Mapping the dimensions of pedagogical frailty: a case study on the conceptual and social representations of teachers from the School of Arts, Sciences and Humanities

• Grant number: 18/21857-0
• Support Opportunities: Scholarships in Brazil - Post-Doctoral
• Start date: March 01, 2019
• End date: January 20, 2020
• Field of knowledge: Humanities - Education - Specific topics in Education
• Principal Investigator: Mauricio Pietrocola Pinto de Oliveira
• Grantee: Joana Guilares de Aguiar
• Host Institution: Faculdade de Educação (FE). Universidade de São Paulo (USP). São Paulo , SP, Brazil

Abstract

Universities have invested time and money to improve the quality of undergraduate education. However, the results obtained fall short of expectations. These concerns, which it is global, led a British teacher to propose the pedagogical frailty model (PFM). From a complex paradigm, this model integrates key elements that describe the teaching activities and the main reasons that lead many teachers (including the most expert ones) to adopt a conservative, traditional, "safe" and possibly out of date teaching approach. Practically speasking, PF can be observed when teachers perceive the cumulative pressures of academic activities as the main reason that inhibit his/her ability to change their teaching practice in response to an evolving environment. The literature points out that searching for meaningful relationships espoused by the academics, about and between the dimensions of the PF model has shown to be a promising starting point for pedagogic development in higher education. The present research is aimed to investigate such meaningful relationships considering two complementary points of view: the cognitive and the social. On the one hand, individual's mental and conceptual representations are evidenced through Novak's Concept Maps; on the other hand, it is observed overlaps of patterns that make up the consensual universes and the Social Representations proposed by Moscovici. Academics from the School of Arts, Sciences and Humanities (SASH) will be invited to participate in this research. It is hoped that the combination of individual teachers' cognitions and collective representations, established within an interdisciplinary and non-departmental academic environment such as SASH, will allow us to characterise this teaching environment from the PFM perspective, pointing out possible improvements in undergraduate teaching.

Scientific publications

(References retrieved automatically from Web of Science and SciELO through information on FAPESP grants and their corresponding numbers as mentioned in the publications by the authors)

AGUIAR, JOANA G.; KINCHIN, IAN M.; CORREIA, PAULO R. M.; INFANTE-MALACHIAS, MARIA ELENA; PAIXAO, THIAGO R. L. C.. Uncovering and comparing academics' views of teaching using the pedagogic frailty model as a tool: a case study in science education. EDUCATIONAL RESEARCH, v. 62, n. 4, p. 434-454, OCT 1 2020. (16/09542-9, 18/21857-0)