Seeking a reflexive space for teaching to and about diversity: emergent properties of enablement and constraint for teacher educators

ABSTRACT

The recasting of teaching as a technical enterprise rather than as a space for intelligent problem-solving means that governments around the world will continue to pursue agendas to regulate and prescribe teacher education. Teacher education reform has been attempted for over 30 years in many countries around the world, yet the crucial priority of preparing teachers for increasingly diverse classrooms has not been addressed. We used reflexivity theory and an innovative social lab methodology to investigate the conditions of teacher education experienced by 12 teacher educators at a metropolitan university in Australia. Personal, structural and cultural emergent properties were evident and were experienced variously as both enablements and constraints. Our findings show that these teacher educators were more constrained than enabled in their reflexivity for teaching to and about diversity. We argue that teacher educators need to form deep and enduring inquiry relationships with schools and communities in order to develop context-specific solutions to address the complexities of teaching to diversity.

KEYWORDS:

• Teacher education
• diversity
• reflexivity
• teacher preparation

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the authors.

Additional information

Notes on contributors

Mary Ryan

Mary Ryan is the head of the Department of Educational Studies at Macquarie University and has an extensive record of program development experience. She is acknowledged internationally for her contribution to research in higher education, is a Principal Fellow of the UK Higher Education Academy and is the recipient of an AAUT citation for outstanding contribution to student learning. Current projects include investigating a reflexive approach to teaching writing in schools; developing pre-service teachers’ epistemic reflexivity to teach to diversity; and tracking the enabling and constraining conditions for teacher education students to manage the demands of the profession.

Terri Bourke

Terri Bourke is a Senior Lecturer and Academic Program Director at the Queensland University of Technology. She teaches into a number of curriculum and discipline units specifically in geography. Her research interests include professional standards, professionalism and accreditation processes especially using the theories of Michel Foucault. Other research areas include assessment in geographical education and teaching to/about diversity.

Jo Lunn Brownlee

Jo Lunn Brownlee is a Professor in the School of Early Childhood & Inclusive Education at the Queensland University of Technology. Her current Australian Research Council Discovery project investigates how teacher educators’ reflexive decision making enables them to prepare teachers for socially just teaching in diverse Australian classrooms. The project takes a transdisciplinary approach by bridging the fields of epistemic cognition and reflexive decision making to explore how rigorous teaching can be enacted in socially and culturally diverse classrooms. This ARC research extends her research program which to date has focused on exploring how epistemic cognition relates to teaching and learning, particularly in early childhood contexts.

Leonie Rowan

Leonie Rowan is an Associate Professor in the School of Education and Professional Studies at Griffith University. Her research relates to the broad fields of higher education, teacher education and the social context of schooling: particularly in regards to the impact of gender on educational experiences and outcomes.

Sue Walker

Sue Walker is a Professor in the School of Early Childhood and Inclusive Education at the Queensland University of Technology and a key researcher in the Cooperative Research Centre (CRC) for Living with Autism Spectrum Disorder. Her research interests include epistemic beliefs and teachers’ practice; early childhood social development; child outcomes in relation to inclusive early childhood education programs; early intervention and the transition to school.

Peter Churchward

Peter Churchward is a PhD student, researching the effect of the current Australian policy environment directed at teacher quality on the development of early career teachers. The research examines how early career teachers, who were graduates of teacher education centres of excellence, have experienced the drive to improve teacher quality.