Pedagogical Constructs: Socio-cultural Conceptions of Teaching and Learning in Higher Education

This book examines the impact of context on academics? pedagogical constructs. It theorizes the relation of teachers to context by focusing on the ways in which they conceptualise (their understanding of what teaching and learning is about), approach (how they perceive they go about teaching in practice) and relate (how they position themselves towards the context) to teaching and learning. It identifies seven 'filters' in the teaching and learning context, which operate at the macro, meso and micro levels of practice to impact on pedagogical constructs. Context is analysed using a socio-cultural theoretical framework. The main argument of this book, which builds on contemporary analyses of teaching and learning, is that approaches that account for teaching practices from within individualistic and mainly psychologistic frameworks tend to produce normative and de- contextualised renderings of teaching while approaches that concentrate on the disciplinary structural characteristics tend to essentialize it. This book, by bringing in the socio-cultural lens, seeks to take account of structures without dismissing individuals within them.