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In this article, we approach large questions regarding justice and equality in the Nordic classrooms. A substantial body of previous research emphasises the importance of student engagement in teaching and learning. Drawing on video data from Norway, Sweden and Finland, we focus on whole-class teaching, i.e. situations in which the teacher addresses the class from the front of the classroom, to investigate justice trough participation. We have approached our topic through two concerns: student participation in classroom discourse and student engagement as providing access to content. Our findings seem to pose some serious challenges for the Nordic welfare society vision of classrooms as core societal hubs for justice and equality. While whole-class teaching is one of the primary tools available for attempting to achieve justice and equality for all, this interaction format seems to contain inherent constraints that do not support equitable student engagement. Further, the way the Nordic classrooms have responded so far to the massive digitisation in their societies seems to pose serious questions rather than provide comforting answers. KEYWORDS student engagement and participation; classroom discourse; access to content CONTACT Marte Blikstad-Balas

In this article, we explore the role of smartphones in the classroom and how they interact with teaching. Drawing on examples of literacy events, we show how the students use the smartphone as a resource to exercise power and influence in the literacy practices in which they participate in the classroom, in relation to a teaching content. These actions take place without the teachers being aware of them, and thus these processes dismantle the teacher's authority in terms of access to, and overview of, the diversity of texts that are managed by the students in the classroom. The article concludes that it is evident that digital tools in general, and smartphones in particular, change the role of the teacher and the school, and that the students' design of texts places new or altered demands on students as well as teachers.

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