The guest of this episode is professor James McGuirk, Director of the Center for Diaconia and Professional Practice at VID Specialized University and professor II at Nord University, both in Norway. As a philosopher, James gives account of what he means by the notion of “the wise practitioner” and how students of professional studies can develop towards becoming wise practitioners. In order to do so, he explicates the three forms of knowledge of Aristotle and brings forth arguments why using one’s own experiences is as legitimate as using others’ in practice research.

00:00:44 – What are characteristics of a wise practitioner?

00:02:06 – What is the role of habit in practical wisdom?

00:04:59 – What is the role of reason in practical wisdom?

00:06:42 – On the three knowledge forms of Aristotle

00:10:38 – What is phronesis?

00:14:03 – On values in institutions

00:18:54 – How can students of professional studies become wise practitioners?

00:24:28 – On the role of stories and experiences in practice research and developing practical knowledge

00:28:04 – Are there any differences in researching narratives phenomenologically or hermeneutically?

00:30:46 – Is using one’s own experiences as legitimate as using others’ in practice research?

00:36:17 – Is developing phronesis, or responsAbility, rather a matter of research than of teaching?

Further literature:

McGuirk, J. (2021): Den kloke praktikeren. In: Fuglseth, K.S. & Halås, C.T. (eds.): Innføring i Praktisk Kunnskap. Anerkjennende, kritisk og konstruktiv praksisforskning. Oslo: Universitetsforlaget.

McGuirk, J. 2017. Experience and the story. I: Catrine Thorbjørnsen Halås, Ingjerd Gåre Kymre and Kari Steinsvik: Humanistiske forskningstilnærminger til profesjonspraksis.

McGuirk, J. og Jan Selmer Methi. (2014); Praktisk kunnskap som profesjonsforskning: antologi over yrkeserfaringen som utgangspunkt for forståelse av kunnskapsutvikling i praksis. Fagbokforlaget.

McGuirk, J. 2016. Phenomenological considerations of habit: Reason, knowing and self-presence in habitual action. Phenomenology and Mind, (6), 112–121. https://doi.org/10.13128/Phe_Mi-19556

McGuirk, J. 2021. Embedded rationality and the contextualization of critical thinking. Journal of Philosophy of Education, (55), 606-20. https://doi.org/10.1111/1467-9752.12563

McGuirk, J. 2023. Paying attention alone and together: The role of attention in the formation and cultivation of habits. Knowing our ways about in the world: Philosophical perspectives on Practical knowledge, eds. B. Molander, M. Solli, & T. Netland. Oslo. Scandinavian University Press.https://www.idunn.no/doi/10.18261/9788215069135-23-06

McGuirk, J. 2023. On the role of the ‘Call’ in professional work and practical knowledge. Exploring Practical Knowledge, eds. K. Fuglseth, C. Cederberg & E. van der Zande. Leiden. Brill

McGuirk, J. 2022.Perspectives on democracy, citizenship, and value education in the Norwegian school. Education in Europe: Contemporary approaches across the continent. New York. Routledge.

The guest of this episode is Cheryl Hunt, Honorary Senior Research Fellow at the University of Exeter/UK, Director and Trustee of the International Network for the Study of Spirituality (INSS) and the founding editor of the Journal for the Study of Spirituality. Cheryl gives an in-depth account of Reflective Practice and how it developed historically in professional practices. Furthermore, she elaborates the relationship between Reflective Practice, spirituality and meaning-making. Finally, she explicates how spirituality can be studied and researched.

00:01:17 – On Reflective Practice and its history

00:14:29 – On the role of the question “Who am I?” in Reflective Practice

00:17:55 – What does it mean to act authentically in professional practices?

00:20:03 – On the relation between authenticity and spirituality

00:23:14 – Is there a relation between spirituality and meaning-making?

00:26:26 – What is the role of spirituality in professional practices?

00:28:19 – Is there a lack of spirituality in today’s world?

00:31:26 – Is Reflective Practice an approach to promote responsibility in professional practices

00:34:33 – How can spirituality be researched and studied?

00:36:10 – How to facilitate spirituality in terms of a reflective practice

Further literature:

- Hunt, C. (2024): Discovering Spirituality through Critical Reflection and Autoethnography. In: Flanagan, B. & Clough, K. (eds.): The Routledge Handbook of Research Methods in Spirituality and Contemplative Studies. London & New York, NY: Routledge.

- Hunt, C. (2023): ‘Doing’ reflective practice and understanding spirituality as a way of being: Implications for professional and transformative practice, Journal for the Study of Spirituality, DOI: 10.1080/20440243.2023.2249823

- Hunt, C. (2021). Critical Reflection, Spirituality and Professional Practice 1st ed. 2021. Palgrave MacMillian

Hunt, C. (2016) ‘Why me? Reflections on using the self in and as research’ In J. McNiff (ed) Values and Virtues in Higher Education Research: Critical issues. (Abingdon: Routledge) pp.48-63

Hunt, C. (2016) 'Spiritual creatures? Exploring a possible interface between reflective practice and spirituality'. In Fook, J., Collington, V., Ross, F., Ruch, G. and West, L. (eds) Researching Critical Reflection: Multidisciplinary perspectives. (London: Routledge). pp.34-47

Hunt, C. (2010): A step too far? From a professional reflective practice to spirituality. In: Bradbury, H., Frost, N., Kilminster, S. & Zukas, M. (eds.): Beyond reflective practice. New approaches to professional lifelong learning. London & New York: Routledge.

Hunt, C. (2009) ‘Wyrdknowledge: towards an understanding of spirituality through reflective practice and mythopoesis’. In P.Willis, T.Leonard, A.Morrison and S.Hodge (eds), Spiritualty, Mythopoesis and Learning (Queensland: Post Pressed). pp.130-146.

Hunt, C. (2006) Travels with a turtle: metaphors and the making of a professional identity. Reflective Practice 7(3), 315-332.

In this episode, prof. Catrine Torbjørnsen Halås, former head of the Center for Practical Knowledge at Nord University, reflects on the relevance of practice research for professional studies like teacher education, social work or nursing. By means of personal experiences, she gives an elaborated account of what practical knowledge is and outlines different methodological approaches, how to develop that kind of knowledge. Last but not least, she explains why it is legitimate to use one’s own practice experience as starting point when conducting practice research.

00:00:44 – Catrine's “personal journey” towards research on practical knowledge
00:02:20 – What is practice research?
00:04:09 – About research on practice, with practice or in practice?
00:05:59 - Differences between humanistic and social science research approaches in professional studies
00:08:39 – What is practical knowledge?
00:13:48 – Your own experience as valuable starting point for practice research
00:16:52 – What kind of methodologies can be used in order to develop practical knowledge?
00:21:03 – The role of unease in practice research
00:26:49 – To what extent is good practice, and with that practical knowledge, a question of the practitioner’s responsibility?
00:30:08 - How should we educate practitioners that are able to take responsibility?

Further literature:

- Halås, C.T. & Fuglseth, K.S. (2021): Fagområdet praktisk kunnskap. In: Fuglseth, K.S. & Halås, C.T. (eds.): Innføring i Praktisk Kunnskap. Anerkjennende, kritisk og konstruktiv praksisforskning. Oslo: Universitetsforlaget.

- Halås C.T, Kymre, I.G and Steinsvik, K. (eds) (2017): Humanistiske forskningstilnærminger til profesjonspraksis. Gyldendal Akademisk.

- Halås, C.T (2023) Jakob Meløe’s Praxeology – an ethnographic approach to research in practical knowledge . Antologikapittel i C. Cederberg, K. Fuglseth & E.vd Zande (eds) "Exploring practical knowledge. Life-World Studies of Professionals in Education and Research. Brill.

- Halås, C.T (2022) Kunnskapsreflektert praxis som tilnærming til å skape sammenheng mellom praktisk og teoretisk virksomhet i sosialt arbeid . i Ø. Henriksen, A. Solstad & G.W. Øydgaard. Sammenhenger i sosialt arbeid. Universitetsforlaget.

- Halås, C.T & McGuirk, J (2021) Det vitenskapelige essayet i profesjonsforskning: en kritisk utprøvende metode. Tidsskrift for psykisk helsearbeid: Volum 18, s. 5-14. https://doi.org/10.18261/issn.1504-3010-2021-01-02

- Halås, C.T & Lombholdt Herholdt, S.M Podcast about writing essays: https://nord.cloud.panopto.eu/Panopto/Pages/Viewer.aspx?id=5dd3a0f6-39ef-4853-a8c2-b1370076f1d5

In this episode prof. emeritus Anders Lindseth talks about his work in the committee for Bildung in higher education (“Dannelsesutvalget - om dannelses perspektiver i høyere utdanning”, 2009) and the fundamental perspectives that this committee brought forward. Furthermore, he discusses the intention of The Research Council of Norway to have more practice-near research and how the Center for Practical Knowledge at Nord University, where Lindseth was professor, met this intention in terms of Reflective Practice Research. In the further conversation, Lindseth gives an in-depth account of why and how this research approach is deeply rooted phenomenology and hermeneutics and why it is legitimate for practitioners to conduct research on their on practice.

00:01:12 – What is the role of Bildung in professional studies and research?
00:02:51 – What are experiences of discrepancy and how to investigate them in terms of research?
00:05:08 – The “personal” in research
00:06:30 – What is Reflective Practice Research?
00:11:45 – Methodologies that can be used within the research approach of Reflective Practice Research
00:23:52 – What is “response-ability” (or “respondability” as Anders also calls it) and why is it important for professionals like nurses, teachers etc.?
00:25:10 – ResponsAbility (or “respondability”) and the practitioner’s search for meaning
00:26:59 – On the theoretical reflection- the third phase of the research process in Reflective Practice Research.
00:29:32 – On the relationship between reflection and meditation

Further literature:

- Lindseth, A. (2020). Dosenten i et FoU-perspektiv. Refleksiv praksisforskning som en vei mot dosentkompetanse. I C. C. Bachke & M. Hermansen (Red.), Å satse på dosenter. Et utviklingsarbeid (Kap. 4, s. 75–101). Oslo: Cappelen Damm Akademisk.

- Lindseth, A. (2021): Diskrepanserfaring og svarevne. In: Fuglseth, K. S. & Halås, C. T. (eds.): Innføring i praktisk kunnskap. Anerkjennende, kritisk og konstruktiv praksisforskning

- Lindseth, A (2009), Dannelsens plass i profesjonsutdanninger. Kunnskap og dannelse foran et nytt århundre. Innstilling fra Dannelsesutvalget for høyere utdanning

Steen Nepper Larsen is associate professor at the Department of Education Sciences at the Danish School of Education at Aarhus University. He is a renowned Danish intellectual and author of many publications. Among them is book together with John Hattie in which Steen challenges the Visible Learning approach. How this book came into life and what Steen assumes to be severe flaws of the education system today, is examined closer in this podcast episode, where Steen also gives an in-depth account of Bildung and why it is so fundamentally different from education.

00:01:02 – Working with John Hattie on the book project “The Purposes of Education”
00:04:13 – Steen's main critique of John Hattie’s Visible Learning approach
00:07:06 – What is Bildung?
00:12:26 – How have the themes of Bildung come under pressure?
00:16:36 – Steen's main arguments against evidence-based teaching
00:21:56 – What would an education without “evaluation fever” and the chase for evidence look like?
00:26:09 – Is the concept of Bildung relevant for today’s professional studies?
00:30:11 – Is there a relation between Bildung and responsibility as presented in the European Qualifications Framework?
00:35:41 – What is needed from us to become truly “seeing”?
00:40:00 – Bildung as the “God-given” in humans?

Further literature:

- Hattie, J. & Larsen, S. N. (2020): The Purposes of Education: A Conversation between John Hattie and Steen Nepper Larsen. New York, NY: Routledge.

- Larsen, S. N. (2022): Evalueringsfeber og evidensjagt. Copenhagen: Samfundslitteratur

- Larsen, S. N. (2019): Blindness in Seeing: A Philosophical Critique of the Visible Learning Paradigm in Education. Educational Science 9(1) 47. DOI: https://doi.org/10.3390/educsci9010047

- Larsen, S.N (2016). At ville noget med nogen – filosofiske og samtidskritiske fragmenter om dannelse og pædagogik. Turbine akademisk.

In this episode we welcome professor Gert Biesta as our guest. Gert is author of the book “The Beautiful Risk of Education” and a well-renown scholar in the field of educational theory. In our talk with him, he explicates why the shift of focus from teaching to learning is unfortunate and why a world-centered approach in education is to be chosen over a student-centered approach. He also describes why it is important for an educator to take risks and why the development of practical wisdom in professional studies is mandatory, so that the students do not only become competent but good practitioners.

00:00:58 – On the difference between educational theory and philosophy of education
00:02:50 – On the unfortunate focus shift from teaching to learning
00:07:41 – Why teaching and learning should be more word-centered than student-centered
00:14:23 – On “subjectification” as one of the three main objectives of education
00:22:37 – What is phronesis and why is it important in professional studies?
00:24:29 – What is virtuosity, in relation to phronesis?
00:27:29 – Is virtuosity teachable?
00:31:18 – Is there a connection between the notion of “responsAbility” and phronesis?

Further literature:

- Biesta, G.J.J. (2015): “How does a competent teacher become a good teacher? On judgement, wisdom and virtuosity in teaching and teacher education.” In: Heilbronn, R. & Foreman‐Peck, L. (eds.): Philosophical perspectives on the future of teacher education. Oxford: Wiley Blackwell.

- Biesta, G.J. 2013. The beautiful risk of education. Routledge.

- Biesta, G,J. 2017. The Rediscovery of teaching. Routledge.

- Biesta, G.J. 2020. Risking Ourselves in Education: Qualification, Socialization, and Subjectification Revisited. Educational Theory, v70 n1 p89-104 2020