An ethnography of learning in an American urban high school

The purpose of this study was to determine the perceptions of the learning process by students, teachers and administrators in an American urban high school. The ethnographic design of the study allowed eight students, five teachers and three administrators to reflect ahead of time on three open-ended interview questions involving the school background and situations where learning was or was not taking place. The interview material was coded using native categories. Using all of the native quotes, presentations were constructed to delineate the school background and the student, teacher and administrative perspectives on the process of learning. Eleven common learning elements or themes were found to course through the entire bank of data. However, the amount of coverage and the type of coverage given to each of the themes varied among the subcultures of students, teachers and administrators. Each subculture saw the learning process, to some extent, from a unique perspective