Indoctrination or education? Intention of unqualified teachers to transfer consumption norms in home economics teaching

Abstract

Almost two thirds of home economics (HE) teachers in Sweden are formally unqualified (FU). Historically, HE has focused more on fostering and prescribing the 'right' choices whereas the modern (2011-) curriculum focuses on teaching consequences of choices and giving students tools for assessing alternatives. Restraining from prescribing norms requires a high degree of professionalism. The objective of this study was to empirically investigate the prevalence of intentions of FU teachers to prescribe consumption norms not supported by the curriculum. Furthermore, to investigate to what extent these intentions are correlated with years of experience as a teacher, personal preferences, or personal consumption. The intention to transfer norms were measured using the concept of intentional misalignment applied to a survey distributed to a sample of FU teachers attending complementary teacher education. A two part survey was used. The first part consisted of multiple choice questions asking the teachers how important they saw it to transfer different consumption norms to their students (e.g. to consume local or organic food). These responses were evaluated quantitatively (Spearman rank correlation, Wilcoxon rank sum test and Kruskal-Wallis analysis of variance). The second part consisted of an open-ended question asking teachers to describe what they saw as the most important take-home message for students in HE. The answers were compared to the national curriculum to identify intentions to transfer unsupported norms. The study indicates that more than a third of the FU HE teachers in Sweden express the intention to prescribe specific types of consumption or to transfer consumption norms that are not supported by the curriculum. The prevalence is correlated to personal preferences and thus indicates difficulties with keeping a professional perspective. These teachers must be given collegial support and opportunities for continued education-to ensure high-quality HE education for future generations.

Intentions of formally qualified and unqualified teachers to transfer norms and values in home economics teaching

“…There are interesting findings regarding the similarities and difference between the intentions of the qualified HCS teachers in this study and the unqualified HCS teachers from the previous study (Håkansson, ). A large percentage of both groups put significant emphasis on consequences of consumption and how this relates to sustainability (category D).…”

“…In particular, fewer show an intention of prescribing what particular labels their students should or should not consume, which is arguably the most unprofessional norm transfer. Moreover, in support of the higher degree of professionalism as an explanatory factor for the difference between qualified and unqualified teachers, is the finding that there is no correlation between personal preferences and the prevalence of prescribing consumption norms and values for the qualified teachers, as was the case for the unqualified teachers (Håkansson, ).…”

“…They need not be representable for all unqualified HCS teachers. However, as previously noted, there are few reasons to assume these to be less professional than the general sample (Håkansson, ) and thus differences between the two populations are if anything underestimated by the methodology used. It should, thus, not affect the conclusions of formally teachers showing fewer norm and value transfer intentions than unqualified HCS teachers.…”

“…The degree to which teachers are able to separate personal preferences from teaching intentions was measured by combining the survey questions on personal preference with norm and value transfer intentions. The previous study demonstrated that many of the unqualified teachers display a noticeable preference for local, organic and additive free foods and that those expressing norm and value transfer intentions have significantly stronger preferences for these (Håkansson, ). Therefore, this study measured preferences for these different types of goods (local, organic and additive free foods) on a 7‐point Likert scale.…”

“…The proportion of respondents mentioning the different categories can be compared with the responses from unqualified teachers in a previous study (Håkansson, 2015). The qualified cohort has a significantly lower emphasis on advertising (P 5 0.0011), see Table 3.…”