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The book explores the idea that pedagogy for autonomy requires the integration of teacher and learner development and can be enhanced through a case-based approach in teacher education. A case-based approach values experiential professional learning and expands professional competences necessary to promote autonomy in schools: developing a critical view of (language) education; managing local constraints so as to open up spaces for manoeuvre; centring teaching on learning; interacting with others in the professional community. Two strategies to implement the approach are presented and illustrated. The first one involves teachers in designing, implementing and evaluating experiences of pedagogy for autonomy, which are the basis for writing professional narratives and building a case portfolio. The second draws on teachers’ pedagogical experience as the basis for the construction of case materials where experiential elements are combined with theoretical input and reflective tasks, so that the teachers who use those materials can reflect about and explore their own practice.
This book uses fifteen grounded research projects to explore innovative self-reflexive approaches to autonomy in language education. It emphasizes the multi-voiced and contradictory complexity of pursuing autonomy in language education and includes commentary chapters to help readers engage with key issues emerging from the research.
Schools and teachers are facing various challenges in a rapidly changing world. In such circumstances, discussing and sharing concerns of mutual interest regarding policy, practice and research is crucial to creating more sophisticated understandings of the various challenges as a first step in the improvement of education. While the future should not be imprisoned in the past, the past does provide valuable lessons that will undergo new iterations in constructing the future. The future will be multi-faceted and complex and the different chapters included in this book are intended to provide important contributions from which to build the future of education. The different chapters provide r...
Pedagogy for autonomy is a continuous struggle for transformative and empowering education. That struggle entails reflecting on what fosters or hinders teacher and learner development, acting towards challenging and reshaping oppressive forces and circumstances, and being willing to deal with complexity, uncertainty and risk-taking, without losing one's hopes and ideals. Our main purpose is to present and discuss ways in which critical reflecting, acting, and being emerge in contexts of teaching and/or teacher education, not as realisations of a grand theory of pedagogy for autonomy, but rather as local, idiosyncratic struggles to grasp and enhance the meanings that autonomy may (not) take in diverse educational settings. Although from different angles, the chapters highlight the central role of teacher and learner development as interrelated aspects of pedagogy for autonomy in language education.
There is an extraordinary but largely unnoticed phenomenon in higher education: by and large, students persevere and complete their studies. How should we interpret this tendency? Students are living in uncertain times and often experience anxiety, and yet they continue to press forward with their studies. The argument here is that we should understand this propensity on the part of students to persist through a will to learn. This book examines the structure of what it is to have a will to learn. Here, a language of being, becoming, authenticity, dispositions, voice, air, spirit, inspiration and care is drawn on. As such, this book offers an idea of student development that challenges the d...
What does 'autonomy' mean within language learning? Should it be enhanced within national, institutional or small group culture and, if so, how can that be done? A variety of new theoretical perspectives are here firmly anchored in research data from projects worldwide. By foregrounding cultural issues and thus explicitly addressing the concerns of many educators on the appropriateness and feasibility of developing learner autonomy in practice, this book fills a gap in the literature and offers practical benefits to language teachers.
This book explores theories of space and place in relation to autonomy in language learning. Encompassing a wide range of linguistically and culturally diverse learning contexts, this edited collection brings together research papers from academics working in fourteen countries. In their studies, these researchers examine physical, virtual and metaphorical learning spaces from a wide range of theoretical and interdisciplinary perspectives (semiotic, ecological, complexity, human geography, linguistic landscapes, mediated discourse analysis, sociocultural, constructivist and social constructivist) and methodological approaches. The book traces its origins to the first-ever symposium on space, place and autonomy, which was held at the International Association of Applied Linguistics (AILA) 2014 World Congress in Brisbane. The final chapter, which presents a thematic analysis of the papers in this volume, discusses the implications for theory development, further enquiry, and pedagogical practice.
This book applies and expands upon the concept of the ‘learning conference’ as a site of learning and development, using the paradigm and methodologies of participatory action learning and action research (PALAR). Making a significant contribution to the field, this is the first book to outline the characteristics and development of a learning conference culture in theory and practice. It demonstrates how application of the learning conference concept can maximise learning opportunities and successful research outcomes to bring about sustainable professional, organizational and community development. An international team of contributors offer their diverse perspectives on conferences and the practical and theoretical work conducted at these events. They contextualize these reflections in the light of global developments in this increasingly troubled twenty-first century marked by greater complexity through technology, globalization, neo-liberalism, climate change and other sources of practical and ideological change, all of which enhance the conceptual and practical utility of the learning conference.