Session Information
15 SES 06, Conceptualisation
Paper Session
Contribution
In this paper we explore how teaching as a profession is understood by considering the conceptual framing of practice by researchers, policy makers and practitioners themselves. We engage with paradigmatic contexts in terms of modes of research into and discourse about practice and provide an overview of the language(s) used, and key areas of consensus and debate.
There have been many ‘false starts’ in practice research, many of which centre around dualist views of knowledge (e.g. Mode 1 and 2) and enquiry (e.g. spectator/ participant). Presented with dichotomies we are invited to take sides, for example Hammersley asks “is action research a form of research [...] or it is a form of action?” (2004, p.170). Our empirical research in partnership with teachers on the importance of metacognitively rich pedagogy and the role of tools in supporting not only student learning but also teacher learning (Baumfield et al. 2009; Lofthouse and Hall, 2014) has led to a resistance to these proffered binaries and the re-framing collaborative practitioner enquiry as an epistemology (Lofthouse, 2014).
In order to do this we focus in this paper on the nature of the activity of teaching, for as Zeichner et al. (2015) point out what we think teaching is dictates what it is we think teachers should know and how they should learn. Drawing on Higgins (2010), we explore the extent to which Arendt’s typology of ‘labour’, ‘work’ and ‘action’ serves to illuminate the realities of the classroom. By resisting the binaries we are able to examine the quality agendas (Wittek and Kvernbekk, 2011) implicit in the ‘choices’: one critique of ‘action research’ is that it fails to meet research quality criteria, here we consider whether and how it meets criteria for action. In this paper we will examine how definitions of quality map on to Arendt’s classification of activities and how differing quality agendas might block or facilitate teachers in moving between types of activity. Arendt directs our attention not only to the intent of teachers’ activities but the cultural and economic context for them, pointing out the structural limitations that constrain teachers, how activity and language in the context shape both what we do and what questions we ask about it. Crucially, her positioning of ‘action’ as the transformational element in education creates the possibility of locating the “crack [in everything].. that lets the light get in” (Cohen, 1968). Locating our discussion within a Pragmatist perspective, (Baumfield, 2016) we engage with Higgins’ identification of three limitations to enacting Arendtian ‘action’ in the classroom: the nature of the public space; the power imbalance in classroom relationships and the extent to which Education is an external end. Taking the position that teaching is both a praxis and has the end of developing multiple forms of praxis, we will argue that the action is not mainly the building of knowledge with the learners but - taking from Bereiter (2002) the idea of teachers working in two knowledge communities- it is the building of knowledge about teaching and learning, an unending epistemic quest (Knorr-Cetina, Hall, 2009) which has characteristics of Arendt’s ‘action’.
Method
Expected Outcomes
References
Baumfield, V.M, E, Hall et al (2009) Catalytic Tools: understanding the interaction of enquiry and feedback in teachers’ learning. European Journal of Teacher Education 32(4): 423-435. Baumfield, V.M (2016) Democratic Pedagogy: thinking together in F. Coffield and S.E. Higgins ‘Dewey Centenary of Democracy and Education’ London: Institute of Education Press Bereiter, C (2002) Education and Mind in the Knowledge Age. Mahwah, NJ, Lawrence Erlbaum Associates. Cohen, L. (1968) Selected poems London: Viking Lofthouse R (2014) Engaging in educational research and development through teacher practitioner enquiry; a pragmatic or naïve approach? Education Today, 64, 4, 13-19 Hall, E. (2009) Engaging in and engaging with research: teacher inquiry and development Teachers and teaching: theory and practice, 15, 6, 669-682 Hammersley, M. (2004) Action research: a contradiction in terms?, Oxford Review of Education, 30:2, 165- 181. Higgins, C (2010) Human Conditions for Teaching: The Place of Pedagogy in Arendt’s Vita Activa Teachers College Record 112, 2, pp. 407–445 Knorr Cetina, K. (2001). Objectual Practice. In T. R. Schatzki, K. Knorr Cetina, & E. von Savigny (Eds), The Practice Turn in Contemporary Theory. Abingdon: Routledge Lofthouse, Rachel, and Elaine Hall. "Developing practices in teachers’ professional dialogue in England: using Coaching Dimensions as an epistemic tool." Professional Development in Education 40.5 (2014): 758-778. Wittek, L & Kvernbekk, T (2011) On the Problems of Asking for a Definition of Quality in Education, Scandinavian Journal of Educational Research, 55:6, 671-684, Zeichner, K, Payne.K.A and Brayko, K (2015) Democratizing Teacher Education, Journal of Teacher Education 66(2): 122-135
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