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The 81 million people living in the Federal Republic of Germany reside in an area slightly smaller than the state of Montana. Germany is a country with a strong agricultural base and a highly developed and advanced industrial sector. Although German economic growth has slowed since unification in 1990, Germany remains one of the strongest economic powers in Europe and the world, ranking 11th out of 173 countries on the United Nation's Human Development Index.
While Germany is a relatively homogeneous nation, its constitution guarantees the cultural sovereignty of each state. Each of its 16 states has its own ministry of education and distinctive set of political, religious, and cultural traditions. The responsibility for primary and secondary schooling in Germany rests with state and local authorities. Although the Conference of Ministers of Education (KMK) coordinates educational efforts among the states, the federal role in education is limited mainly to the regulation of education and training assistance, including vocational education, and the promotion of scientific research.
Since the late 1940's, the KMK has issued resolutions on topics ranging from the approval of textbooks and parent-school cooperation to the improvement of math and science instruction in the schools. Germany has developed through the KMK a set of de facto national standards and guidelines for school forms, which include agreements on the mutual recognition of school completion qualifications, a common curriculum, and required hours of instruction. These agreements form the basis for a degree of comparability between states in a politically and culturally diverse country and reflects a desire for consensus regarding educational structure, the basic goals of education, course requirements, and requirements for completing school.
Central to any discussion of education is an understanding of the basis of the school curriculum. Issues related to curriculum have been addressed by the KMK, and many have dealt with instruction in science and mathematics in particular. A 1968 resolution presented a detailed justification for "modernizing" math instruction and a set of curricular guidelines encompassing grades 1-13. (Empfehlungen und Richtlinien zur Modernisierung des Mathematikunterrichts an den allgemeinbildenden Schulen 1968). Examples of other resolutions related to math and science include: "Improving Math and Science Instruction at the Gymnasien of the Federal Republic of Germany" (1970), "School Experiments as a Means of Improving Science Instruction" (1971), and "Recommendations and Guidelines for Math Instruction in the Elementary School" (1976). Each of these resolutions is the product of education research and a common desire by the states to create a set of voluntary national standards in key subjects.
Our aim in this volume is to provide an overview of several important aspects of German schooling that will complement the data of the Third International Math and Science Study (TIMSS). The TIMSS study administered math and science achiev ement tests and surveys in many nations around the world. The case studies, from which this volume results, were designed to illuminate the cultural and structural context in which schooling takes place in Germany, Japan, and the United State s, and to promote a better understanding of how key policy issues facing U.S. educators are dealt with in these other cou ntries.
The research goal in each of the three countries selected for case study research was to conduct an in-depth study of four policy topics of key interest to U.S. policymakers. These are national standards in education, teacher's preparation and working lives, the role of school in adolescents' lives, and how students' differences in ability are managed by the school system. This qualitative information provides the supplementary contextual information necessary for educators to assess and interpret the quantitative data collected through the TIMSS.
In all three countries, an ethnographic case study method was used to investigate the four major topics. An extensive review of the relevant literature served as background for the formulation of the research topics. Topics and questions were generated and refined by educators and social scientists from the University of Michigan's Center for Human Growth and Development, review panels affiliated with the U.S. Department of Education in Washington, DC, education scholars in Germany and Japan, and the field researchers. This approach ensured that the questions studied were relevant to U.S. policymakers and applicable in the German and Japanese context. This common set of questions was investigated in each of the three countries (Germany, Japan, and the United States) involved in the Case Studies Project.
The researchers met for a weeklong training session at the University of Michigan prior to the field visits. Because the design called for unstructured interviews and conversations, the training helped assure that the qualitative data would be collected in a consistent yet thorough manner and with a high degree of validity and objectivity. There were guidelines for a common set of questions for each topic, but the actual interview was designed to be free flowing. Researchers were instructed to probe for additional explanations and elaboration of answers when responses were unclear or seemed incomplete.
To facilitate data analysis and provide cross-culturally comparative reports, the researchers developed mutually agreed upon sets of code words to tag and sort the descriptive data within a qualitative data management computer program. Training was provided on use of the data management program, and researchers were each given a portable computer loaded with this program for use in the field as well as a modem for electronic mail communication with the Center for Human Growth and Development and fellow team members.
The National Center for Education Statistics (NCES), in consultation with the case studies project director and German colleagues, chose three cities as field sites. The main site was chosen to be roughly similar to the main sites in the United States and Japan, according to several characteristics such as size, demographics, economic base, and geographic centrality.
In Germany, the three research sites selected were in three different regions: central, eastern, and southern. These three sites were chosen because they represent regional, socioeconomic, and ethnic diversity, as well as the various educational structures found in Germany. Within each of these sites schools were selected to obtain the full range of school forms that exist at the secondary level as well as at schools of high, middle, and low academic achievement. The primary research site was called Central City. The two secondary sites were called South City and East City. To preserve the anonymity of all sites and persons interviewed, pseudonyms are used throughout the volume.
Although the majority of schools visited were located in urban or suburban areas, a few schools at the primary field site were located in rural settings just outside of the metropolitan area. The number of schools visited at the primary and secondary field sites differed. Schools at the primary field site included elementary, lower secondary, and higher secondary levels, and in accord with the grades tested by TIMSS, attention was focused on the 4th, 8th, and 12th grades. A smaller number of schools were visited at the secondary sites.
In Germany, the inclusion of fourth grade was of special importance for the case studies, because (in most states) it is the last grade of elementary school, and the classrooms still include students of all levels of ability. Students in the 8th and 12th grades attend specialized forms of schooling into which they are tracked according to their level of ability. Therefore, at the middle school level, we visited 8th-grade classrooms in four different types of schools, and at the 12th-grade level we visited both academic and vocational secondary schools.
The field research was primarily gathered by means of interviews and conversations with teachers, administrators, students, and parents, in addition to classroom and general observations. All interviews were conducted in German, and each researcher was responsible for investigating one of the four major research topics. Although the above-mentioned interviews and observations provided the majority of the ethnographic research data, discussions were also held with school authorities and governmental policy experts at the state and national levels. The researchers also collected documents from schools, career-counseling centers, state ministries of education and affiliated research institutes, companies, and the Conference of Ministers of Education.
Altogether more than 180 interviews were held with parents, teachers, students, school administrators, and counselors. Of these, 41 were with individuals connected to a Grundschule (elementary school), 80 were with individuals connected either to a Hauptschule, Realschule, Mittelschule, or Gesamtschule (different types of middle schools), 28 were with individuals connected to a Gymnasium (college-bound high school), and 35 were with individuals connected with a Berufsschule or Berufliches gymnasium (vocational high schools). Officials from a state ministry of education and from the KMK were also interviewed to obtain state and federal perspectives on a variety of educational issues.
Researchers also conducted at least a dozen observations at each of the traditional school forms: the Grundschule, the Hauptschule, the Realschule (or combined Haupt/Realschule), and the Gymnasium. A smaller number of observations were conducted at the Gesamtschule, Berufsschule, and Berufliches gymnasium by each field researcher.
Despite initial reluctance on the part of several schools to participate in the study, we found the principals and teachers at all of the schools we visited to be very open and willing to share their views and experiences with us. The majority of these interviews took place in the schools, although a few were held over coffee in nearby coffee shops. Interviews with students were easy to arrange through the principals or classroom teachers. Most were conducted individually at the school. A few were conducted as group interviews. Parents, both fathers and mothers, were also very willing to meet with us and talk about their views and experiences. Most of these interviews were arranged for us by the school principals and were conducted in the parent's homes.
The interview and observation data were transcribed, translated and entered by each of the researchers into a qualitative data analysis program called HyperQual2. Using HyperQual2, the researchers were able to assign codes (tags) to passages, which referred to certain frequently occurring themes. Although a common set of codes was agreed upon prior to the research, the researchers were also allowed to add to their coding scheme as they felt necessary. This coding system allowed the researchers to analyze and sort the tagged data from each of the interviews and observations by searching and extracting all of the field research findings related to specific themes.
Members of the German research team worked together in Germany for 3 months in the fall of 1994. Although they were able to communicate easily with each other electronically through an e-mail system that also linked them with staff at the University of Michigan, the German research team also met regularly to discuss their findings and assess their progress. Following the field research, copies of each individual's research data were submitted to the University of Michigan for storage and to facilitate access by other team members as they began the long process of data analysis and report writing. In addition, the researchers returned to the University of Michigan for several days to meet as a group, present preliminary findings, and exchange ideas related to the findings.
The process of analyzing the data and writing the field reports began almost immediately. Once the data were transcribed and translated, tagged and sorted, the individual researchers each spent several months writing their chapters. Draft copies of each chapter were submitted to the project director, Harold Stevenson, for review and comments. The authors then worked to refine their drafts, responding to the comments provided. The resulting chapters, which appear in this volume, are the result of many months of intensive work.
Jürgen Baumert, a German professor of education, and Rainer Lehmann, the German national research coordinator for the TIMSS project, assisted the Case Studies project in gaining access to schools. To this end, Baumert and Lehmann submitted applications for research to the appropriate state ministries of. Once the state ministries had approved the application for research, letters were sent to schools selected by our German colleagues asking for their cooperation. The final decision to participate was left up to the individual schools, and in some cases principals sought permission from the teaching faculty before responding to our request. Although this practice led to a delay in the case of one school?s participation, the researchers found that all of the principals and teachers were welcoming and cooperative once the decision had been made. Arrangements to interview teachers and students were almost always made through the principals of the schools, and most parent interviews were arranged for us through the principal as well. Although the researchers tried to obtain interviews from a full range of students and parents, we found that those who were interviewed were either average or highly involved parents and students. Observations of math and science classes were often arranged for the researchers on the day of the visit, with principals requesting permission of the teacher as the researcher was being introduced to them. As a result of the spontaneity of these arrangements, researchers were given the opportunity to observe the types of classes, which are typical of these schools, not pre-rehearsed or specially prepared lessons.
[Chapter 1: (Part 2 of 3)]