Towards a Discursive Pedagogy in the Professional Training of Community Educators
Date
2008Author
Bamber, John
Metadata
Abstract
The author’s previous research into the learning experiences of mature, workingclass
students undertaking a professionally endorsed qualification in Community
Education, was overly negative in its view of the students whilst underplaying the
role of curriculum in their learning. Reinterpreting their undergraduate experience
more positively leads to thinking about how their educational needs could be
reconciled with the programme’s aim to produce critically competent graduates. Four
principles derived from the Habermasian concept of communicative action can
inform thinking about an appropriate pedagogical approach. The first directs
attention to the acts of reciprocity that underpin learning. The second focuses
attention on how knowledge can be constructed through redeeming claims. The third
signals the necessity of safeguarding participation and protecting rationality in
argumentation, and the fourth points to the idea of competence as a constructive
achievement. Taken together, the four principles express the ideal of a discursive
pedagogy in which teachers and students socially construct knowledge appropriate to
the subject area. Because it involves active participation based on a commitment to
open communication and argumentative reasoning, approximating the ideal
conditions of a discursive pedagogy could address the student’s learning needs whilst
meeting the programme’s aim. Anticipating and considering the likely issues and
challenges involved in attempts to realise these idealised conditions suggests ways in
which a discursive pedagogy could be given practical form.