I love Dyson’s talk about the official and unofficial classroom in the Pine Cone Wars article:
“Through analytic accounts of classroom life, I have aimed to capture the inevitable interplay between the official classroom community, with its values and practices, and the unofficial one generated by children. This interplay can be both beneficial and challenging for all concerned: official literacy practices can generate and become a resource for unofficial childhood practices; and, at least potentially, those unofficial practices may inform and even transform official possibilities.”
Some teachers don’t even acknowledge that there is an unofficial community, to their peril! On the other hand, should we simply acknowledge the unofficial or should we appropriate it and make it part of the official curriculum? Is that even possible?
