Teachers, Reflection, and Socially Just Pedagogy

EEP442 and EEP418Lecture 10

Teachers, Reflection, and Socially Just Pedagogy

Module 3

• Reflect on your teaching practice• Reflect on your becoming teacher identity• Reflect on how occupying a position of privilege might enable

you to work for social change through socially just pedagogies

How can we use our pedagogies to bridge gaps for our students in terms of their outcomes and engagement with schooling.

What difference can pedagogy make?

Teachers and schools can make a difference to a more equitable society – but not all the difference (Hayes, et al, 2006)

There are no quick fixes, no easy methods, no one size fits all when it comes to trying to improve the outcomes and

engagement levels of your students(Kamler & Comber, 2008, p.74)

The Socially Just Teacher

• Who are my students?

• What do they need?

• How can I help?

• Are the current policies, curriculums, practices and pedagogies making social inequalities worse? Could I do things differently? Would this help those who are disadvantaged most?

What are socially-just pedagogies?

Socially Just Pedagogy

What can I do differently?

Relationships

Expectations

Being Reflexive

Individual learning

plans

Who is at a disadvantage?

Socially Just Pedagogies

Socially just pedagogies are the firm belief that everyone has the right to a quality education – that if someone is not doing well at school – it is because the system is not

looking after them – the system is not teaching them well enough.

It is the socially just teachers’ role to:

• make the system more accountable in any way possible• use their pedagogies to try and bridge the gaps

...different names, same idea…• Authentic pedagogies (US) – authentic learning

• Quality pedagogies (NSW) - Intellectual quality; a Quality learning environment; significance

• Critical pedagogies - philosophical and political notion

• Turn-around pedagogies (see Kamler & Comber, 2005) – turning ‘problem children’ into ‘children of promise’

• Place-based pedagogies (see Thomson, 2006) – learning about the local; local networks

• Productive pedagogies (QLD) – (see over)

There are several models that can provide a framework under which teachers can choose to develop strategies…

Turn Around PedagogiesAt the commencement of the research they identified students who they were particularly concerned about

in terms of literacy outcomes. The challenge was to learn more about their students ‘funds of knowledge’, their ‘virtual school bags’, their family resources, and their investments in popular culture

OUTCOME

Teachers turned their ‘problem students’, those with the lowest outcomes into ‘children of promise’ by learning about them as people.

SO

Here, ‘turning around’ is a process – ‘an everyday (rather than miraculous) event…turning around involves a physical and embodied turn by the teacher – moving to see the child and their families in different

contexts with a new lens…’

It also involves putting the structure and design of the teacher’s curriculum and pedagogy at the centre of the problem – rather than blaming the individual student for ‘failure’

’

Place Based Pedagogies

Miners, Diggers, Ferals and Showmen

Place-based curriculum ideally assists young people to build local networks; make them engaged in their learning; and make them feel like they are somebody in this particular place…

Productive Pedagogies Dimensions

• Intellectual Quality

• Relevance/connectedness

• Supportive classroom environment

• Recognition of difference

PRODUCTIVE PEDAGOGIES (Lingard, 2007)

Productive Pedagogies and Critical Reflection

Do my lessons foster….Intellectual quality: deep thinking and deep engagement

Connectedness and relevance: drawing on knowledge beyond the classroom relevant to students

In my practice, do I ensure….

A supportive classroom environment

Recognition of difference

Reflection in TeachingWhat is reflexivity?

Regularly putting your own practice, attitudes and knowledge under the microscope

The reflexive teacher is a life long learner who…

1. Sees professional development as a career long commitment2. Reads the research and practitioner magazines3. Is engaged in issues that effect their profession4. Is self-reflexive and documents their reflections5. Strives for authentic, productive, quality, turn-around pedagogies6. Strives to be a better teacher

What is your understanding of reflective practice in teaching?

Teachers have a responsibility to learn throughout their professional lives so that they can continue to develop effective ways to enhance children's learning and wellbeing. Research evidence shows that reflective practice

can help educators to become increasingly thoughtful about their work and motivate them to explore new ideas and approaches.

- Respond thoughtfully and with integrity to complex situations and challenges

- Make careful and well-informed decisions and plans

- Implement and evaluate changes in their practices and policies

- Be accountable to families, colleagues and communities for their choice of approaches and methods

- Improve learning experiences and outcomes for children

Delpit (1995), speaking about teaching in multicultural contexts, claims it is necessary ‘to really see, to really know the students we must teach’ (p. 183).

STOP. THINK. CHANGE.

The Self-Reflective Teacher• Learning about yourself…learning about your own thinking,

your own practice

• It is claimed that we do not learn by experience but by reflecting on experience

• Deep learning is about looking beyond the obvious, challenging the accepted norm and seeking to connect knowledge

How to be Reflexive

• It’s a way of thinking and way of operating• It’s about being self-critical• It’s about having a conversation with yourself• It’s about conversing and planning with colleagues• It’s about articulating your thinking and

documenting your practice– Professional learning journal– Professional blogs– Teaching portfolios

Making a difference: Early career English teachers research their practice

Example of a teacher who was brave enough to put her own pedagogies, under the microscope – particularly around her own

feedback techniques – and she asked students how useful her feedback was for them….

This teacher undertook ‘research’ to find out the effectiveness of this particular pedagogy:1. Reviewed the literature on feedback 2. Assessed her own feedback techniques3. Surveyed students through a written questionnaire4. Invited students to write narrative memoirs about writing and

feedback

Why Research?• Enhances your professional development• Key to being a reflexive professional• Take ownerships and responsibility of your learning• Able to talk to others about practice and planning• Gives you ideas• Fill gaps in the knowledge and produce new theories• Encourages teacher learning in individuals and groups of

teachers• More equitable teaching practice• Recognition of diversity• Increase learning for all students

What we have covered….• Policy• Competition• School Choice• Neo-liberalism• Neo-conservatism• Marketisation• Globalisation’• Gender• Race• Sexuality• Social Class• Social Justice

What we have seen is that schooling can make social inequalities worse, especially due to recent moves towards neoliberal market practices of competition and economic rationalism. Our students can be disadvantaged through being positioned as ‘losers’ – they can be disadvantaged through discourses of childhood, through

social class, through gender and sexuality, through race and ethnicity, Indigeneity, through their social, cultural and economic

background.

BUT schools are also an ideal place to address these social inequalities by trying to bridge the gaps through socially just

pedagogies…

Socially Just PedagogiesSees students not as ‘problems’ but as full of promise

– have high expectations– overcome deficit theories

Sees students and their families in a positive light– research & get to know the local community

Fosters connectedness and relevance for the student– popular culture– cultural background– students’ interests, knowledge and experience drawn on

Fosters a supportive classroom environment– attitudes and relationships– inclusive curriculums– official rewards and recognition– recognises difference in your class

• conference with student/get to know student

• conference with student and parents/carers

• personal learning plans

• research/reflect on own pedagogies

• popular culture pedagogies/visual literacies

• place-based curriculum – local community projects

• critical pedagogies

• look into programs & support & funding available

• talk to a trusted colleague and/or executive teacher

• start a support/peer group

The role of theory in reflective practice

How can the sociological theories we have encountered in this subject help us to think

through the way we teach?

• Reproduction theory• Critical race theory• Feminist theory