L’informatique à l’école : le modèle du « pair-expert » en mutation ?

Since the mid-1980’s, a group of advisers has been appointed in primary schools in order to encourage teachers to use computers in their practice. These resource persons (animateurs TICE - ATICE) still work in primary schools, unlike in secondary schools where some teachers are occasionally appointed as part-time resource persons. Their role, initially characterized by a trial-and-error hands-on approach, has evolved since the early 1990’s toward functions less directly related to learning: using computerized tools to manage the education system, implementing compulsory validation programs (B2i : assessment of computer skills for secondary school students) and national or local experimentations. This paper, based upon a 2007 PhD research, analyses the characteristics of the role these actors play. It describes the multi-faceted transformation process of ATICEs’ professional identity through the study of a professional on-line forum about the use of computers in teaching practices. This forum is very reactive and represents a valuable tool for job-related communication between peers, contributing to spread the official instructions around the teaching community. The lack of an overall and updated institutional framework for this specific mission accounts for the emergence of a professional identity, which expresses itself through experience-sharing within the forum, anchored in expert practice and negotiated with the institution