In search of the architect of learning: a commentary on scaffolding as a metaphor for instructional interactions

The Evolving Object of Software Development

This paper contributes to an ongoing debate on the effects of bureaucratic rationalization on relatively non-routine, knowledge-work activities. It focuses on the Software Engineering Institute’s Capability Maturity Model (CMM®) for software development. In particular, it explores how the CMM affects the object of software developers’ work and thereby affects organization structure. Empirical evidence is drawn from interviews in four units of a large software consulting firm. First, using contingency theory, I address the technical dimensions of the development object. Here CMM implementation reduced task uncertainty and helped master task complexity and interdependence. Second, using institutional theory, I broaden the focus to include the symbolic dimensions of the object. Adherence to the CMM involved the sampled organizations in efforts to ensure certification, and these symbolic conformance tasks interacted in both disruptive and productive ways with technical improvement tasks. Finally, using cultural-historical activity theory, I deepen the focus to include the social-structural dimensions of the object. Through these lenses, the software development task appears as basically contradictory, aiming simultaneously at use value, in the form of great code, and at exchange value, in the form of high fees and profits: the CMM deepened rather than resolved this contradiction. The form of organization associated with these mutations of the object of work is a form of bureaucracy that is simultaneously mock, coercive, and enabling.

L’autorégulation de l’apprentissage et la collaboration dans le développement professionnel des enseignants

Cet article examine l’interrelation entre l’autorégulation et l’apprentissage collaboratif dans le développement professionnel des enseignants. Pour commencer, un cadre théorique est établi afin de définir le développement professionnel chez les individus comme situé dans la pratique, au sein de communautés d’apprentissage collaboratif. Cette discussion fournit les balises pour décrire deux initiatives consécutives de développement professionnel dans lesquelles les enseignants ont cherché à traduire des principes éducatifs innovants dans la pratique. Un aperçu des deux projets est fourni, accompagné d’un rapport de résultats centrés sur l’enseignement de processus d’apprentissage, et sur comment les enseignants sont arrivés à changer leur pratique à travers leur participation à cette recherche collaborative.

A case study of the apprenticeship process: another perspective on the apprentice and the scaffolding metaphor

This study focused on the apprenticeship opportunities in a collaborative writing context. The examination of written artifacts and discursive interactions revealed that collaborative contexts offered unique participatory spaces that allowed students to use their knowledge in ways that exceeded their independent competence. Of note, too, is that the study revealed students' active and constructive role, refuting the perception that most students with disabilities are passive learners in the teaching-learning process. Implications of the study further suggest the importance of peer collaborations in creating successful literacy apprenticeships, as well as in providing teachers with greater insight into the developmental progress and literacy potentials of their students in the context of situated literacy activity.