Gode Valg – om læreres utvelgelseskompetanse i Kunst og håndverk (Good choices – on teachers’ selection competence in Arts and Crafts)

Abstract

The article highlights and discusses teachers’ educational selection competence in the subject area of Arts and Crafts, and introduces the assumption that it is possible and useful to construct a choice perspective on educational actions. Certain challenges related to the requirements of the teachers’ selection competence, such as teachers’ knowledge, pedagogical content knowledge, content, methods and assessment of the subject, are also introduced. Vygotskij’s theories on borrowed experiences, and the psychological judgement theories of Kahneman & Tversky and Kahneman & Fredricks, are presented as selected theoretical perspectives. Examples from empirical studies that have focused on the specialized area of teacher education in Arts and Crafts are also provided. Situations in which selection issues are critical to a student’s learning and mastery of the upcoming profession are presented and discussed. The choice perspective reveals a potential opportunity to develop new structures in the complex situation of Arts and Crafts teacher education. The perspective may shed light on how uncertainty led participants to restrict their choices to those that were perceived as viable options. Moreover, it could help to problematize aspects of the speciality of this area of teacher education, and more specifically, the combination of creative praxis in arts, design and/or crafts, and educational practice and teaching skills. It is concluded that more research is needed, and it is hoped that on-going research will be facilitated to contribute to this initial study. This knowledge will strengthen the research-based foundation for educating teachers with enough selection competence to make sound choices.