Why does innovation in education take so long? Field, Habitus, Identity - that's why

I spend my life convincing educators to do things differently. Of late, we've taken the policy at NoTosh of not working with a district or school unless the Principal, the Head Honcho, the Boss is in the room participating. Why? Because the Field, Habitus and Identity developed by all the teachers in the room will provide the eventual block to any change happening.

Pierre Bourdieu's view of the world, set up nicely to help you see why you always need to have a whole-school approach to innovation, is nicely summed up in this research paper pdf, in a succinct three pages.

The Field is where what we're informed by research as being good learning and teaching is thrown out in the hubbub and busy-ness of the school day: "Forget what they tell you about teaching at Uni - this is where you'll find out how to really teach." To get over this, the whole field needs to experience the changes being proposed to remove the pressure of the field to descend to lowest common denominator.

The lowest common denominator in the field? Every time? Yes - because the Habitus of the people in the field is formed from the strong experiences of learning at school, the thirteen years compulsory schooling that shapes our inner understanding of what a successfully run classroom or school looks like. When we enter the classroom again, in our twenties, thirties or forties, it is this strong visual (and odoursome) memory that kicks back in, and we revert to the way we were taught. This is why it's important to always know what your happiest and least happy memories were at school, and work out ways to emulate the former and change the latter.

Finally, the Identity of a teacher is formed from this collective mix of historical habitus and current day field - individual responsibility for development within the collective responsibility for change as a whole school is the only way to adapt for the long-haul.

Thanks to Derek Robertson for the push over to Bourdieu this morning, while I toiled with change at the EU workshop on harnessing digital games for inclusion and empowerment of the disengaged, pictured above.

Comments

[BalancEdTech]

No mention of Dan Lortie?

[bokij]

Great blog momentaly bookmarked!
Best regards from Serbia

[Paula-Manivelas puerta]

Nice analysis and interesting blog.
Innovation in education is without doubt a complicated issue. I think that one of the most relevant things to achieve that goal is empower teachers to adopt new technologies.