Transitions as dynamic processes — A commentary

Abstract

Studies of learning have been paradoxically, and righty, criticized for being non-developmental, or a-historical. Also, it has taken time and effort for researchers to really take account of the socially, situated components of learning. In this beautiful collection of papers, the editors invite us to take seriously the historical, cultural, situated, and dynamic nature of learning. These papers plunge into the complexities and messiness of schools, relationships to parents, diverse social and cultural settings, or sorts of knowledge. Avoiding dilution, the papers share a common cultural–historical theoretical frame that allows considering the dialectic relationships of various activity settings, together with the demands theymake on actors, and how thesemight correspond, or not, to people's own motives. Finally, what connects the papers is obviously the notion of transition — home-to-school (Hedegaard, Bottcher, Sanchez-Medina), in the child's development in different settings (Fleer, Ullstadius), in the case ofmigration (Sanchez-Medina et al.), or the transformation of educational systems (Chaiklin). The papers give us first an overview of the heuristic power of the cultural–historical framework developed by Marianne Hedegaard (this volume, and Hedegaard & Chaiklin, 2005; Hedegaard, Fleer, Bang, & Hviid, 2008; Hedegaard, 2003) and invite us to give a specific attention to the directionality of the system — that is, what demands a given setting makes on children, and conversely, how children are oriented toward these demands. The evident strength of this tradition is its capacity to highlight the dialectic nature of the processes by which the child or the learning person participates in the creation of his or her social environment, and by which the implied actors and institutions, whether they are aware of it or not, contribute to the creation of the conditions from which the child will feel, think, and act. Such processes can be shown because of three further strengths of this tradition, illustrated across the papers: first, its theoretical anchorage; second, its epistemological choice to consider the child (or the learner's) perspective, and third, following these points, its methodological creativity, which allows researchers to, for example, follow children from home to school and back (see also Hedegaard et al., 2008; Hviid, 2008) or shift activities and motive orientation within the same setting (see Fleer in this collection). Hence, the paradigm is consistent and, thanks to this consistency, opens door for further theoretical developments. In what follows, I will first underline the interest of the dialectic processes highlighted by the papers; on this basis, I will then question the use and implications of the notion of transition.