Decentralization and Change in Teaching Style in Sweden:

The Emergence and Expansion of the “Working Team” (arbetslag) from 1960 to 1980

Abstract

  This paper discusses the change in teaching style in Sweden from 1960 to 1980 stemming from the decentralization reform in education. This discussion is important in two ways: to focus on the Swedish case as a suggestive model for Japan and to link decentralization as an administration reform with what happened in the classrooms.

  Decentralization is one of the key agendas in education reform in many countries, with Sweden having received much attention as a pioneer in the field. It is important for Japan to look at the Swedish case, as the once highly centralized Swedish administration system is very similar to the Japanese administration system. Decentralization is a popular field of research in educational administration and policy. Although previous research has revealed changes in the relations among several levels of administration (i.e., the central government and local authorities), change that occurs daily at the classroom level has often been overlooked.

  There is evidence that during this period in Sweden, the quantity of teaching in small groups and individualized teaching increased, while whole class teaching decreased. Furthermore, the teaching of interdisciplinary topics and the development of related teaching resources began at this time. This paper defines the “working team” (arbetslag) as a factor for this change, and proposes that the emergence and expansion of the working team was stimulated by decentralization reforms. A working team indicates a team of teachers and students, often consisting of teachers with different subject specialties who are responsible for certain groups of students. The team plans the curriculum and can divide students into flexible group sizes suitable to the content and method of teaching. The working team is now a common concept in Swedish schools. According to the Swedish National Agency for Education, 96% of teachers in the compulsory school participated in a working team in 2003.

  In this paper, the notion of formal and informal institutions is used to link decentralization reforms and change in classroom practice, with the working team considered as a medium. First, the concept and system of working team is introduced and defined within a context of the decentralization of education (i.e., change within formal institutions). Second, how the working team in schools has changed the daily habits and professional practices of teachers, such as teacher collaboration and teaching (i.e., change within informal institutions) is discussed.

  Three projects are discussed: the Trump committee experiment (1964–1965); the VGL experiment in Malmö (1965–1968); and the Sanden school project (1977–1980). The Trump committee experiment aimed to optimize class size, and was itself modeled after an experiment by the American educational researcher, J. L. Trump. Planned by the central government, the experiment found that the Trump model of organizing teachers, teaching assistants and office assistants into one team did not match the professional culture in Swedish schools. The VGL experiment was planned to search for a form of classroom and instructor organization that was better suited to the Swedish school environment, thus the experiment was operated in a more flexible manner. A school in Malmö implemented a model in which two qualified teachers taught three classes with two assistants and one secretary. Again, the division of roles between the teachers and the assistants proved problematic. The two aforementioned experiments were cited in the SIA committee’s report, which investigated the practices and activities inside schools in 1974, and which was the starting point of decentralization reforms in education. Citing these projects, the SIA committee’s report presented the idea of the working team. (View PDF for the rest of the abstract)