Engaging with theoretical diffraction in teacher education

Abstract

This article presents a study in which we began with a question "how to teach theoretical reflectivity in teacher education, and ended with a sentence "there is theoretical diffraction in teacher education". The research presented in this paper took place in the context of a university course in which we have been involved for the past two years. During the course we simultaneously pursued to teach theoretical reflection and to analyse what was happening as we taught theoretical reflection. For two years we asked, 'What are students doing while we are trying to engage them in theoretical reflection?' We noted that students are engaged in theory, but not in ways easily readable to the educators, and that the process could rather be called theoretical diffraction than reflection. Theoretical diffraction during the course was patterned by existing discursive practices: 1) disciplining emotions and focusing on control and answers, 2) personalising school as the teacher and personally defending it, 3) prioritising practice over theory and seeing both as dogma.

Constructing learning spaces – knowledge development in work-based learning

“…Hence, these processes mainly focus on individual students; the environment’s impact on students’ learning processes is rarely followed up. This discourse can be problematic when connected to experiential learning because of its preoccupation with the individual rather than how external discourses function in the workplace to address educational problems (Lanas et al , 2015). Positioning teachers to perceive their challenges as mainly their own responsibility may imply losing sight of other discourses that influence teachers’ work (Lanas et al , 2015).…”

Storying Diffractive Pedagogy

“…Reflection and reflexivity are deeply rooted in education and constructed as essential for the development of learning. In effect students are expected to mirror sameness (Lanas et al, 2017;Søndenå, 2002), or the knowledge and behaviour of others (with greater knowledge). Such technicist approaches in education reinforce the idea that there is a singular and correct way to do and be a learner; these ideas are encapsulated in ECTE programmes and pedagogies that hail reflection and reflexivity as the key to becoming an effective teacher.…”

Sticky stories from the classroom: From reflection to diffraction in Early Childhood Teacher Education

“…One example is Otterstad (2012: 147) who urges investigations of pedagogical processes that move beyond critical reflection to include diffraction as a way of seeing teacher educators' pedagogical processes. Another example is suggested by Lanas et al (2015) who investigated theoretical reflections in teacher education in Finland. They suggest that in the university classroom, diffraction concerns how theory passes and twirls around in the various spaces in the classroom.…”

“…Diffraction offers an alternative methodology to reflection (e.g. see Barad, 2007, 2014; Davies, 2014b; Lanas et al, 2015; Lenz Taguchi, 2012, 2013; Osgood & Giugni, 2015), which is being taken up in research on kindergartens and higher education. One example is Otterstad (2012: 147), who urges investigations of pedagogical processes that move beyond critical reflection to include diffraction as a way of seeing teacher educators’ pedagogical processes.…”

“…Consequently, teacher educators fail to fully recognize student teachers’ diffracted theoretical utterances as theory. Further, this diffractive approach allows educators to re-evaluate what they have taken to be student disinterest, and to approach pedagogy in more expansive and experimental ways (Lanas et al, 2015: 539).…”