The ‘lens’ of theory for teaching and learning

There is a considerable body of literature on the ideology and pedagogy of higher education, emanating principally from the UK, Australasia and the USA. The range is vast and comprehensive: ‘overview’ texts on the position of ‘the academy’ in the 21st century; materials on generic teaching and learning issues (e.g. how students learn, assessment, curriculum design); topic-focussed approaches (problem-based learning, blended learning); discipline-specific materials (how students learn through problem-based methods in e.g. geography). Some of the material is thoroughly researched but some is more tentative, inviting further experimentation with ideas that have not been fully tested. Becoming involved in any of these areas of work is another way to bring new ‘lenses’ to our personal practice. At the very least, it can lead us to try things in our teaching that we might not have thought of. More comprehensively, a theoretical perspective can give us alternative ways of conceptualising and articulating our unique mix of beliefs, knowledge and assumptions.

• Theory can:
• help us 'name' our practice
• break the circle of familiarity
• be a substitute for absent colleagues
• prevent 'groupthink'
• Theory should make us:

• ask questions
• allow us to argue and challenge

For more on this topic:

The Higher Education Academy’s Resource Database includes sections on:

• Research and Scholarly Evidence on Teaching / Research Relationships in Higher Education
• Scholarship of Teaching
• Various other topics, searchable from the Resources Database home page
• The relevant subject centre of the HEA will almost certainly offer further articles on the theoretical basis of the pedagogy in your discipline.

The University of New South Wales also has an excellent resource on the scholarship of learning and teaching