Thinking Practice: CPD as Ethical Work

Abstract

This study draws upon a methodological approach based on the use of objects to explore the experiences of a group of teachers undertaking a Masters-level Continuing Professional Development programme. Eight Respondents were invited to bring three objects to their interview that represented significant aspects of their practice in relation to the course. These objects afforded an exploration of respondents’ views, experiences and consideration of the impact of the programme on their professional identities. In order to engage analytically with the data the work draws upon notions of spatiality as well as the later work of Foucault on truth and subject formation.

The thesis considers the role of professional learning as shaped by the current policy process and, how professional learning is, in turn, shaped by the teachers undertaking the course. Such a consideration allows for a methodological take on the CPD process as one whereby people, as well as objects, such as ‘standards’, play equally important roles.

In drawing upon the later work of Foucault (1984a, 1984b) analysis of the data considered the ways in which the practices of the course that the teachers engaged with (Askēsis) lead to a desire to speak their mind and express ideals of truth about educational practice (Parrhēsia). This means that in thinking about their practice through the activities and processes of the programme encourages the development of the ethical work of the teacher. In the light of such problematisation, this study encourages a rethinking of both policy and practice and argues for a change in the discourse of education from the concept of professional development to that of professional learning within a relational and ethical framing.