The Significance of Schooling
Life-Journeys in an African Society

This 1933 study explores the difficulties of meeting the multiple agenda of modern schooling in a case study of a rural African community.

Robert Serpell (Author)

9780521144698, Cambridge University Press

Paperback, published 24 June 2010

364 pages
22.9 x 15.2 x 2.1 cm, 0.53 kg

Schooling in the modern world has a multiple agenda: the promotion of economic progress, the transmission of culture from generation to generation, and the cultivation of children's intellectual and moral development. Originally published in 1993, this book explores the difficulties of achieving a synthesis of these objectives, in a case study of a rural African community. The analysis contrasts the indigenous perspective on child development with the formal educational model of cognitive growth. Teachers in the local primary school are shown to face the challenge of bicultural mediation, and the significance of schooling is discussed for each of the diverse individuals of the study in terms of his or her own reflections and interpretations. Two different attempts to activate a local dialogue about the school as a community resource are described and the implications for approaches to educational planning are explored.

List of illustrations
List of tables
Preface
1. The multiple agenda of schooling
2. Wanzelu ndani? A Chewa perspective on child development and intelligence
3. The formal educational model of cognitive growth
4. Bicultural mediation: local challenges for teachers
5. Life-journeys and the significance of schooling
6. Dialogue and accountability: the school as a community resource
7. Perspectivist reflections on educational planning
Appendix
Notes
Bibliography
Indexes.

Subject Areas: Educational psychology [JNC]