During 2023 we would like to invite as many of our teacher educators (mentors) as we can to consider the importance of having subject-focused conversations with their beginning teachers (trainees). Often, in our dialogues, we focus on pedagogy – this is important – it is a key capability in our profession, if not the key capability. We draw on the Robin Alexander (2010) definition of pedagogy,
‘Pedagogy is the observable act of teaching together with its attendant discourse of educational theories, values, evidence and justifications. It is what one needs to know, and the skills one needs to command, in order to make and justify the many different kinds of decisions of which teaching is constituted’
Part of what we need to know, is the distinctive nature of the subject that we are teaching, its disciplinary structure, its key concepts or principles, as well as the associated fine-grained knowledge that relate to different aspects of that knowledge.
We are wondering how best to make those key concepts visible in our coaching conversations. We are therefore hosting a number of subject forums to explore this together.
An invitation to focus on subject knowledge.
We would like to invite teacher educators (mentors) to contribute some subject specific questions that a beginning teacher could be asked following an observed lesson. To book your place please use this link .
The questions that we generate together will be carefully informed by the distinctive nature of each subject. We will work as cross-phase groups to develop these resources. The dates and times are shared in the resources section below.
Together we will generate questions that teacher educators can use as prompts in their own dialogues. We will update this area with the questions as they are updated. In the meantime here is a piece by Christine Counsell written for the Chartered College of Teaching which discusses the question of Substantive and disciplinary knowledge in the curriculum.
These are the sessions that we are hosting to create the resources. If you would like to take part (and we hope that you do) please book your place here.
