Racorería de latón estampado según norma UNE EN 12.164

Whilst reducing meta-pedagogy to its possible elements, in isolation of each other, is helpful in terms of analysis, the meta-pedagogical approach taken by teacher educators will be holistic. The elements may come together in different ways, relating to particular models of meta-pedagogy. Whilst it is undoubtedly true that there is no “one best way of educating teachers” (Hoban 2005, quoted in Loughran 2007a:11), there are a number of models of current meta-pedagogy presented in the literature, as well as visions of what it should be. Grossman et al (2009) refer to “our existing repertoire of pedagogies of reflection and investigation” (p274). ‘Pedagogies of investigation’ are referred to by Lampert (2010), who suggests that this enables teacher education to “attend to theory in a way that is situated in practice” (p25). Mueller (2003) also writes of “a pedagogy of reflective

practice” (p72), which, according to Ure (2010), has been the main pedagogical response to the problem of the gap between theory and practice in teacher education – “in the belief that iterative processes refine skills of observation in learning and teaching”(p463). However, despite the emphasis on encouraging student teachers’ reflection (Fisher et al 2010, Kessels & Korthagen 1996, Loughran 2010, Lunenberg & Korthagen 2009), research findings suggest that ‘reflective practice’ lacks clarity in terms of definition and implementation, with the result that it “often defaults to little more than lay thinking” (Ure 2010:463). This contrasts with the professional expertise which is needed, according to Korthagen et al (2005):

The issue of promoting reflection is only one example of an area in which teacher educators need a complex understanding of teaching and learning…[requiring] expertise that, in a professional sense, needs to be clear, explicit and applicable in teaching about teaching. (p108)

Due to time constraints on teacher education programmes, Lunenberg & Korthagen (2009) also suggest that the “intensive individual supervision” (p236) required to promote detailed reflection may not happen. In the absence of an agreed approach to nurturing reflective practice (Mueller 2003), it appears that “there may well be little shared meaning about what it means to do reflection or inquiry in preservice teacher education” –despite similarities in the language used and the activities which are encouraged (Cochran-Smith & Lytle 1999:272).

Cochran-Smith & Lytle (1999) suggest that there is a ‘new’ model of teacher education that is generally “more constructivist than transmission oriented” (p258), which recognises the prior knowledge and experience that student teachers bring with them. However, the “telling, showing and guided practice approach”(Myers 2002, quoted in Loughran & Berry 2005:197), consisting largely of transmission, anecdotes and modelling (Field 2012), appears common, particularly amongst new teacher educators. Adopting a phrase from Berry (2007:118), Bullock (2009:296) talks of the temptation of “(e)nacting a ‘pedagogy of presentation’…, in which I told my candidates about strategies and scenarios that worked when I was a classroom physics teacher”, which reflects the findings from my own study (Field 2012). In addition to this, within the literature there is reference to “a pedagogy of pandering” (Bullock & Ritter 2010:46) and “pedagogies of the obvious” (Segall 2001:240) in HE, and “mediocre pedagogy” demonstrated by (albeit school-based) teacher educators (Buitink 2009).

Although Hau-Fai Law et al (2007) and Carpenter & Tait (2001) comment on the progressive pedagogical practice adopted by the teacher educators in their respective studies, there appears to be a degree of consensus within the wider literature regarding a need to develop the effectiveness of ITE pedagogy, as previously indicated. Somewhat alarmingly, Korthagen et al (2006) suggest that

“teacher education practices are often counter-productive to teacher learning” (p1021), and comment on

the challenge that confronts teacher educators in altering deeply held, acculturated views of teaching and learning and the imperative of moving beyond a narrow instrumentalist approach that emphasizes the “how to”, the “what works”, and the mastering of the “best” teaching methods. (p1036)

In contrast to this ‘narrow approach’, Loughran (2009) suggests that meta-pedagogy “is about knowing the what, why, and how of practice in sophisticated ways” in order to be “able to create pedagogical situations that encourage students of teaching to learn about the problematic nature of teaching”(p201), and needs to

be most clearly evident in a teacher educator’s deep knowledge of, and expertise in, practice in relation to both learning about teaching and teaching about teaching. This view of a pedagogy of teacher education builds on the notion of pedagogy as the relationship between teaching and learning and is particular to the way that such knowledge and practice is developed and enacted in and through teacher education practices. (p199)

As a way forward, Grossman et al (2009) suggest that the existing pedagogical approaches of reflection and investigation should be supplemented by “pedagogies of enactment” (p274): that is, teacher educators attending to clinical aspects of practice, and a move from discussion of what a teacher might do towards student teachers enacting practice. The benefits of this are seen to be as follows:

The more laboratory-like settings provide the chance for novices to get immediate, targeted feedback on their early efforts to enact components of practice…, which can help them hone their practice before entering the more authentic, but also more complex, setting of the…classroom. (p284)

This ‘practice-based curriculum’ would appear to reflect Segall’s (2001) call for teacher education classrooms to be “practicum environments in-and-of themselves where practice gets theorized and theory is not only considered for practice but is indeed practiced” (p240), as well as Kazemi and Hubbard’s (2008, cited in Lampert 2010:27) call “for the rehearsal of “routine instructional activities” in teacher education”. Lampert also refers to the use of“rehearsal as a pedagogy”, and van Huizen et al (2005:284) to “clinical supervision”. The notion of “research-informed clinical practice” is articulated by Burn & Mutton (2013), who describe the latter component as “a deliberate process of rehearsal, intended to refine particular skills…[emphasising] the experiential processes by which novices develop their abilities to teach effectively” (p3). This is not taken to mean learning by imitation, but rather engaging in enquiry, and “the creative processes of interpretation, intervention and evaluation, drawing on diverse sources of knowledge that include research evidence as well as [pupil] data” (p3). The Oxford Internship Scheme is identified as an early model of a programme built

upon these principles in the UK, a collaborative partnership between HE and schools, which relied on on-going analysis and research to inform its development (McIntyre 1997). This has subsequently been incorporated into the Oxford Education Deanery11.

Rather than ‘clinical practice’, which is traditionally associated with medicine, Shulman (1986) proposes ‘case method’, related more readily to law education:

I envision the use of case method in teacher education, whether in our classrooms or in special laboratories with simulations, videodisks and annotated scripts, as a means for developing strategic understanding, for extending capacities toward professional judgment and decision-making. These methods of instruction would involve the careful confrontation of principles with cases, of general rules with concrete documented events – a dialectic of the general with the particular in which the limits of the former and the boundaries of the latter are explored. (p13)

As a first step to developing a new pedagogy of teacher education, if this is indeed desirable, Korthagen et al (2006) advocate an approach which is more focused on the learner – both student teacher and pupil:

If the telling, showing and guided practice approach is to be displaced, there is a need to reconceptualise teaching about teaching in terms of teaching the students, not the curriculum. A subtle, but important reformulation is that this means helping student teachers learn how to teach, i.e., helping them to learn how to help children learn. (p1030)

Gale (2000) also proposes a need “to become ‘learner-centred’ rather than ‘content-centred’”(p136), which will require a rethinking of meta-pedagogy. He suggests moving to problem-based learning, which “challenges traditional assumptions about knowledge, its ownership (expertise) and appropriate relations between teachers and learners”(p136). In similar vein, Edwards (1995) talks of the teacher educator’s role as “contingent supporter of the learning of the less expert [student teacher] …managed through the selection of tasks designed to promote particular forms of dialogue” (p600).

The value of dialogue is also highlighted by Fisher et al (2010), who perceive it as enabling a process where student teachers can “construct new meaning, understand their own learning and their psychology of being a teacher” (p95). How teacher educators adapt their pedagogy to embed learning to learn (or learning how to learn) in their ITE courses is seen to be the challenge here (p97), and, reflecting Edwards’ (1995) observation (above), the possible key to this is “to develop a more collaborative and reciprocal model of teaching and learning” (p99).

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See http://www.education.ox.ac.uk/about-us/the-oxford-education-deanery/the-oxford-education-deanery- 201314-examples-of-practice/

Colucci-Gray & Fraser (2008) privilege a pedagogy of personal inquiry and reflection-based learning for the student teacher, whereby teacher education becomes less “about delivering concepts and models of teaching practice”, and more about “uncovering conceptual maps and adjusting the teaching and learning processes to the learner, so that new learning maps and new conceptualisations can be produced” (p478). Similarly, Ure (2010) suggests a pedagogy which is comprised of these three elements:

discursive processes that favour the use of deep conversations about teaching; professionally constructed learning experiences; and non-judgemental feedback that is focussed on the use of evidence for teaching(p472).

Perhaps more prosaically, Hobson et al (2006) suggest that an effective pedagogy of teacher education

would need to address differentiation and the individualisation of provision within group settings, as well as in one-to-one mentoring or tutoring and, within that, specifically age- related pedagogies, the combining of, and tensions between, providing scaffolding (educational support for learning professional practices) and emotional support. (p61)

What the literature also reveals is the emphasis placed on what student teachers need to learn, rather than on what might be the most effective pedagogical interventions or methods to bring this about, as illustrated in the following statement: “teacher educators should support student teachers in acquiring practical wisdom, theory, and experience in connection with each other” (Lunenberg & Korthagen 2009:232). Cochran-Smith & Lytle (2010), however, do provide some examples of these, making reference to constructivism, pedagogical inquiry, deliberations/reflections (including journal writing and cases of practice) (pp270-1). Korthagen (2004:88) identifies six further methods: modelling, contingency management, giving feedback, instructing, questioning, and cognitive structuring. Zeichner (2007:40) refers to microteaching, case methods, practitioner research, and teaching portfolios. A range of pedagogical strategies which have been used with student teachers to promote reflection are provided by Cheng et al(2012), as “the development of reflective tasks, (video) cases, portfolios, and regular site-based seminars during which tertiary faculty work closely with interns to examine practice against more theoretical inputs”(p783). However, these extracts are not typical, and descriptions of meta-pedagogy are relatively rare within the literature on teacher education.

So, from the literature, it would appear that the current focus in many ITE programmes is on reflection, investigation, and reflective practice, and the associated meta-pedagogies. Within the realm of their ‘elaborated pedagogies’, teacher educators may also adopt a pedagogy of guidance (Murray 2012) related to their work with schools. This links to pedagogy which privileges student teachers enacting practice, which is reported to occur in pockets; these include clinical supervision, case method, and research informed clinical practice, as well as the notion of ‘rehearsal as a pedagogy’. In

addition, a number of researchers have found evidence of constructivist and progressive pedagogies. It appears likely that I may experience various iterations of these meta-pedagogies in conducting my research. What may be less likely is that I encounter models which are predominantly learner-centred, or collaborative and reciprocal. It is possible the research will uncover pedagogies of presentation, pandering, or the obvious – or indeed, mediocre pedagogy. Above all, the study will illuminate elements of these focuses in the teacher educators’ meta-pedagogical practice, whether or not teacher educators label it as such.