A proposal

This is one version of my proposed thesis work.
The format is a two page proposal, so it's a bit bare bones/technical.
Anyways, it's a start...

In North America, Britain and Australia, policy researchers and critical theorists have identified a narrowing and tightening of the controls on teachers’ work: a shift to more intense managerialism and de-professionalization (Ball, 2008; Hilferty,2008; Thomas, 2005). These same pressures have prioritized skills development in literacy and numeracy over other content areas, and highly specified pedagogy and assessments. That prescriptive approach to curriculum limits the effectiveness of teachers by deskilling them, and it leads to more shallow learning and students’ disengagement from school (Goodson, 2005; Lipman, 2006).
In this context, good teachers are assumed to be faithful deliverers of mandated curriculum (Ayers et al., 2008). However, some teachers still actively engage in curriculum construction, particularly in areas that are ignored and underdeveloped in formal policy making. In these cases, teachers may notice the gaps that formal curriculum leaves (even in high priority areas like literacy) and/or the inadequacy of certain curriculum priorities for their students (Dunn, 2009) Teachers may view these challenges as “windows” of opportunity to engage in major curricular decisions and design (Bascia & Young, 2001). These activities result in deep professional development which promotes student learning (Cochran-Smith & Lytle, 1992). The purpose of my research study is to document this phenomenon: teachers’ active curriculum making in the context of curricular areas that are not (yet) supported with curricular materials and professional learning opportunities. My research will be guided by two questions: What does active curricular construction look like? What influences teachers’ capacity and ability to take on this type of curriculum work?
Conceptual Framework
The social sciences have often relied on Kantian definitions of agency where an individual’s ability to act is either wholly independent of or wholly constrained by circumstances. In education, researchers have overemphasized structure, for example by assuming that the locus of control for teachers’ actions and decisions is always the school curriculum (Clandinin & Connelly, 1998; Sloan, 2006). At the other extreme are conceptions of teachers' actions as heroic and idiosyncratic (Irvine, 2003) More recently, some scholars have tried to understand agency as more than an individual’s possession or act of will and rather as a capacity that is emergent (Archer, 2000), develops over time (Bascia & Young, 2000; Ermibayer & Mishe, 1998) and is influenced by context (Archer, 1998).
My conceptual framework is grounded in the work of Archer (1998; 2000) Bascia and Young (2001) and Emirbayer and Mishe (1998). Archer argues that an individual’s capacity for agency emerges from interaction with the social, practical and natural worlds. Her concepts of morphogenesis and morphostasis set the stage for understanding the way individuals are situated in context, and the concepts of continuity and change. Emirbayer and & Mishe understand agency as being influenced by an individual’s past, present and future. Bascia and Young’s characterizations of teachers’ agency in particular provides education- specific language and terms: taken-for-granted normative dimensions of teachers’ work; pressures and constraints on teachers’ decisions to act; teachers’ career –long trajectories in which different actions are more or less valued at different times; and the broader social and political nature of teachers’ work.
Methods
This research is connected to a larger project entitled Teachers as Curriculum Makers. This project will map out the social networks developed in the process of teachers’ curriculum making. My research contributes to this goal, but differs as it will focus on deep investigation into individual teachers. I will have access to curriculum development histories as well as to individual teachers who are or have taken part in active curriculum construction in two areas: Holocaust and genocide education, and the integration of Aboriginal perspectives into the curriculum. I will conduct life histories in each curricular area, and develop detailed documentary history of the subject. Life histories will be gathered through semi structured interviews that involve teachers reflecting on their personal and professional history, and in particular as it relates to their active curriculum making activities. The data will be analyzed using Bascia and Young’s (2001) framework, with the work of Archer and Emirbayer and Mishe providing the theoretical grounding for the analysis.
Significance:
This research addresses efforts to broaden our understanding of educational change processes and the parameters of teachers’ work in the larger educational system. The formal policy process often ignores teacher-driven curriculum innovations, and this reinforces the domination of powerful interests and may restrict the educational system’s capacity for innovation and improvement. Curriculum reform is system, state, and internationally driven; however this perspective does not provide a complete picture.