Digitalization pushes the way we relate, communicate, teach, and learn. Teacher education (TE) plays a key role to ensure high quality and relevance of the transformation process to a digitized society (Starkey, 2020). Still, a gap exists between the student teachers’ (STs) need for professional digital competence (PDC) to support pupils’ learning in digitized learning contexts and the education actual offered in TE (Fernández-Batanero et al., 2022; Instefjord & Munthe, 2017). Simultaneously, research show that developing professional digital competence in educational settings are complex subject- and context specific processes, which cannot be made generic or separated from the overall process of teaching and learning (Sargent & Calderón, 2021; Aagard et al., 2022). Hence, the fusion of technology and education needs to be developed from within and integrated in the specific contexts of TE practices (Brevik et al., 2019; Aagaard et al., 2022). 

This study is situated in the context of a three-year digital research- and development project, “Learning Avatar”, enrolled in TE programs in physical education (PE) and performing arts (PFA), respectively. In these subjects there exist inherent tensions between the embodied, collaborative and situated nature of the subjects’ learning versus assumptions of disembodied and decontextualized digitized ways of learning (Andersson et al., 2023; Gallagher et al., 2020; Li & Wong, 2023). Until now, research in these fields have been sparse, especially when zooming into the broader pedagogical implications of implementing technology in physical subjects (Andersson, 2023; Koekoek & Van Hilvoorde, 2019). Hence, exploring if and how technology could reshape, transform and develop the quality of teaching and learning of PE and PFA from within is in crucial need for more investigation (Koekoek & Van Hilvoorde, 2019; Sargent & Calderón, 2021). Thus, the study aims to explore the transformative learning processes of teacher educators (TEds) related to PDC while participating in an interdisciplinary PDC development project in the context of PE and PFA teaching education.

Transformative learning theory (TLT; Kitchenham, 2008; Mezirow, 1997) is a developmental framework explaining the process where adult learners’ frames of references (e.g., assumptions, beliefs and worldviews) are confronted, revised or restructured to guide new and more nuanced future actions (Mezirow, 1997). To engage in transformative learning and foster change, TEds must encounter situations, often referred to as “disorienting dilemmas” (e.g., fusion of technology and education), that cause them to critically question and challenge their currently held frames of reference (Code et al., 2022; Kitchenham, 2008; Mezirow, 1997). Facing a disoriented dilemma creates a situation in which the TEds either can neglect the tensions, reject PDC as relevant, and thus, resist the change, or take on agency and engage in a transformative learning process (Code et al., 2022).

Based on the aforementioned, the following research questions guided our work:

1. What are the frames of references constituting the TEds’ understanding of PDC and in what ways do the TEds experiencing PDC as a disoriented dilemma in relation to PE and PFA teacher education?
2. What kind of transformative learning processes are experienced by the TEds in PE and PFA in relation to PDC on individual and study program level from pre-phase to post-phase during the Learning Avatar project?
3. What factors promote or inhibit transformative learning processes when teacher education programs facilitate change and development?

The context of the study is the Learning Avatar project. The overall aim of the LA project is to enhance student-active learning and teacher students' PDC using an experimental teaching simulation laboratory for the further development, testing, and evaluation of a digital visualization 3D app in TE and school practicum. The LA tool offer the potential to produce physical subject material in 3D format with tools to zoom in/out, shift perspective, and tempo, and thus, potentially assist and extend the presence of the teacher in these subjects in various ways. This study departure from the TEds’ perspective and their transformative learning process during all phases of the project and include seven TEds that function as both participants and practitioner researcher. They/we represent PE (2 male/1 female) and PFA (4 female) and have varied and complementary subject-specific, pedagogical, didactical, sociological, and PDC competence and experience. The study is positioned in practitioner inquiry (Cochran-Smith & Lytle, 2015; Hordvik et al., 2020). An advantage of practitioner inquiry is its flexibility, and we integrated characteristics like authentic professional context as case, collaboration in a community of practice, blurred boundaries between research and practice, and systematic procedures for data collection and analysis (Cochran-Smith and Lytle, 2009). Data was collected during all the project phases and consisted of written planning and evaluation notes (6), transcripts of audio recording of peer debriefing sessions of knowledge- and experience sharing (7), and structured individual reflection notes related to (a) TEds’ PDC frames of reference (9) and (b) TEds teaching experience (21). In the data analysis process, we used a six-phase reflexive thematic analysis (Braun & Clarke, 2021). Familiarizing data involved listening to all interviews, reading data transcripts, and note-taking for first-impression ideas to establish a thorough overview of the whole data set. Initial coding was conducted by marking text extracts with first-impression code names. Subsequent phases, 3↔5, involved further theme and sub-theme development by arranging the relevant initial codes into broad initial themes and grouping the themes into categories. Finally, the themes and sub-themes were defined, named and refined into the results. The project was submitted to and approved by the Norwegian Agency for Shared Services in Education and Research, and informed content was attained. In line with the practitioner-inquiry design, the participants were also the researcher. Thus, reflexivity, structure/systematically, prolonged engagement, and collective meta-reflection were important tools to enhance trustworthiness.

Findings revealed that the disorienting dilemma was constituted by layers of tensions regarding PDC in PE and PFA: (a) PE and PFA as unique subjects vs. digitalized ways of learning; (b) technological trends vs. less screen time as health promotion, (c) governmental expectations of digitalization vs. personal experienced reality, (d) traditional vs. renewed views on teaching and learning, and (e) TE’s’ vs. STs’ experience and familiarization with technology from before and after the digital era. These tensions triggered a need for agency and development, resulting in active engagement in the transformation process. During the pre- to post-phase, a change in our PDC assumptions, knowledge, and practice appeared. For example, a more positive attitude with less resistance or fear of the unknown, and enhanced PDC competence and more nuanced views on the role of technology in teaching and learning. Still, we kept a critical view of the implementation of technology and digital tools in relation to our embodied subjects. Especially emphasized is the need of PDC to be subject-specific and connected to a pedagogical purpose. As with other aspects of educational practice, digital technology can make the education better or worse, depending on how it is used. In regard change of practice, the transformation process influenced the way we facilitated PDC in our TE programs (e.g., study plans, curriculum) and in own teaching, which transformed from being about PDC to also focusing more on how to integrate PDC in own teaching practice. Lastly, the results identified four categories that influenced the transformation processes: (a) learning as doing and reflecting - actions as the drive, (b) collaborative learning with or from peers, (c) a process of revising and re-structuring own theory of practice, and (d) organization and contextual settings. The implications of these findings for TE in PE and PFA are discussed.

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