden is presented.