The article is principally written for adult educators. It models an auto-ethnographic approach situating this within a critical pedagogic orientation. As an adult educator working in the Republic of Ireland, I draw from two instances in my own life that helped me to re-think my racialised identity. By reflecting on discomforts in terms of my own…

Scaffolding pre-service teachers to critically reflect on their practice remains a challenging goal. Exploring the extent to which peer discussion facilitates this critical reflection is the focus of this paper. Using a series of three linked tasks, pre-service teachers 1) reflected on a classroom incident from a vignette of practice, 2) shared…

Deborah Britzman, over 15 years ago in her insightful essay "Is There a Queer Pedagogy? Or Stop Thinking Straight", posed questions that continue to resonate (Britzman, Deborah P. 1998. "Curriculum: Toward New Identities", edited by William Pinar, 211. New York: Routledge). What if lesbian and gay theories were understood as…

A strong current in contemporary Catholic thought -- the theology of interreligious or interfaith dialogue -- stresses the importance of dialogue and collaboration with followers of other world faiths. This article proposes that religious education in Catholic schools, particularly at post-primary level, needs to engage more with this theological…

This paper describes the conceptualisation and appropriation of narrative in the design of digital storytelling technology (DST), to augment reflective practice among Irish pre-service teachers. Reflective practice remains a predominant professional formation component of programmes of teacher education. In this key developmental activity, teacher…

This article looks back on the professional development offered to teachers of English to support them in their teaching of film since the introduction of film into the English syllabus in Ireland in 1998. It focuses on three inter-related elements: the interpretation or reading of film; the pedagogy that supports this interpretation; the…

In September 2010, five mathematics lecturers set out on a professional development project with the following aim: to reflect on teaching practice using John Mason's Discipline of Noticing. At the end of the academic year, each lecturer considered her experiences of engaging with the process. In this paper, we describe the observations made and…

Background: Concerns that current forms of physical education teacher education (PETE) are not adequately providing teachers with the tools necessary for working with the realities and challenges of teaching physical education in contemporary schools has led some scholars to advocate for an approach that prioritises meaningfulness in physical…

The aim of this study is to investigate whether Lego could be used as a tool for reflective practice with social care practitioners (SCPs) and student practitioners. This article outlines an action research study conducted in an institute of higher education in Ireland. Findings from this study suggest that Lego can be used to support student…

Traditional school subjects are challenged by the acceleration of access to knowledge in the new age of media available to both teachers and students. Teachers who are socialized into existing traditional practices are now encouraged to introduce technology into their pedagogy. This Paper explores a particular way in which teachers can creatively…

In this article the author opens up a space for reflective inquiry linked to her pedagogy with Student English Teachers and in conjunction with readings on embodiment and aesthetic experience. The author tries to deepen her practice as a teacher educator, 'looking back to travel forward' (Cremin et al. 2005:1) and looking forward in desire and…

A better understanding of the relationship between beginning teachers' beliefs and the pedagogies of teacher education (TE) programmes that support their learning across time can enhance TE programme effectiveness. This 6-year longitudinal study examined the development and change of beginning primary classroom teachers' (n = 6) beliefs about…

This paper reports research into developing digital storytelling (DST) to enhance reflection within a specific professional learning context--that of a programme of teacher education--while concomitantly producing a transferrable design framework for adaption into other, similar post-secondary educational contexts. There has been limited…

Peer observation of teaching (POT) has become common practice in many universities. However, it could be argued that existing models often have limited scope for understanding the student experience. This study presents a modified approach to POT in which the researchers adopted the roles of (1) lecturer, (2) peer-participant and (3)…

The central idea of this study is using blended problem-based learning (PBL) in an academic development context with key roles emphasised: academic staff in the role of students and the academic developer as the tutor. The context is a module entitled "Designing e-Learning" on a postgraduate programme for academic staff in Ireland. It is…