Updating the concept of General Didactics in accordance with the changes brought about by the development of our society, and questioning the consequences and effects caused by the model on which it is based, is necessary and essential if we want to maintain a General Didactics that is useful and adapted to our times. The book Future of General Didactics explores these issues and questions the traditional foundations on which it is based. Society changes, schools change, and the ways of thinking about General Didactics must also change and adjust their models according to the needs and evidence that are discovered. New alternatives that broaden the outlook for conceiving General Didactics must emerge in order to overcome the immobility in which it finds itself, and to glimpse a more promising future.
The book Futuro de la Didáctica (Future of Didactics), by Antonio Medina’s research group and Agustín de la Herrán’s research group, offers two different visions for overcoming the challenges facing General Didactics today, and even for restarting General Didactics, as Herrán’s research group puts it, from its roots.
Firstly, from Antonio Medina’s research group, one can find a scientific-artistic vision and understanding of General Didactics. From this approach, it is assumed that the complexity involved in the transformation of the scientific basis of didactic knowledge must be overcome, bearing in mind the view that General Didactics has a direct connection with the “art of teaching”. From this perspective, General Didactics is understood as science and as art to explain the teaching-learning process. It values the depth of the didactic act, which is sustained through a dialogue and an interaction between those involved in the teaching-learning process (teachers, students, families, learning community, and new digital scenarios).
Agustín de la Herrán’s group, from a radical and inclusive approach to understanding General Didactics, starts from the premise that the foundations that support General Didactics are radically incomplete, denaturalised, egocentric, myopic, or foreshortened. It considers that General Didactics remains on the surface of educational reality, making its analysis and comprehension impossible. From a superficial approach it is difficult to achieve its final purpose, which is the education and integral formation of human beings. In order to overcome the bad practices associated with General Didactics, it is proposed to work on conscience as an antidote and a path towards a better future. A General Didactics based on consciousness moves from doing to giving oneself, opening oneself, liberating oneself, expanding oneself, inquiring and internalising oneself. The accumulative ego of the student, which is formed on the basis of a traditional teaching model, is replaced by an ego that is self-critical, rectifies, yields and gives itself. The General Didactics of mediocrity and complacency is destroyed by being understood from the radical and inclusive paradigm.
The reading of these two positions for approaching, understanding and reflecting on General Didactics leads us to think of new alternatives for conceiving it. It leads us to conclude that we cannot continue to maintain traditional, obsolete models for the foundations of General Didactics, which remain on the surface and do not allow us to advance in a conscience-based education. There are other ways to progress towards an integral education of students. Specifically, there are other ways of conceiving General Didactics, such as those proposed in the Future of General Didactics, which open up new possibilities for broadening the horizon of General Didactics towards a more human, more artistic, more profound and more conscious future.
Reading the book The Future of Didactics is, therefore, an essential requirement for those who are interested in knowing and understanding new alternatives for approaching the foundations of General Didactics. For this reason, it is a book especially recommended for all those who are disillusioned with the current models and are looking for a radical change that will give foundation and meaning to their work in General Didactics.
Cristina Moral Santaella
“Audio-visuals, sociocultural inequalities and education” is an essay based on an interpretative paradigm research that shows how audio-visual technologies and the digital divide influence the increase in sociocultural inequalities in the educational system. Antonio Bautista García-Vera, Professor of Didactics and School Organization, expresses between the lines his sensitivity and concern for the improvement of school education through the possibilities of audio-visual technologies. The book follows a discourse and structure typical of a research paper, distributing the content into eight chapters, annexes and a bibliography.
The author takes us into the research with the first-person narration of the initial contact with the educational centres. In the first chapter, the reader is immersed in the daily life of the two primary education centres of the Community of Madrid, protagonists of what was to become a new scenario for the generation of shared knowledge. There is collaboration between the educational community -teachers, mothers, fathers and students- and the research team.
The second and third chapters of the book are intended to guide the reader in understanding the specific purposes of the research. The background points out, firstly, the importance of differentiating those more technical and functional uses that a digital tool presents, from the role or function it acquires in society and in education or its meaning. The interrelated conceptual frameworks guide to understand how the meaning we give to technologies is linked to sociocultural and educational inequalities. Recognized authors and emerging research are cited in reference to the digital divide, technological literacy, art in aesthetic awareness and digital competence.
From this state of the art, the origin of the study arises under three curiosities to solve about technological and audio-visual tools in formal education: understanding the meaning they acquire in educational centres; to know how the personal, social and academic development of students is favoured; and identify the implications for professional development and teaching staff. To respond to them, the fourth chapter is intended to describe the principles of data collection, discourse analysis and the phases of the study. The research methods are specified in a meticulous and detailed way, considering ethical aspects, coherence and validity. Data collection through interviews took place during and after the implementation of digital literacy processes for teachers and students. The study denotes rigor and methodological relevance in the way in which the sensations, perceptions, analysis and reflections of students and teachers are interpreted and described.
The three curiosities are resolved in chapters 5, 6 and 7, respectively. The results show how the functions assigned to the media had expanded during the study: from meanings about the transmission of information and entertainment activities, towards meanings related to expression, creativity and problem solving. This is a great finding of the project, since it shows how to promote the achievement of Digital Competences in multicultural educational contexts for social inclusion. Another significant finding is the impact that audio-visual literacy has generated on academic performance, personal and social development, and the professional projection of students. Audio-visual productions have caused an improvement in the sensitivity for beauty and art in connection with daily experiences and own interests. The results also reflect the role of the media in the personal development and professional development of teachers. These acquire prominence when teachers try to connect with the interests and motivations of the students. For readers of Bautista’s book, it is of special interest to stop and review in detail the quotes from the interviews of the participants.
The essence of the results are presented in the eighth and last chapter in the form of conclusions. Bautista reflects in depth on the contributions of the study to reduce the digital divide and improve social ties through technological development in educational communities. The transparency in the description of the research, the sensitivity for the audio-visual world and the concern for the improvement of education guide the reasons for delving into this book.
Laura Fernández-Rodrigo
This book for formal and non-formal education teachers intends to be a manual of theater and drama in education. As stated in the subtitle, “Theater in education without memorizing texts. 77-1 drama & theater techniques” offers seventy-eight ways to do theater in the classroom without the need for the students to memorize texts, in an attempt to break down the notion that memorizing texts is the only way to practice theater in the classroom.
This book is aimed at education professionals that want to teach differently but do not have any or enough training in theatrical education. More often than not, teachers are only interested in getting to know the practical process that involves representing a play, being unaware of the possibility of “doing theater” without the students memorizing other people’s texts.
This book is divided into two parts. The first one includes the following sections:
The second part dives more into what drama and theater techniques are. Drama techniques are those that take place in a classroom, while theater techniques are those that start in the classroom and finish in a public showcase. Therefore, in drama the students are the actual recipient of the teachings, while in theater is the audience. However, the goal of both strategies, according to the authors of this book, is to be pedagogic; this facet cannot be traded for some other goal, such as a merely artistic one. Following this reasoning, the educational strategies are compiled into two blocks, completed by a third one: assessment techniques.
The book includes more than four hundred creative proposals adapted to the curricular subjects from all different educational stages. Moreover, it also includes 234 audiovisual references in the form of QR codes, which supports the learning of each technique, thus ensuring the effectiveness of this manual as an educational tool.
Based on this idea, the authors put forward the pedagogical value of this way of approaching theater in education by considering that the repetition of a beforehand written text forces students to face a lifeless text. This way of approaching theater in the classroom has been conducted by literature and dramatized readings. In turn, the authors of this book intend to offer tools to give voice to the students: their topics, their language, their concerns, etc.
As Sajarov, nuclear physicist and Nobel Peace Prize, used to say: “Those who have never seen an orange, will not order an orange. Our task is to promote the orange and ignite the desire.” That is precisely what the authors intend to do, ignite the desire to use educational tools inspired by drama/theater in education. Those of you who approach this methodology will confirm that, once this book falls into your hands, there is no turning back: the adventure for your students to know, create and find their own voice will be already in motion.
Book review by Antoni Navarro Amorós
Translation into English by Rocío Barquilla González