Welcome to the WJETT blog
What is WJETT?
The WJETT blog or Warwick Journal of Education - Transforming Teaching blog is designed to encourage staff and students to disseminate good practice and to engage with their peers on academic cultural critique or areas of research that they find interesting. With the increased focus on ‘teachers as researchers’ in the sector, many qualified teachers are expected to publish the outcomes of any action research projects they undertake. The WJETT blog can be the first step on your journey towards publishing and enables you to experience publishing and reviewing in a friendly and supportive environment.
You will need to scroll down the page below the tags to see the posts.
Staff room epistemological highlights
Sitting next to me at one of the computers in the staff room was a science teacher of no little experience and maturity. He was busy preparing a hand-out sheet when with a deep sigh, he mentioned he would need to find some Tippex (other brands are available). Surprised, I glanced at what he was doing, "I could do without all these symbols", he remarked staring at the picture image on his powerpoint presentation. Eager to offer support (and naturally bearing in mind teaching standards part two) I was happy to suggest he insert a box, do a bit of formatting and, as if by magic, the result he was looking for was achieved. Such was his joy that his mood immediately lightened and after at least two high-fives later, this newly acquired knowledge was already rippling, wave-like to his fellow colleague the other side. "Look what you can learn by talking" he exclaimed." Bingo! "All learning is social, according to Vygotsky, I proudly announced, keen to ensure good academic deference, whilst happily condensing too many journal articles into a crudely 'constructed' and grossly oversimplified sound bite (hey, I’m team maths, we like abstraction). A short discussion ensued to the point where our respective zones of development were appropriately proximal, and we returned to our respective tasks. The Plenary. So, what happened here? Well, while the radical constructivists tussle over the epistemological nature of objective truth, or otherwise, we seem to have at least some evidence that learning took place through social interaction, go Lev, and don’t forget to put it in your PDP. People were made happy through the learning experience (smiley face), and I managed to deliver, albeit of a largely procedural nature, one of my best lessons of the week!
Writing guidance
Can I write about anything in my blog post?
Yes pretty much. Academic cultural critique (Thomson and Mewburn, 2013) is always a good source of content for academic blogs. This can include (but is not limited to) comments and reflections on funding; higher education policy or academic life. You might also want to consider blogging about:
- Academic practice (Saper, 2006)
- Information and/or self-help advice
- Technical, teaching and careers advice
- Your research or practice
- How you’ve undertaken research
- The impact of research on your practice
- An area of research/practice that interests you
- Your teaching experiences/reflections
How long can my blog post be?
Each individual blog post should be no longer than 500 words. Long blocks of text are sometimes hard for readers to digest. Break up your content into shorter paragraphs, bullet points and lists whenever possible. Also include a list of keywords or tags as this makes it easier for Google to find your work.
Do I need to use citations?
No, this is a reflective piece so it does not need to include citations (but you obviously can include them if they are relevant).
Can I include links or images?
We would encourage you to include links to any articles that you have considered whilst writing your blog post. We also welcome the use of images (as long as you have permission to use them) as they can often help to illustrate a point and obviously will not be included in the word limit. Please remember this is a public site so if you want to include images of your students in your classes then you will need permission to do this.
What is the process for submitting a piece of work?
Your blog post should be emailed to A.Ball.1@warwick.ac.uk. Once the submission has been reviewed it will either be uploaded at the beginning of the next available week or sent back to you for editing if it requires amendments. You should then send the amended work to me once again and I will then upload it.