This article likens education to playing a game. Whereas students think of education as a finite game--as something to beat--educators see the educational process as an infinite game, and hope to instill in students a desire to pursue knowledge for its own sake, to value their time in the process, and to be prepared for life's surprises. In David…

This book is intended to be a practical guide to the encouragement of reflection in teaching and learning within the context of the British higher education system. The book emphasizes the use of questions for focus; the use of examples to answer the questions; more generalized discussions based on the examples; the use of ordinary language…

Examines issues of student and teacher development and identity. Considers how metaphors for basic writers often constrain possibilities for teacher learning. Notes that as long as educators position themselves as problem-solvers, they foreclose the possibility for changing themselves in relation to students. Argues for the importance of attending…

The author, a (British) science teacher, explains his changing perceptions of teaching and learning in science over a 30-year period. He illustrates effects of a personal conversion to an active teaching strategy by referring to the teaching and learning of ecological concepts in younger children and in elementary teachers in training. (39…

Addresses the documentation of children's work to build reflective practice, aid memory, and support teachers' discourse. Identifies favorite sources for theory, illustrates moving from data to theory, notes that knowledge needs to be indexed for accessibility, recommends combining technique and knowledge, and calls for knowledge exchange among…

Relates the journeys of two English teacher/professors through their changing field: how their approach to teaching and research has been challenged along the way by critical incidents in classrooms and with individual students; and how their stances on what literature teaching is and should be, and what research is and should be, have changed.…

The purpose of this paper is to theorize the author's teaching in a course for experienced university teachers, in a context of increased attention to such courses. The focus in the course is transforming and enhancing ways of being university teachers, through integrating knowing, acting and being. In other words, epistemology is not seen as an…

Janice Wearmouth is a senior lecturer in the Faculty of Education and Language Studies at the Open University in the UK. She has many years' experience of teaching and research in mainstream secondary schools and of developing and leading postgraduate development courses for teachers in the area of special and inclusive education. In this article,…

Forty-four student teachers' existing understanding of Information and Communications Technology (ICT) and the way it changes as they learn to teach is examined. The cohort were taking a postgraduate certificate in education course at the University of Cambridge UK in 2000-2001. Data from assignments, questionnaires and interviews were analysed.…

Technology can be used to effectively support FLCs. This chapter explores how technology and a community of inquiry model can be used to facilitate individual reflection and critical discourse about teaching practice. (Contains 2 tables and 1 figure.)

Universities have realized the need to equip students with appropriate information and computer technology (ICT) skills to prepare them for the workplace. This paper highlights a situation in which academics are uncomfortable with the new technological innovations being used to enhance teaching and learning. The need to integrate technology into…

Although there is a fair amount of knowledge on the issue of promoting student-directed learning, research indicates that teachers are not always able to put that knowledge into practice. Therefore, new educational practices related to student-directed learning should be introduced in teacher education. This makes it possible to break the didactic…

This research aims to study the ways in which a teacher learns through and about professional practice. Data presented here is drawn from one year of teaching and focuses on pedagogical practices, critical reflection upon those practices and the impact of the implementation of a new physical education syllabus in Maltese secondary schools. The…

This paper reports on a study that attempts to encourage teachers to use a visual and verbal approach to storytelling as a method of critical reflection. It demonstrates and discusses how one teacher uses the visual images to comment critically, adding a playfully ironic dimension to a verbal perspective of everyday teaching activities. Many…

In this article, an approach to the final assignment for a seminar class in early childhood education is discussed. The goal of the project was to give practicing teachers a sense that they could make changes in their thinking and therefore their practices, in the present time and in the future, and see themselves more clearly as leaders of their…