Gerasimos Koustourakis

The new educational policy for the reform of the curriculum and the change of school knowledge in the case of Greek compulsory education

This article looks critically at Greek educational reform to the curriculum of compulsory education—reform that took place so that Greece could put into practice the decisions of the European Union of Lisbon (2000) for the contribution of education to the adaptation of the new data of the ‘knowledge society’. Bernsteins theory about pedagogic discourse is utilized. Also, with the use of qualitative content analysis in specific resources (parliamentary debates, new curriculum and textbooks) we tried to answer the following questions: Which are the dominant social principles that led the Greek state to change the curriculum? Through which process and with the contribution of which factors did the reform of the curriculum come about? And which are the characteristics of the new school knowledge and of the pedagogic practices that are selected for their reproduction at the level of the classroom?

Changes in school mathematics knowledge in Greece: a Bernsteinian analysis

The purpose of this paper is to critically examine the changes that took place in school mathematics knowledge for pupils aged six and seven (first grade of Greek elementary school) and its pedagogical approach, which took shape following the reforms of the mathematics curricula in 1982 and 2003. Our analysis is based on Bernstein’s theoretical framework on pedagogic discourse and Dowling’s theoretical framework on textual domains. The results showed that there are differences between the 1982 and 2003 reforms, in terms both of the content of mathematics knowledge, as well as of the forms of pedagogic interaction between the teacher and the pupil.

Visual representations of the internet in greek school textbooks and students' experiences

Our research is concerned with the visual representations found in textbooks used for the teaching of the Internet in Greek secondary schools. Visualization, as both the product and the process of creation, interpretation and reflection upon pictures and images, is considered here to be very important, as it is the only way students gain insight into the nature and function of the Internet, its size, complexity and invisibility. Initially, we attempted to analyze and reflect upon school textbooks’ visual interpretations of the Internet. A scheme of categories of visual representations has been identified and reveals the characteristics of the textbooks’ representations as well as their limitations. Sketch-comics and computer snap-shots are the more popular types of Vrep, although a considerable number of them cannot be characterized as accurate and few of them have an explanatory or complementary function in terms of the content presented in the text. We have also explored the impact on students’ readings of two visual representations in one of the textbooks, used without any caption or textual information. The phenomenological aspects of the VRep seem to attract students’ attention and create obstacles in conceptualizing the main idea conveyed in both representations, but when the field of ICT is implied and not clearly portrayed in the VRep, students face serious problems in recognizing the phenomenon. It seems that it is difficult for an image on its own to paint a thousand words.

Cultural activities and the family’s ‘institutionalised’ cultural capital: the case of native and immigrant primary school pupils

Abstract This paper explores and interprets the cultural activities of native and immigrant primary school students in relation to their parents’ ‘institutionalised’ cultural capital. The research used a questionnaire and semi-structured interviews with sixth grade primary school students from a Greek city which had a high proportion of immigrants due to its geographical location and the activity of its port. The research results showed that the students’ cultural activities were correlated with the ‘institutionalised’ cultural capital of their parents. More specifically, native students whose parents possessed a high level of ‘institutionalised’ cultural capital were involved in cultural activities which defined the ‘cultivated’ person. This was in contrast to native students whose parents possessed low and middle levels of education. This specific group of students shared similar cultural practices to students who were of immigrant origin and whose parents possessed similar educational characteristics.

Regulative discourses of primary schooling in Greece: memories of punishment

Abstract The mechanisms of discipline and power within the institution of the school constitute, in part, the relationship between society and childhood. This article traces the relationship between official regulative discourses of control and punishment practices over students in primary school. It focuses on the memories of schooling of first-year students in a Department of Primary Education at a Greek University. The concepts of power, discipline and discourse from the theory of Michel Foucault are drawn on to examine the pedagogical control over primary school pupils. The research was carried out using an open questionnaire in which participants were asked to describe their experiences of school punishment. The key findings showed that corporal punishment is dominant in the memory of the majority of research participants. The reason for the pupils’ punishment was mainly their making noise in the classroom and their poor performance in core subjects of the curriculum. These findings are significant for the sociology of education as they reveal the real and symbolic violence of school life that endures in memories of childhood, schooling and society.

Historicity as a legitimising argument in the case of the Greek educational reforms of 1985 and 1997–1998 in general and technical‐vocational education

The purpose of this study is to investigate how the ‘historical argument’, namely references to the educational policies and practices of other historical periods, was used by Greek politicians in the framework of the 1985 and 1997–1998 educational reforms. Employing the method of quantitative and qualitative content analysis, the authors attempt, on the basis of original sources (parliamentary debates/minutes) both to count and interpret the historical references.