Thinking together in the UK and Mexico: transfer of an educational innovation

Abstract

The Thinking Together educational programme was first developed in the UK to promote the use of exploratory talk in primary classrooms. It emerged out of a strong tradition of group work and the promotion of oracy in the UK curriculum. The approach was then adapted and applied in te very different context of Mexican state primary education. In this paper we compare the programme in Mexico with the programme in the UK. We explore the similarities and the differences in the implementation of the programme and in the research findings. This comparison leads to three main conclusions:
- that both quantitative results and the results of discourse analysis were remarkably similar in the two studies despite the marked differences in social and cultural context;
- that the relationship between teacher's normal practice and the proposed intervention was closer in the UK than in Mexico and this impacted on the implementation and the sustainability of the project.
- that there are some signs that the programme may have empowered girls in mixed gender group work in Mexico in a way that was not noted in the UK

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