Les maisons familiales rurales, une forme scolaire "poreuse" dans l’enseignement professionnel français / Rural Family Houses: A “Porous” School Form in French Vocational Education

Abstract

This article highlights how the dominant school form—characterized by a didactic contract and decontextualized knowledge—is evolving under the influence of so-called alternative schools in France. The Maisons Familiales Rurales (MFR, or Rural Family Houses), by integrating professionals as trainers (referred to as moniteurs) and blurring the boundaries between times and places of learning, illustrate a porous school form. This approach enables the circulation of knowledge where practical and oral knowledge takes precedence over written, academic knowledge. The article proposes reconsidering the school form not as a fixed model, but as a negotiated educational order, shaped in interaction with the social conditions of learning. The MFRs thus offer a revealing example of the structural adaptation of the school form in the context of vocational training through initial work-study programs rooted in the agricultural sector.