Talking About Reproduction: Science Teachers’ Discourses and Cultural Processes in Canadian and Indian Classrooms

• In Event: Communication and Communities

Abstract

This paper will examine the complex relations between science teachers’ discourses and their sociocultural settings, during a period of educational reform. Reform policies in Canada and India have redefined the nature of teaching and learning to align with the constructivist ideology (MELS, 2004; NCERT, 2005). Teachers in these contexts have been positioned as culture brokers and reflective practitioners with the view that they might account for students’ sociocultural experiences. Comparative education researchers (Tabulawa, 2003) have critiqued these changes by linking them to the neoliberal agenda steering global economic structures. By illustrating how science teachers’ discourses have been shaped by various local and global conditions this paper will provide insight into processes of cultural reproduction taking place in classroom settings.

Author

• Anjali Anna Abraham, McGill University