My research focuses on the epistemological problem of how we learn from experience, with particular attention to how pre-service and early career teachers learn from the problems and tensions they encounter in personal practice. Lortie’s (1975) concept of the “apprenticeship of observation,” which called attention to the socializing effects of mass schooling for perspective teachers, is an important perspective through which I am examining the role that prior assumptions about teaching and learning play in both learning to teach and learning to teach teachers. I am particularly interested in how problems of learning science, problems of learning to teach science, and problems of learning to teach using digital technologies interact with each other.

Please click on one of the sub-pages for an overview of one of my research projects, as well as recent publications/presentations that are related to particular projects.

Self-study of teacher education practices (S-STEP) is a well-established methodology that helps scholars to describe, interpret, and analyse their pedagogies. Although there is not one set methodology used for self-study (Loughran, 2005), a defining characteristic of powerful self-studies is that teacher educators come to understand their own practice differently as a result of engaging in self-study. Although there is a growing body of literature documenting the transition from school teacher to PhD candidate to assistant professor who teaches teachers (e.g., Berry, 2007, Bullock & Christou, 2009, and Ritter 2009), the majority of teacher educators engaged with self-study are tenured academics who have significant experience teaching teacher candidates. Murray and Male (2005) noted how teacher education “demands new and different types of professional knowledge and understanding, including extended pedagogical skills, from those required of schoolteachers” (p. 136). Little is known, however, regarding the extent to which beginning teacher educators purposefully develop pedagogies of teacher education as they struggle to fulfill all of the other obligations associated with their new roles.

Pinnegar and Hamilton (2009) recently made a strong case that adopting an ontological stance toward self-study underscores the “moral commitment” of self-study research. As a new academic charged with the task of teaching future teachers, each one of whom has the potential to teach hundreds of children over a long career, I regard studying my pedagogy as a moral imperative. This study will help me to answer the following questions:

  1. What are the features of my pedagogy of teacher education?
  2. What are my prior assumptions about how people learn to teach, and what is the impact of these assumptions on the ways in which I teach my classes?
  3. How can I create an environment of trust so that teacher candidates feel comfortable thinking critically about the teaching strategies they learn and use during the year?
  4. How do I implement technology in my teacher education classroom? What effects does technology have on the way I think about and enact my pedagogy?