Session Information
Contribution
Current educational policy developments in Wales (as in many other countries) are setting ambitious targets for improving curriculum and pedagogy as well as pupil achievements. Professional development is seen as integral to these processes, but there remain debates about what constitutes effective professioanl development, and what forms this should take (Borko, 2005). As policy frameworks intensify, accommodations needed to be made between 'outside-in' policy-driven models of professional development, and the 'inside-out' beliefs, goals and priorities of the teachers.This paper reports a collaborative action research study with a large primary school, involving a university researcher (E. Wood) , and the teaching and support staff of the school, in designing, implementing and developing the study. The focus was implementing the Wales Foundation Phase for children age 3-7, and improving the quality of teaching and learning through play, an area that remains a significant challenge in the UK and elsewhere (Wood, 2007a, b). Play presents particular challenges in terms of learning, curriculum and pedagogy because of the tensions between child-initiated and teacher-directed play activities.The research collaboration involved initial guidance on action research methods from the author. The teachers defined their own research objectives, and worked with the author to design their own studies that were relevant to their particular age group. Methods chosen:classroom observation, research conversations with children, video and still images. Reflexive research conversations between the research teams, and with the author, took place during and at the end of the studies, in order to track research processes, outcomes, emerging themes and professional dilemmas.The focus in this paper is on teachers as learners, their engagement in and with the action research process, and the different outcomes of the research collaboration. Three key areas are reported: teachers' engagement in the project; provoking dilemmas of teaching and learning; developing teacher knowledge, and implementing change processes.Theoretically, this analysis takes a situative perspective (Puttnam & Borko, 2000; Borko, 2005) in which learning is conceptualised as changes in participation in socially organised activities, and individuals' use of knowledge as an aspect of their participation in those activities and practices. Furthermore, this study reveals the ways in which participation in a community of research and practice is influenced by the school and local community contexts, given the challenges of including children from range of ethnic minority groups, with 16 community languages amongst new and established migrant groups. Thus a situative perspective on practitioner research is highly context dependent, and reveals contextually relevant professional problems, dilemmas and solutions. This calls into question the juxtaposition between policy-driven forms of professional development, and attempts to promote the relevance of educational research through collaborative school-based research projects.Borko, H. (2005) Professional development and teacher learning: mapping the terrian, Educational Researcher, 33(8) 3-15 Putnam, R. & Borko, H. (2000) What do new views of knowledge and thinking have to say about research on teacher learning? Educational Researcher, 29(1) 4-15 Wood, E. (2007a) Conceptualising a Pedagogy of Play: international perspectives from theory, policy and practice. In D. Kuschner (Ed) Play and Culture Studies, Vol 8, Ablex, Westport, CTWood, E. (2007b) Re-conceptualising child-centered learning in early childhoodeducation, Forum, 49(1), pp 99-102 Teaching and Teacher Education
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