Reading reflections diffractively - becoming teachers

Description

In this study, we ask what might be made possible if teachers embrace affective ways of knowing and learning in pedagogical settings by thinking with the concept of ‘becoming’. Here, becoming is attended to as an ongoing process of moving, changing, and shifting in and of itself, eluding explanation and going beyond a static definition (Massumi, 1992).

The empirical material consists of teacher students’ reflections generated during the university course Children’s literature and drama, as well as reflections and discussions amongst the authors of this paper. We approach the empirical material as practical provocations, that is, thought-provoking events, or diffractive engagements from practice (Nordström, 2022). The practical provocations are presented as companions for thinking, seeing, and feeling with, as opposed to representational examples (Vintimilla et al., 2021). 

Thinking with practical provocations of teacher students’ reflections gathered on an interactive digital whiteboard, as well as our (teacher educators and researchers) diffractive reading and collaborative writing opens up novel ways to think about relationality in literacies teaching and learning in educational settings. Diffractive reading takes the place of interpretivism and representationalism in treating the practical provocations as emergent, open, and dynamic rather than focussing on comparing, coding, contrasting, or categorising (see also Jackson and Mazzei, 2013; Murris and Bozalek, 2019). 

Further, we examine affective intensities in becoming teachers by using non-representational and postqualitative methodologies. The aim is to disrupt and rethink the ways in which we approach reflections and relationality in literacies education and teacher education.

Period	8 May 2023
Event title	NoFa9 – The 9th Nordic Conference on Subject Education: NoFa9
Event type	Conference
Location	Vasa, FinlandShow on map
Degree of Recognition	International