Preparing teachers for inclusive education: using inclusive pedagogy to enhance teaching and learning for all

As the concept of ‘inclusive education’ has gained currency, students who would previously have been referred to specialist forms of provision, having been judged ‘less able’, are now believed to belong in mainstream classrooms. However, it is often argued that teachers lack the necessary knowledge and skills to work with such students in inclusive classrooms. This paper reports findings of a study of a new initial teacher education course that starts from the premise that the question is not whether teachers have the necessary knowledge and skills to teach in inclusive classrooms, but how to make best use of what they already know when learners experience difficulty. The theoretical rationale for the development of the course is outlined and examples of how teachers might engage in more inclusive practice are presented.     

Scaffolding teachers to foster inclusive pedagogy and presence through collaborative action research

Teachers can be influential change agents in transforming their schools if they regularly reflect on their pedagogical practices, looking for improvements that will help all learners reach their full potential. However, in many sub-Saharan African countries, teachers seldom get an opportunity to collaboratively reflect on their practices. Action research, as an in-service professional development strategy, can be an ideal means of empowering teachers to collaboratively reflect on and improve their pedagogy to be more inclusive. Drawing from collaborative action research projects conducted by teachers in two primary schools in Zanzibar, Tanzania, this article explores the role of collaborative action research in developing the capacity of teachers to inform improvements in their pedagogical practices. The findings show how the participating teachers, with scaffolding influence from a critical friend (research facilitator), developed professionally along their zones of proximal development by promoting their pedagogical and research skills to enhance the presence, participation and achievement of all learners in their schools. Based on the findings, the article shows both the advantages and disadvantages of using collaborative action research in teacher professional development in the study context. The article also discusses the significance of organisational learning in in-service professional development in order to foster inclusive pedagogy through collaborative inquiry among teachers.     

Participatory action research as pedagogy: investigating social and ecological justice learning within a teacher education program

A research collective comprised of teacher candidates, graduate students, and faculty set out to investigate the role and impact of social and ecological justice learning in a teacher education program. Amidst the tensions, negotiations, and articulations of the research design, the collective came to recognize the spaces of participatory action research as sites of growth and efficacy toward justice learning. And, each began to perceive themselves as both impacted by educational structures and as agents enacting their own visions of professional practice. These outcomes are discussed in the context of the growing body of participatory action research, emphasizing the dynamic learning precipitated within the intersections of the research collective. The empirical analysis, involving survey and interview data, brought to bear the rarity of events participants (teacher candidates) recognized as invoking meaningful social and ecological justice learning, and goes some way to describe such learning in terms of embodied experience. The paper closes with a selection of testimonials provided by members of the research collective, offering personal accounts of what was gained through participating in the research process.     

Structured creative processes in learning playwriting: invoking imaginative pedagogies

The concept of the ‘creative’ in creative writing has a vexed history. This article explores the myths surrounding creativity and how they have influenced the way teachers have approached playwriting pedagogy. It reports on research into the teaching and learning experiences of students and teachers in secondary schools, focusing on the participants’ understanding of creativity and the impact this had on the pedagogical process. The research found that a counterproductive idealist view of creativity persists in classrooms: the teachers and students were operating on a conception of creativity and creative practice that reflected a belief in a mystical and unknowable creative process. This article explores the experiences of creativity through systems theory and argues that this approach can inform teaching and learning for creative processes and products. The article concludes that the teaching and learning practices were unnecessarily tentative and that knowledge of creativity theory would improve the students’ development of both playwriting proficiency as well as creativity-relevant skills. It suggests that demystifying the creative process should result in greater student proficiency and improved teaching and learning experiences for teachers and students.     

Expanding and sustaining arts-based educational research as practitioner inquiry

ABSTRACT

As practitioner inquiry is now established as a widely-recognized research tradition and flourishing movement for educational change, we might consider ways that practitioner inquiry could be conceptualized and executed to broaden implementation, deepen understanding, and sustain inquiry within teacher education. Arts-based research may be an ideal methodology for the extension and sustainment of such inquiry as its visual, performative orientation lends itself to participant engagement and provides access in the representation and dissemination of results. This article will put forth models for advancing arts-based practitioner inquiry within the field of teacher education, by drawing from multiple cycles of a dual-layered, ABER study. This vision of arts-based practitioner inquiry is that of inclusion, increasing the number of those who conduct and interact with research; collaboration, blurring boundaries between the inquiries of teacher educators and pre-service teachers; accessibility, tapping into the power of the arts to engage and communicate in ways that scientific language cannot; and continued engagement, using learning from one cycle to inform inquiry in the next.     

Rethinking creativity: Present in expression in creative learning communities*

Often defined as originality and innovation and desired for the economic profits it can produce for both individuals and their societies, creativity has been examined in order to find ways in which it can be promoted through various instructional practices in and beyond schools. Nonetheless, creativity as a fundamental basis of human existence and learning in a shared world is largely understudied. In this article, I examine the commonly held assumptions of creativity as it is incorporated into educational practices—that is, the notion of creativity as developable and achievable, and often as measurable and evaluable. I explore some of the (negative) consequences of understanding creativity in this way and assert the need to reclaim the notion of creativity in order to recognize the ways in which creativity is a part of our everyday lived experiences, always including interactions with the bodily self, co-existing others, and the phenomenal world. Understanding creativity as an expressive mode and way of being in the world encourages a rethinking of creativity in education, positioning creativity as implicitly interwoven in the act of expression as it is undertaken in a community and advocating that this expression ought to be encouraged in both processes and products of learning.     

创新型地理师资的培养

实施创新教育,需要大量的创新型教师。高师地理专业是培养创新型地理师资的摇篮。要更新教育理念,改革课堂教学,对师范生在创新意识、创新思维、创新能力、创新精神诸方面进行全方位的培养。     

Making connections: a conference approach to developing transformative environmental and sustainability education within initial teacher education

Abstract

Children today face significant challenges in response to living in a globalised world and the predicted environmental threats to the planet. However, implementing environmental and sustainability education (ESE) within schools can be complex and is often ignored within initial teacher education (ITE). In response, this project aimed to evaluate pedagogies for developing transformative learning for ESE within the context of university-based ITE. We ran a conference for trainee teachers informed by critical, participatory and arts-based pedagogic approaches. Alongside this, we undertook an interpretive case study, collecting data through questionnaires, focus groups and in-conference spoken reflection. Findings suggest trainee teachers gained a more nuanced understanding of the value and nature of ESE, as well as more affective and informed engagement with it, across the conference. Implications for ESE within ITE focus around the potential of pedagogies which provide affective experiences, in particular participatory and arts-based pedagogical approaches, for inspiring and empowering trainee teachers to enter into schools and develop their own ESE practice as classroom teachers.     

Inclusive pedagogy in action: getting it right for every child

A key assumption underpinning formative assessment strategies is that individual pupils must be fully involved in the process. While such engagement and attention on the individual is important, studies suggest that teachers do not always readily engage with formative assessment as a reciprocal process which involves pupils. Additionally, a focus on individual differences between pupils can be problematic if the work that is set for some is differentiated to such an extent that they are not able to participate in classroom activities with others. Inclusive pedagogy is an approach to teaching and learning that attends to individual differences between pupils but avoids the marginalisation that can occur when pedagogical responses are designed only with individual needs in mind. Using participant observation and video footage from three classrooms that captured ‘learning moments’ identified by teachers and pupils, this study documents how the professional craft knowledge of teachers develops as they learn to use what their pupils have to say about learning in the context of whole class teaching. By concentrating on the findings from one site, this paper shows how teachers can use what they learn from listening to pupils’ self-assessments of their learning in ways that meet the standard of inclusive pedagogy.     

Towards educational inclusion in a contested society: from critical analysis to creative action

This paper is written by democratic educators who stand for the idea that is it worth developing, through classrooms and schools, a socially just (egalitarian), anti‐discriminatory society where interdependent relationships are valued. This paper significantly develops some of the ideas explored in the authors’ earlier contribution concerned with progress in Northern Ireland towards educational inclusion, and how this might more effectively advance in a post‐conflict transforming society. In particular, the paper poses the ‘so what’ question, and it responds by exploring the practical implications of six key ideas thought essential for transforming learning environments supportive of cultural diversity, equity and excellence for all. In addition, it includes examples of how school staff, along with collaborating partners, might utilize these key principles in order to facilitate school improvement.     

Combining feminist pedagogy and transactional distance to create gender-sensitive technology-enhanced learning

In this paper, we argue for a new synthesis of two pedagogic theories: feminist pedagogy and transactional distance, which explain why and how distance education has been such a positive system for women in a national distance learning university. We illustrate this with examples of positive action initiatives for women. The concept of transactional distance allows us to explore distance as a form of psychological and communication space, not simply of geographical distance. Feminist pedagogy, on the other hand, has recognised the importance of gender in structuring disciplines as well as teaching strategies. Both theories implicitly position the face-to-face classroom as the ideal learning environment, with the implication that distance learning has to produce a deficient environment. We argue that the evidence for women does not support this and present examples of feminist distance learning provision that has offered successful technology-enhanced learning and educational opportunities.     

自主创新学习的教学模式分析

自主创新的课堂教学模式是以学生为主体，教师为主导的教学模式，注重学生的自主性和发展性，不仅让学生获得知识，而且要让学生得到自主创新学习的体验，以培养他们的创新意识，创新精神和创新能力，实现创新教育的目的。学生自主创新学习能力的培养主要通过定位，探究，评价，内化四个环节的双边活动进行。     

Feminist pedagogy and social change: the impact of the caribbean institute in gender and development

This paper examines the utility of a feminist pedagogical framework in establishing and organising the Caribbean Institute in Gender and Development (CIGAD), which is a biennial intensive gender and development training programme that has taken place in Barbados since 1993. To highlight the major impact that CIGAD has had in educating and empowering Caribbean men and women, the authors will first discuss the importance of feminist pedagogies in teaching, learning and activism in this programme by locating them within an intersectional postcolonial/transnational framework. Secondly, the authors consider the ways in which feminist pedagogy and praxis have been central in training women and men in the Caribbean region in gender analysis, helping them recognise the important role gender plays in development planning and policy as well as how it can be integrated into their work to improve their communities. Finally, through a feminist dialogic, participatory and experiential approach, the authors assess the impact that the CIGAD has had on participants, and community development training will be discussed based on the monitoring and evaluation of the exercise completed in 2014.     

Action learning and the creative industries: the efficacy of an action learning set in building collaboration between a university and creative industries

In the UK, the creative sector has been identified as a key strand in the economic recovery strategy. Composed of mostly micro and small enterprises often grouping together for particular commissions and projects, there is a tendency to operate primarily through a series of networks made up of peers. This paper presents the outcomes of a ‘peer-to-peer business programme’, or action learning set, involving 10 participants from the creative sector over a period of 6 months. The programme was based on a ‘Six-Squared’ model where participants would address their own needs alongside participating in, and developing further understanding of, action learning sets in order to establish sets with others. Assessment of outcomes indicated that the programme allowed participants to develop new skills with peers, network and strengthen relationships and collaborate in a university programme. The paper concludes by suggesting that, within the context of a growing and vibrant creative industries sector and increasing pressures on universities to engage with the business community, it is essential to develop flexible, peer-led and innovative models of collaboration.     

Opportunities for a democratic pedagogy: a comparative study of South African and Swedish teachers' attitudes to inclusive education

This paper is based upon the collaboration between two research groups from Stockholm University and the University of South Africa. The main objective is to compare attitudes between South African (SA) and Swedish teachers regarding inclusive education (IE). IE in this paper is examined as a distinct part of the Swedish welfare system. The method used can be characterised as a combined, quantitative and qualitative research design with a purposive sampling. A similar adapted questionnaire was distributed in the two countries. The Swedish teachers in our data are more pro‐inclusion and more hesitating to accommodate learners with barriers in special schools. However, both the Swedish and the SA teachers in the study are hesitating towards the feasibility to implement IE practically. A team approach is concluded to be an adequate pedagogy for supporting IE both in South Africa and Sweden.     

Developing Movement as inclusive pedagogy

This article details the emergence of a training framework to support professional development in inclusive Movement teaching. This arose from a collaborative research project in spring 2008 (supported by the Training and Development Agency, UK), between two universities in England and Israel. Movement education is surprisingly underused globally, even in the early years, with some recent revival within special education. This is despite the long-recognised importance of interactive physical activity for underpinning children's development, and particularly for those with special educational needs, supported by findings from neuro-science. The training framework falls within a hermeneutic view of the teacher informed by humanistic psychology and reflective practice, with Movement seen as an empowering, creative and dialogic pedagogy.     

国外职前融合教育教师培养模式及其对我国的启示

融合教育的普及与质量提升对融合教师提出了更高的要求。当前教师培养的模式需要进行调整以应对融合教育带来的挑战。本文对国外两种主要的融合教育教师培养模式进行了介绍,分析了两种模式的课程调整方式、课程调整内容、课程实施方式以及两种模式各自的优缺点,并在此基础上,针对我国的融合教师培训现状,提出了融合教师培养的若干建议。     

From marginality to the mainstream: learning from action research for sustainable development

Education for sustainable development establishes the need for change within education; in particular, teacher education is recognised as a priority for reorientation towards sustainability needs. The Ubuntu Network is an action research programme, focusing on supporting teacher educators to explore the integration of development education and education for sustainable development into their programmes and professional practice in Ireland. From 2006 to 2008, 22 action research projects were implemented within nine post-primary teacher education programmes in Ireland and collectively published in an e-book. A systematic review of these projects was undertaken to identify emerging themes with a view to informing future work of the Ubuntu Network, and to guide the practice of mainstreaming education for sustainable development. These themes are described in this paper and demonstrate an evolution of pedagogical approaches, centring on ethical values and identity work.