TEACHING IN CONTEXT - 2025/6

Module Overview

This module is central to the MA programme. Participants will be supported to reflect upon how teaching in their own disciplinary / professional context is conceptualized using a range of practical and theoretical lenses that draw upon contemporary educational research.

The module will emphasize and bring to the fore key elements of the regulative discourse that underpins the pedagogic framework of the programme: connectivity and transformation. This will provide participants with an appreciation of the pedagogy that runs through the programme (and tools to make it explicit) and will also help them to consider the influence of the teaching-research nexus and role of technology in contemporary education.

Emphasis will be placed on ¿starting and ending with the discipline / professional context¿ to scaffold participants' developing understanding of the contexts within which they work.

Module provider

Surrey Institute of Education

Module Leader

MEDLAND Emma (Sy Inst Educ)

Number of Credits: 15

ECTS Credits: 7.5

Framework: FHEQ Level 7

Module cap (Maximum number of students): N/A

Module Availability

Semester 1

Prerequisites / Co-requisites

N/A

Module content

Indicative content includes:

The content will be divided into seven topic headings:

Disciplinary structures;
Disciplinary threshold concepts;
Forms of knowledge - Conceptual-Procedural / Theory¿Practice.

Formative assessment task

Teaching models (including ¿student-centredness¿ and ¿students as producers¿);
Exploring the potential of PCK (TPACK - Technological Pedagogical Content Knowledge);
Research-teaching nexus;
Evaluating learning and teaching quality.

Assessment pattern

Alternative Assessment

N/A

Assessment Strategy

The assessment strategy is designed to provide participants with the opportunity to demonstrate:

Communication of evidence-informed understanding through a variety of formats;
Critical reflection upon the nature of own disciplinary / professional context through comparison with a variety of pedagogic contexts;
Engagement with a range of theoretical lenses to develop greater insight into own pedagogic context;
Synthesis of multiple sources (i.e. self-reflection, literature, practice, feedback etc.) to interrogate
entrenched pedagogic practices characteristic of own context.

The module design is underpinned by the concept of constructive alignment to ensure that the
learning and teaching strategies and assessment tasks align with the module learning outcomes.

Thus, the summative assessment for this module consists of:
SA1: A poster presentation in which the participants will present a visual / written overview of the
knowledge structures and forms of knowledge that characterize their teaching context, drawing
upon the literature to gain insight into the implications for practice [Addresses ILOs 1-2];
SA2: A multi-perspective analysis of teaching in which participants will be analyzing teaching within their own context through the theoretical lenses discussed during the module [Addresses ILOs 3-4].

Formative Assessment:

The formative assessment for SA1 will take the form of discussion forum posts in which participants will
be scaffolded to share their reflections upon the nature of knowledge structures and forms that
characterise their disciplinary / professional context. Participants will receive feedback from both their
tutors and will be expected to provide feedback on their peers' contributions too. The formative
assessment for SA2 will take the form of a short synthesis of a small suite of papers drawn from the
participant¿s home disciplinary / professional teaching literature to help them to build on their pedagogic knowledge, using language that is as familiar as possible so as to enhance the inclusivity of the module by reducing the educational jargon that might prove a barrier to learning. This assessment is entitled: ¿a synthesis of a suite of papers related to teaching in my context".

Indicative suites of papers that are suitable for this assessment are indicated at the end of the reading
list, though a participant may construct their own suite of papers in negotiation with the module leaders. Feedback on this submission will be provided to participants in good time so that they can reflect and act upon the comments within the final summative task (i.e. SA2).

Feedback:

A dialogic approach to teaching will be adopted within this module, in which all participants will be encouraged to share their thoughts and experiences of their contexts. This will allow frequent opportunities for participants to gain
insight into a diversity of other contexts, and in so doing, to compare this to their own contexts and to
develop their inner feedback skills (Nicol, 2019). Participants will also be supported to contribute to
discussion forums on a weekly basis and to engage with the peer and tutor feedback provided in order to continue to develop their understanding on a continuous basis, as well as to reflect and act upon the feedback focused on assessment task ideas. When combined with the multiple opportunities that
participants will have to provide feedback to their peers, this will support the development of feedback
literacy.

Module aims

• Encourage teachers to reflect upon the nature of their disciplinary / professional contexts; the way it is constructed and taught.
• Allow teachers to reflect upon the influence of the wider Higher and Professional Education context of teaching and learning.
• Provide evidence-informed methods of teaching evaluation that move beyond the subjective.

Learning outcomes

Methods of Teaching / Learning

The learning and teaching strategy is designed to:

Scaffold participants to view teaching within their own contexts through a variety of interpretive
lenses;
Enable participants to visualize / articulate and interrogate the often-implicit knowledge structures
and forms of knowledge that characterize disciplinary / professional contexts;
Support participants to develop digital capabilities around literature searching / researching a topic
and presenting the findings in an accessible format that can be shared more broadly;
Develop participants critical engagement with and synthesis of pedagogic literature, communication
of ideas, engagement with peer and tutor feedback (i.e. feedback literacy), and application of
theory to develop greater insight into practice, thereby developing future employability skills.

A central aim of this module is to support participants to engage in theories surrounding the
teaching-research nexus, and in so doing enable them to develop evidence-informed practice through the interrogation of their implicit understandings and enactment of their teaching
contexts. This aligns with the MA¿s educational aims of contribution to participants theoretically-informed understanding, scaffolding of reflective practice, and disruption of existing beliefs about
teaching through interrogation of tacit beliefs surrounding the influence of the nature of the
context within which they work. The dialogic approach to teaching adopted will also enable
participants to be exposed to multiple disciplinary, theoretical perspectives that will underpin the
interrogation of practice. The module also aligns with the Surrey Institute of Education¿s core
values of respect and dialogue, requiring the development of trust and respect as the basis from
which participants can be challenged to disrupt entrenched attitudes found within professional /
disciplinary contexts.

The learning and teaching methods include:

Formal online interactions that will take the form of synchronous online sessions. Each session will focus on one or two of the topics outlined above and will be accompanied by a guided study task, the results of which will be posted and discussed online, as well as in subsequent synchronous sessions.
Individual tutorials: the first focusing on ideas / readings for the formative assessment task, the second focusing on discussion of the feedback received in relation to the formative task, the third (and fourth if required) to discuss the summative task and how the formative task can inform this;
Guided study that will direct the participants to consider their own disciplinary / professional context in relation to the content topics. Participants will be set reading / tasks to focus their thinking on each of these topics, particularly with regard to their disciplinary / professional contexts, and will be asked to return to their original conceptualizations to consider how their learning has confirmed and / or caused the evolution to this original conceptualization;
Ongoing interaction will continue outside of formal synchronous sessions via the discussion forums
and will support participants to share and be exposed to a variety of different disciplinary /
professional contexts, which will in turn encourage the articulation of the nature of their contexts.

The reading list for this module is particularly comprehensive to include a selection of papers from
various disciplinary foci ¿ especially to support the formative assessment. Participants will then choose
the readings appropriate to their contexts, or develop their own suite of references with guidance from the module tutors.

Indicated Lecture Hours (which may also include seminars, tutorials, workshops and other contact time) are approximate and may include in-class tests where one or more of these are an assessment on the module. In-class tests are scheduled/organised separately to taught content and will be published on to student personal timetables, where they apply to taken modules, as soon as they are finalised by central administration. This will usually be after the initial publication of the teaching timetable for the relevant semester.

Reading list

https://readinglists.surrey.ac.uk
Upon accessing the reading list, please search for the module using the module code: GCAM023

Other information

The MA in Higher and Professional Education is committed to developing graduates with strengths in Digital Capabilities, Employability, Global and Cultural Capabilities, Resourcefulness and Resilience, and Sustainability. This module is designed to allow students to develop knowledge, skills, and capabilities in the following areas: Digital Capabilities: The digital capabilities developed through engagement with this module work on two levels: conceptual and procedural. Conceptually, the influence of technology on the nature of teaching within context is one of the indicative content topics for this module. Procedurally, participants will be supported to develop their own digital capabilities through searching for relevant literature, engagement with online discussion forums, presenting their assessed tasks using a variety of formats (e.g. written assignment, poster / presentation), and reflecting upon the benefits and challenges that digital technologies offer for pedagogic practice in context. Employability: The development of greater insight into the nature of teaching within own disciplinary / professional context through engagement with relevant literature and exposure to a variety of perspectives / contexts will equip participants with the tools to interrogate their pedagogic practice and challenge entrenched attitudes that can stifle development. This insight will provide participants with the skills to engage in evidence-informed developments to practice. Resourcefulness and Resilience: The module requires participants to interrogate the implicit structures and forms of teaching that are characteristic of their disciplinary / professional contexts. This will require the interrogation of entrenched attitudes and application of evidence-informed reflections that could underpin future innovation to practice. This process is likely to scaffold participants to question the nature of their disciplinary / professional contexts, and the vulnerability that this may potentially create is potentially emotive and challenging. Through the dialogic approach adopted by the module leaders, and support for the development of a community of learners, the module will create safe spaces for participants to embark on this journey and provide a range of theoretical lenses that can inform the development of greater insight into practice and the ability to be able to justify the pedagogic approaches and developments adopted. Furthermore, within the final summative assessment task, participants will be encouraged to reflect upon their learning journey and to recognize how the nature of their disciplinary / professional contexts mediates the outcomes of learning and teaching experiences. Sustainability: Reflection upon the nature of teaching within participants own context is central to this module and this insight will scaffold participants to be able to apply evidence-informed justification to interrogate their pedagogic practice. This insight will provide participants with access to the implicit characteristics of how knowledge is structured and formed, and some of the key influences that can shape it, which will support development of greater understanding of what quality education means within their contexts. Furthermore, the module provides a foundation for the development of academic writing scaffolded through engagement with literature relevant to own context, which then feeds into the final summative task. Participants will also be exposed to a range of teaching approaches through the various contributors to the module, as well as through their engagement with other participants enrolled on the module.

Programmes this module appears in

Please note that the information detailed within this record is accurate at the time of publishing and may be subject to change. This record contains information for the most up to date version of the programme / module for the 2025/6 academic year.