DR.ANNE PIA

LEARNINGVOICES UK

Learning in Times of Change:The Levers for Change

A Time of Change – the 21st century

Trends that will impact on education (Gary Marx,2000):

For the first time in history, the old will outnumber the young

Majorities will become minorities, creating ongoing challenges for social inclusion

Release of human ingenuity will become a primary responsibility of education and society

Pressure will grow for society to prepare people for jobs and careers that may not currently exist

The 21st Century: Impact on Education

Competition will increase to attract and keep qualified educators

Scientific discoveries and societal realities will force widespread ethical choices

Common opportunities and threats will intensify a worldwide demand for planetary security

Understanding will grow that sustained poverty is expensive, debilitating and unsettling

Greater numbers of people will week personal meaning in their lives in response to an intense, high tech, always on, fast-moving society (Marx,2000)

What do you Think?

Identify 3 significant changes in society that we need to take account of in education?

Societal Imperatives for change to our practice

Are we witnessing social disintegration and the creation of a new order in society?

Are we seeing a re-emergence of old values? We are witnessing mass re-skilling of the old

workforce Our role as educators?

Our professional aspirations

“Teaching is a performative act. And it is that aspect of our work that offers the space for change, invention, spontaneous shifts, that can serve as a catalyst drawing out the unique elements in each classroom…

to embrace the performative aspect of teaching we are compelled to engage “audiences”…

….to consider issues of reciprocity …teachers are not performers in the traditional sense of

the word…(our work) is meant to serve as a catalyst that calls everyone to become more and more engaged

Societal Imperatives for change to our practice

Giddens (1991) norms and traditions we have known are subject to “disembedding mechanisms and the individual is thrown back on personal dispositions and has to look inwards to discover a self in a broader and novel environment. Nothing can be assumed any longer, nothing taken for granted. In a search for personal meaningfulness, we must re-invent our daily social lives”

“Self-identity becomes a reflexively organized endeavour…..the reflexive project of the self, which consists in the sustaining of coherent, yet continuously revised narratives ….takes place in the context of multiple choices (Giddens,1991)

Societal Imperatives

Old knowledges, new knowledges, finite knowledge, negotiated knowledge, useable knowledge.

Technological advance and speed of change

Pressure to acquire new skills, new approaches, new thinking in our own fields very quickly

Changing balance of world power – new markets for education, new cultures, different expectations

Social Imperatives

Fullan and the dynamics of change: “the key is for teachers to see themselves and be seen

as experts in the dynamics of change” (1992) Teachers’ role in helping people “find and give

meaning to life” (1992) Educators preparing learners for workplace we

cannot envisage For lives that we cannot configure

Societal Imperatives

A world of uncertainty (employment, skills, economy, identity, lifestyle, social and personal relations)

Need for mobility – physical, intellectual Environment of both choices and constraints Need for flexibility Adaptability Openness and vision Reflection skills/ability to communicate and network

Over to You

What new skills does/will the teacher of the 21st century need?

Learners’ perspectives

“but my personhood is intact. My selfhood undamaged. I find value and meaning in life, and I have no wish to be cured of being myself. Grant me the dignity of meeting me on my own terms…recognize that we are equally alien to one another, that my ways are not merely damaged ways of yours. Question your assumptions. Define your terms. Work with me to build bridges between us” (Powell;2000)

Learners’ Perspectives

• Learners’ enormous investment in the learning process “my time is now”

The “unfinished me” and “finding me” (Karen) “no space for identity”/personal qualities and skills

often untapped in the learning space “you learn more from people who show you respect;

with teachers, there should be no tensions, no negative environments, no struggle”

Welcome -research-based learning, peer and tutor dialogue as a learning tool

Learners’ Perspectives

Welcome -ability to lead in the classroom - opportunity to bring other knowledges, skills and

experience to their learning experience -making connections with their wider professional,

social, personal lives - to locate their learning in the world they experience

through media/music “workmanlike partnerships” (Coffield’s learners;

2009)

The policy landscape we work in

Skills for Scotland (SG, 2007) –skills agenda-”a Scotland where people can work in teams, are creative and

enterprising and hungry to continually learn new skills… entrepreneurial and innovative”

- a literate and numerate workforce with ICT literacy and problem solving skills

Framework for HE in Scotland (2003) - focus on LLL, widening access, skills for a Smarter

Scotland and developing collaboration SFC Learner Engagement – a key strand CfE schools and colleges –relationship between

learning, social responsibility, participation, and confidence.

The Demand for Change: professional aspirations

“Teaching is a performative act. And it is that aspect of our work that offers the space for change, invention, spontaneous shifts, that can serve as a catalyst drawing out the unique elements in each classroom…

to embrace the performative aspect of teaching we are compelled to engage “audiences”…

….to consider issues of reciprocity …teachers are not performers in the traditional sense

of the word…(our work) is meant to serve as a catalyst that calls everyone to become more and more engaged

Aspirations and professional engagement

“I am often most joyous in the classroom, brought closer to the ecstatic than by most of life’s experiences… the academy is not paradise. But learning is a place where paradise can be created” (hooks;1994)

Lecturer quoting learner “you ripped me apart but you put ne back together lovingly”

“sparkle”, “that feeling in your stomach”,

Our professional aspirations

…to become active participants in learning …the engaged voice must never be fixed and

absolute, but always changing, always evolving in dialogue with a world beyond itself (hooks;1994)

…there is an aspect of our vocation that is sacred; there are those of us who teach who believe that our work is not merely to share information but to share in the intellectual and spiritual growth of our students.

…to teach in a manner that respects and cares for the souls of our students is essential…

DR.ANNE PIA

LEARNINGVOICES UK

Learning in Times of Change:The Levers for Change