Policy Practice and Institutional Conditions in England and Scotland Viv Ellis amp Jane McNicholl University of Oxford Allan Blake University of Strathclyde Discussant John Furlong University of Oxford ID: 244781
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The Work of Teacher Education:Policy, Practice and Institutional Conditions in England and Scotland
Viv Ellis & Jane McNichollUniversity of OxfordAllan BlakeUniversity of StrathclydeDiscussant: John FurlongUniversity of OxfordSlide2
The Work of Teacher Education:Policy, Practice and Institutional Conditions in England and Scotland
Viv Ellis & Jane McNichollUniversity of OxfordAllan BlakeUniversity of StrathclydeDiscussant: John FurlongUniversity of OxfordSlide3
The Work of Teacher Education:Policy, Practice and Institutional Conditions in England and Scotland
Relationship between social structure and human agencyMixed method studyAcademic work – intellectual labour within the exchange relations of academic capitalismSlide4
The background
Historical interest in teacher education as a form of higher education (one that traditionally has had a strong moral purpose).More recent empirical and theoretical interests in studying academic work as labour within specific social, material conditions.Specialist theoretical interests in the socio-historic organisation of human activity – the ‘bottom line’, especially the division of labour – OSAT.Personal and professional interest in what we as teacher educators do – and why.Slide5
An evolving project
Phase 1: study of advertisements and job descriptions for university-based teacher education positions in England using a variety of discourse/text analysis methods (2008 – 2009).Phase 2: mixed-methods study of the practices of a sample of 13 HE-based teacher educators across England and Scotland as well as their accounts of their work – funded by HEA through ESCalate (2010 – 2011).Phase 3: extended case studies of 5 of the sample (in England) to develop our analysis of the person-in-context.Slide6
Jane,
Institutional conceptualisations of teacher education as academic work in EnglandAllan, The ten job dimensions of teacher educators’ work in England and ScotlandViv, Artefact-mediation in the activity of pre-service teacher educationJohn, ResponseDiscussionSlide7
Institutional Conceptualisations of Teacher Education as Academic Work in England
Jane McNicholl, Viv Ellis & Anna PendryUniversity of OxfordSlide8
Rationale and Theoretical Framework
To investigate the ways in which HEIs in England categorised teacher education as a form of academic work. Informed by sociocultural perspectives on language-in-use
and ways in which categories are formed that allowinstitutions, collectively, to think and to reason
(e.g. Mäkitalo & Säljö 2002). Slide9
Data Sets and Methods of Analysis
Job advertisement texts (n = 111)
Membership categorisation analysis
Word frequencies and key-words-in-contextLinguistic annotation (word classes)
Genre analysis
Interviews with
HoDs
(n = 8)Slide10
Findings: job advertisements
No differences in categorisation were observed between types of HEI. Teacher education as a category of work was produced as a form of ‘super teacher’
.
45% of the vacancies in our sample did not require any form of research background. Slide11
Conceptualising the work of teacher education:
The nouns... an experienced, highly skilled practitioner who is passionate about their subject (new university).The verbs... training students on the BA courses (new university);
... delivering secondary ITT programmes
(old university).
The adjectives...
an
enthusiastic
and
dedicated
person
(new university).Slide12
Findings: interviews with HoDs
In the old (research-intensive) universities the teacher educator was produced as a troublesome category – a hybrid category.… and in the new (teaching-intensive) universities the teacher educator was different to any other kind of academic worker due to links with professional settings – an
exceptional category. Slide13
Conclusions
Expectations of teacher educators’ work varies according to institutional settings - but to such an extent that the category teacher educator is no longer coherent or meaningful?Variation is within as well as between institutions; variation is not related to sectors ('old' or 'new' universities)
Universities did not specify research activity in nearly half of the job descriptions.
Strong emphasis on 'super teacher' characteristics and personal attributes such as dedication, enthusiasm and resilience.
Leadership producing
teacher educator
as a hybrid or exceptional category of academic worker.
Ellis, V., McNicholl, J. & Pendry, A. (2012) Institutional conceptualisations of teacher education as academic work in England,
Teaching and Teacher Education
, 28, 685-693.Slide14
Coda: Insights from Australia
The invisible teacher educator? - Nuttall J. et al (in press) Journal of Education for TeachingSlide15
The Ten Job Dimensions of Teacher Educators’ Work in England and Scotland
Allan Blake1, Jane McNicholl2, Viv Ellis2, Jim McNally11 University of Strathclyde; 2 University of OxfordSlide16
The WoTE research sample
No.
Pseudonym
Gender
Institution
Main Phase/Subject
Years in
HE
Highest qualification
Research active
1
Gould
F
England - OLD
Secondary - English
2
M
√
2
Duff
M
England – NEW
Primary - History
6
M
3
Drummond
F
England - OLD
Secondary - Science
<1
M
4
Davis
F
England – FE
Secondary - Science
18
M
5
Coodle
F
England – NEW
Secondary - Geography
19
D
6
Brooks
F
England - OLD
Secondary - Science
4
M
√
7
Brock
F
England – FE
Primary - History
17
B
8
Alloway
F
England – NEW
Primary - Maths
1
D
9
Monk
F
Scotland
Secondary - Maths
7
B
10
Lenton
F
Scotland
Primary - General
4
M
11
Hale
F
Scotland
Secondary - Geography
3
M
√
12
Hacker
F
Scotland
Secondary - Geography
5
M
√
13
Gresham
M
Scotland
Secondary - Music
17
B
√Slide17Slide18
Job DimensionsCourse management
Personnel activitiesExternal examination at another institutionExamination at own institutionMarkingProfessional developmentResearchRelationship maintenanceWorking with a group of students (teaching)
Tutoring an individual student (academic supervision, lesson observation/de-briefing)Slide19
Job dimensions (hours): means and standard deviations, May 2010
Work of teacher education: job dimensionsN
Minimum
Maximum
Mean
Std.
Deviation
Relationship maintenance
13
3.0
31.0
13.192
6.9986
Marking
13
0.0
28.5
7.115
8.5736
Tutoring an individual student
13
0.0
30.0
6.500
7.9373
Working with a group of students
13
0.0
16.5
6.385
6.6525
Research
13
0.0
23.5
5.923
8.6671
Course management
13
0.5
15.0
5.192
4.1660
External examination at another institution
13
0.0
19.5
1.500
5.4083
Examination at own institution
13
0.0
18.0
1.423
4.9827
Professional development
13
0.0
11.5
1.077
3.1678
Personnel activities
13
0.0
5.0
0.615
1.4456Slide20
Job dimensions (hours): means and standard deviations, Oct 2010
Work of teacher education: job dimensionsN
Minimum
Maximum
Mean
Std. Deviation
Working with a group of students
12
1.5
36.5
18.458
12.0632
Relationship maintenance
12
3.0
42.5
16.500
11.1049
Tutoring an individual student
12
0.0
17.5
4.625
5.0728
Course management
12
0.0
14.0
2.958
4.4694
Research
12
0.0
14.0
2.917
5.1027
Marking
12
0.0
9.0
2.708
2.9190
Professional development
12
0.0
7.5
0.875
2.1755
Personnel activities
12
0.0
5.0
0.417
1.4434
External examination at another institution
12
0.0
0.0
0.000
0.0000
Examination at own institution
12
0.0
0.0
0.000
0.0000Slide21
FindingsThe work of teacher educators in this sample appears to be high in time to
relationship maintenance, which (according to these statistics) appears to be the consistent, defining characteristic of the work.Slide22
What is relationship maintenance?
Some examples:Email – from early in the morning to late at night and across the weekend; on the move (in cars using Bluetooth); hyper-responsive (audible signals); very carefully-worded.Home visit to student teacher off with stress.A whole day structured around interaction with schools and student teachers about sustaining the relationships within and between them.School placement meetings that take into account personal and perhaps idiosyncratic preferences by individual mentors.Slide23
What is relationship maintenance?
Communicative activity directed at maintaining and repairing relationships with schools and between schools and student teachers under the heading of ‘partnership’.Slide24
‘The engine room’
“I’m still trying to make sense of my own institution […] there seem to be two sorts of people: there seem to be the people, they’re called the ‘engine room’, the people who teach the students […] And then there is another set of people who do research [...] and they
’re sort of these two separate pots of people. Now there is some overlap between them, there are some links between them, so I
’m one of the engine room people, and certainly I’m encouraged to do research... not insisted upon, but I
’
m encouraged. And indeed I want to and I
’
ve already started some […] You know there are sessions which are run by various people on you know writing, on researching, and they
’
re just open and you just go along if you want to. So there
’
s a sort of really lovely atmosphere that you can embark on this.
”Slide25
Artefact Mediation in the Activity of Pre-Service Teacher Education:
Tools for Learning or Rules for ComplianceViv EllisUniversity of OxfordSlide26
Artefacts?Slide27
Triangular representation of a human activity systemSlide28
The only way to get an insight into the nature of the object-related activity is to understand the material production of tools, the social exchanges among people, and the individual subjective processes that participate in regulating the production of tools and social exchanges.
(Kaptelinin & Miettinen 2005, 3)Slide29
Observing artefacts in use: what are they mediating and why?Slide30
Observing artefacts in use: what are they mediating and why? Slide31
What’s going on?
A random name generator projected onto an Interactive White Board intended to serve as a concrete tool for stimulating change in classroom interaction patterns in order to facilitate better assessment for learningAND/OR A fun thing to do in a classroom to get children interested in participating in the lessonSlide32
What’s going on?
Artefact used to mediate student teachers’ learning about the concepts of AfLVsSomething you can doA ‘rule
’ or norm of behaviourSlide33
Some insights into the expertise of the HE-based teacher educator?
Unlocking the meaning of artefacts derived from situations of practice: - accessing abstract knowledge in the course of an intense focus on practice - a tool for learning (ideal as well as material) - but within constraintsSlide34
Concluding comments
Viv Ellis University of OxfordSlide35
HEI expectations of teacher education as academic work are fairly narrow;
Relationship maintenance is necessary work – it is the ‘glue’ of partnership, the ‘domestic labour’ of Education departments;Within the structures and social relationships of academic capitalism, teacher educators are subject to proletarianisation;More generally, a lack of a view of the future of teacher education as professional education within the university.Slide36
Discussant
John FurlongUniversity of OxfordSlide37
Questions and discussion