Interrupting the frame: reflective practice in the classroom and the consulting room

Abstract

In this paper I consider some of the affinities between the teacher-student dynamic in academic supervision, and the therapist-patient dynamic in the therapeutic relation. Drawing on my own experiences, I identify several difficulties that pertain to these two settings. First, in the context of the classroom, I consider how the requirement to speak and the requirement to write call for different modes of engagement, and can provoke different types of anxiety. I explore the function of mediating texts as a way of engendering a critical distance from one's own speech acts. I then turn to Sigmund Freud's intriguing evocation of the quality of 'aloofness' as that which should colour the patient's engagement with the transference situation. I shall treat Freud's recommendation of aloofness as a mode of critical distance -and a type of impersonality -that can be put to work in the classroom as well as in the consulting room. Finally, I ask what happens when distance fails; when there seems to be no space for impersonal critique. One way of thinking about the failure of distance is through the lens of shame. Here I focus my thought on the contention that the scope for shaming is especially prominent in vocational settings that challenge and interrogate the subject's capacity to know.

The Psychosocial in Norwegian Teacher Education in Light of Epistemic Objects and Therapeutic Culture

“…This changing professional role is evident when the psychosocial is conceptualised within a psychoanalytic framework. Viewed through a psychoanalytic lens, the classroom is transformed into a counselling room where the past experiences of individual pupils become highly relevant to social and emotional (inter)action (Hogan, 2019;Walsh, 2014;West, 2014). This includes, for example, psychodynamic training of teachers to enable them to identify and respond to the unconscious drives, emotional forces, and affective expressions of school children (Hogan, 2019).…”

Full issue Vol.13 No.1 (2023)

“…This changing professional role is evident when the psychosocial is conceptualised within a psychoanalytic framework. Viewed through a psychoanalytic lens, the classroom is transformed into a counselling room where the past experiences of individual pupils become highly relevant to social and emotional (inter)action (Hogan, 2019;Walsh, 2014;West, 2014). This includes, for example, psychodynamic training of teachers to enable them to identify and respond to the unconscious drives, emotional forces, and affective expressions of school children (Hogan, 2019).…”

The ambivalence of the psychosocial in Norwegian education. A policy document analysis

“…Cases of the latter partly use storytelling as a tool to establish a more encompassing form of scientific report, one that is rooted in subjective consciousness and embodied being-in-the-world (e.g. Kovinthan, 2016;Chappell et al, 2014;Hogan, 2019;Walsh, 2014;West, 2014). Among these qualitative works, psychoanalytical perspectives on school life are prominent, allowing for viewing social interaction as affected by individuals' past experiences (Chappell et al, 2014;Hogan, 2019;Walsh, 2014;West, 2014).…”

“…Kovinthan, 2016;Chappell et al, 2014;Hogan, 2019;Walsh, 2014;West, 2014). Among these qualitative works, psychoanalytical perspectives on school life are prominent, allowing for viewing social interaction as affected by individuals' past experiences (Chappell et al, 2014;Hogan, 2019;Walsh, 2014;West, 2014). This perspective is to make visible phenomena that otherwise would go unnoticed, such as affective expressions, and unconscious drives and desires.…”