Podcast 393, Professor Kathy Hall (11-3-20)

Presented and produced by Seán Delaney.

On this week's programme I'm delighted to speak to Professor Kathy Hall from University College Cork. In a wide-ranging discussion about teaching, teacher education, research and policy, the topics raised include the following:

• Becoming a primary teacher in Carysfort College
• Doing a Bachelor in Arts degree in University College Dublin, with many other primary teachers, followed by a H.Dip
• Returning to Carysfort to do a postgraduate diploma course in special educational needs
• Starting a Masters degree in Trinity College, transferring to complete and PhD and becoming a teacher educator in Christchurch Canterbury College
• Moving to Leeds Metropolitan University and subsequently to the Open University and two years later to University College Cork
• Her doctoral dissertation on the topic of discovery learning and first language learning
• Her book, Listening to Stephen Read and its implications for teaching reading
• Why some children leave school with limited literacy
• The relationship between policy and teaching literacy
• How the market influences education in Ireland
• Assessing student teachers’ preparedness to teach literacy
• Summative and formative Assessment – Black and William Important Review on Formative Assessment
• Can anyone teach?
• The relationship between skills, practice and reflection in teaching
• School and University roles in teacher education
• The unifying theme across all her research
• Discourse analysis as a research method and what you can learn about classrooms from using this method. In this framework she refers to the IRF – initiation, response and feedback – pattern of classroom interaction.
• Doctoral research topics
• How different opportunities to learn can exist within the same classroom
• Problems with competitive classrooms
• Advice she would give the Minister for Education
• Etienne Wenger Communities of Practice book
• Tara Westover Educated