The impact of different educational ideologies on how knowledge is conceptualised and the implications for learning and the teacher and learner roles was outlined in chapter 2 (table 2.8). My own view was outlined in section 2.2.2.1, where I argued for a socially critical approach to geographical education which incorporates the New Agenda of sustainable development and global citizenship. In this respect I believe that, in terms of the geographical persuasions outlined in appendix 3, both environmental and
humanistic/welfare persuasions allow for, although do not require, a socially critical perspective, but the scientific/descriptive-rich one does not (for a fuller discussion of this view see Martin, 2004). Previous research (Martin, 1997; Catling, 2003a) shows that the majority of primary students hold an image of geography that is similar to the
scientific/descriptive-rich persuasion. I therefore believe that it is important for the
geography component of the PGCE primary course to develop a curriculum and pedagogy that enables students to develop an environmental and a humanistic/welfare dimension to their geographical conception.
Theoretically the implications of this and the research into students changing conceptions are the need to recognise the context of experience that has constituted individual student s
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60 knowledge while at the same time fostering new and creative approaches to teaching
[the subject] (Klein, 2001: 264). One might consider whether, if students
preconceptions and beliefs are not examined when there is the opportunity to do so, they might enter the professions with conceptions and beliefs that are less than helpful and that then become ingrained in practice and subsequently far harder to change. For example, Brown et. al (1999) in a study of student teachers understanding of mathematics teaching shows that if a student teacher s transition from scholar to practitioner is to be successful it must, for most,
involve a considerable degree of unlearning and discarding of mathematical baggage Lack of attention to this potential impediment may help to account for why teacher education is often such a weak intervention why teachers are most likely to teach math just as they were taught. (Brown et. al. 1999: 301).
However, the importance of the tutor s conceptions as an influence should not be ignored as illustrated by Klein (2001) who describes how she thought she had been modelling collaborative, discovery and problem-solving approaches that students would enjoy and wish to replicate in their own teaching. When it became evident that students were not replicating these approaches she reflected, over a number of years, on why this might be the case and drew the conclusion that, if her practice ignored the power-knowledge relationship then students experiences of investigative approaches would be severely limited . Despite her best efforts it seems as though, unconsciously, messages about the nature of knowledge (and where the power to create knowledge lies) disempowered the students.
Analysing my actions now I can see how teachers, like myself, act according to their knowing (as constituted subjectivity) about subject knowledge and how learning happens and her explanation for this is that I was blind to the White, middle-class European appropriation of the real world in the way I spoke in lectures and tutorials and the Anglo-European genesis of journal writing as a means of making sense of experience (Klein, 2001:262).
In other words, the socio-cultural element of knowledge construction was not explicitly acknowledged students might be invited to construct their own meanings, but the
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61 Roth (2001) also questions the power-knowledge relationship as it exists in the dominant paradigm evident in the Canadian education system. He critiques the authentic school science paradigm on the basis that:
enculturating students to a particular world-view (and the associated knowledge and knowledge representations) without also reflecting on the epistemology involved appears to be more akin to indoctrination than to democratic education secondly, why should the scientists image of science be the one we want students to experience rather than the science of naturalists, community activists, environmental activists, organic gardeners and so forth ? (Roth, 2001: 20)
It is possible to see how, in the English context where both the school and ITT curriculum is largely determined externally, this creates an even greater challenge. On the one hand teacher educators are encouraged (Brown, 1999; Corney, 2000) to use constructivist approaches to knowledge transformation, while on the other hand others (Klein, 2001; Roth, 2001) raise the question of whose knowledge should be offered as an alternative. If both these are taken into account it reinforces the idea that we need to be explicitly aware not only of our conceptions of subjects and pedagogy, but also of epistemology and educational ideologies. It also suggests that an alternative to constructivist approaches might be required. Roth argues for a social constructivist approach which allows students
to participate in open and democratic debates in which a diversity of world-views are negotiated rather than subject to particular epistemologies and that this can be addressed by including a radical doubt towards the pre-constructed concepts and common sense that always and already permeate any discipline (Roth, 2001: 21). Thus it is possible to incorporate a prescribed curriculum, but to do so in a way that raises students critical awareness of how such a curriculum was created, which geographical paradigms are evident and which are not, and as a result to question and debate about the dominant paradigms both geographically and educationally. In this sense I think my approach is deliberately transformatory.
Askew & Carnell (1998) propose a transformatory approach to learning and teachers professional development in which transformatory means learning that leads to change in individuals, groups, organisations and society. They acknowledge the influence of Friere s liberatory education and feminist pedagogy, both of which have a view that consciousness contains a critical capacity that allows us to transcend the dominant discourse. Briefly, they describe how a transformatory approach to learning embodies principles which include:
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62 meta-learning holistic learning self-actualisation and collaborative learning
contexts (Askew & Carnell, 1998:153) where explicitness and subjectivity are clearly valued. In relation to these principles, they suggest that it is the interconnection of understanding on three levels personal, theoretical and practical that creates such a powerful base for teachers professional development. The focus for learning is not the substantive areas of the curriculum, but the learner, the learning context and the learning process and the key values that underpin this approach are equality and justice.
In the context of working with PGCE students, John (1996) suggests a number of strategies which can support a transformatory approach to ITE, three of which seem particularly pertinent here:
1. Students can be liberalised by ensuring an open learning environment where values, feelings, beliefs, ideas and practices are presented, explored, examined and evaluated in an open, relaxed and constructive manner (p. 102)
2. Tutors need to encourage students to rethink their basic understandings of their subject and the pedagogy which supports it. Knowing and understanding a subject in the academic sense is very different from understanding it in a pedagogical sense (p. 102). We need to help students to make the transition to pedagogical thinking.
3. Prospective teachers can be helped to reconfigure their existing beliefs if they are presented with a variety of alternative models (p. 104). This modelling of practice can help them see things from the perspective of learner. Modelling needs to reflect beliefs of the tutor and this should be done explicitly in order for students to see value of reflecting on practice in this way.
The proposal is therefore that a transformatory approach to ITE is most appropriate if the goal is to expand and elaborate student teachers' conceptions and beliefs. The following section shows how this was applied to the geography component of the PGCE Primary course at my HEI in 1999-2000.
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