The challenges for new academics in adopting student-centred approaches to teaching

Abstract

The current article provides a perspective on the day-to-day challenges that a group of new teachers experienced as they adopted more student-centred approaches to teaching. Three semi-structured interviews were conducted over two years with 11 new teachers from a range of higher education institutions and subject disciplines. The analysis used case studies, alongside a search for common themes, to provide fine-grained insights into the teachers' development. A main finding was that in using approaches that more actively involved the students, the teachers described challenges specific to their local contexts. In particular, the idiosyncrasy of the topic being taught was a key factor. The second finding was that regardless of the conception of teaching held, all teachers described challenges in translating this way of thinking into practice. Such data provides a useful resource for academic developers to open dialogue with new academics about the challenges they face in developing as teachers.

Keywords:

• teacher development
• teaching approaches
• learner-centred
• longitudinal study
• new lecturers

Acknowledgements

Thanks to Dai Hounsell, Teaching Leaning and Assessment Centre, Edinburgh University and Velda McCune, Learning and Teaching Centre, University of Glasgow, for their assistance with the data analysis and helpful comment on drafts of this article.