Scott Bulfin, in comparison with those who called for teachers to write in the 1990s, emphasises the importance of collaboration – communicative writing with others. This writing can take place between colleagues in a school setting, between friends, and between more and less experienced educators. This collaboration can take place face to face or online.

Collaboration intensives the reflexive  processes and the products are deeper than each individual writer would have achieved alone.

Bulfin claims that writing has been central to his professional development and gives examples –

• email conversations
• coauthoring an article
• blogging

In addition, his dialogue with students is influenced by these processes. Bulfin seems to see student benefit as secondary, as an extra – his main interest is his own professional learning as a teacher . In the 1990s teacher-writing was recommended as a direct means of understanding student difficulties and improving instruction. Bulfin is referring to a far broader concept of teacher learning.

Bulfin cites a list of beginning teachers (is it degrading to call someone a “beginning teacher” rather than an “early career teacher”?) and practitioner researchers who reflect on their practice in writing.

The author uses the term “discursive community” to describe the field where “texts – narratives, counter narratives and arguments … frame and reframe each other”  (p. 41). “These texts ‘speak’ to each other in generative, though sometimes dissonant ways, creating a space where knowledge is co-constructed” (p. 41). I have been particularly interested in the “writing cirle” I have been discovering, teachers and teacher educators (many from Monash University) who write, read each other, co-write and co-publish. The idea of colloboration through written conversation is demonstrated in various ways in the literature I have been reading. As I read, I am often envious of the significant professional relationships formed and maintained through writing. I consider myself lucky to have been exposed to these practices and the intelligent and wonderfully enlightening ideas encompassed in these texts.

Bulfin mentions the possibility of dialogue between pairs or groups of early career teachers and also between novice and more experienced practitioners. (Of course a wonderful example is contained in the written conversations and  co-authoring done by Graham Parr and Natalie Bellis). Bulfin describes “a dialogue in which there is more than a hint of potential for teacher renewal and change, and an argument in favour of a broader notion of professional identity and learning than is implied by the notion of ‘professional development’, involving a recognition of the value of other dialogical spaces (Bakhtin, 1981;Bulfin and Mathews, 2003) and the socio-cultural nature of learning and identity (Lave & Wenger, 1991; Renshaw, 1998; Rogoff, 1994; Witherell, 1991) (p. 41).  Often we push for collaborative social learning environments for our students and ignore the fact that teachers have the same needs, that teacher learning is of course based on the same principles.  I have been looking at myself in the mirror as a result of this reading – how do the PD courses I run measure up? This is another topic I should be addressing at length in writing…

According to Bulfin, teachers are continually subjected to the tensions between the “personal and private” and the “public and political” (p. 41). Teachers in schools are always negotiating between these opposite forces. This observation is extremely relevant. Examples I can think of are:

• PD courses are usually in biggish groups and are ready made and top down – no room is made for the interests or individual needs of the participating teachers. I do begin my courses with a questionnaire about teacher needs but this is far from adequate.
• Very often questioning and reflection in schools are directed toward school needs or pupil needs, teacher needs are rarely discussed.

In his narrative, Bulfin retells his experiences from his first years of teaching. Dealing with the isolation often felt by teachers, he missed the rich theoretical conversations characteristic of university life. There are, at least here in Israel, almost no connections made between pre-service study and what is done in schools. As an experienced teacher and literacy coach, I am ashamed to say that I have no idea how pre-service teachers are prepared these days. I concentrate on helping early career teachers become familiar with school and making them feel at home, I really have been missing something…  

“So while there is plenty of talk and conversation that goes on in schools…there are also many barriers to the type of ‘authentic conversation’ (Clark, 2001) or sustained intellectual dialogue that is important for quality teacher learning. The situation is similar with respect to writing – while a lot of writing goes on, very little could be regarded as reflective  or exploratory. Most is done in order to meet administrative demands” (p. 43). Staff rooms are noisy places. My husband says that teachers attend more meetings than the government. Teachers talk about what is going on, they often complain together, sometimes share success stories, plan together and discuss pupils and their achievements.  Some of the barriers to ongoing “intellectual dialogue” are lack of time, resistance to personal exposure (the same personal vs public tension), lack of modelling, encouragement and appropriate frameworks. As far as writing goes, the same barriers are relevant but the situation is dimmer. Here in Israel, as I have said before, teachers only write (openly at least) what is absolutely required and necessary. Most of this is definitely administrative in nature.

“importantly, we also wrote narratives of our teaching and other reflections on critical incidents, sharing these  with each other. This gave us space to unpack and to theorise our experiences, to re-examine our basic assumptions, to ‘try on’ the talk and mind of professional teachers in a more personal-private setting” (p. 44).

Bulfin and his learning companion Katrina discovered “alternative ‘spaces’for…professional learning” (p. 44).

Collaboration, conversation, written dialogue –

Bulfin claims: “Being presented with different readings of one’s own text can result in a type of fracturing of original intent, and that can be very generating” (p. 47). This kind of safe professional relationship can be incredibly empowering. As far as I can see  many educators are now receiving this kind of critical reading and constructive feedback through blogging. Here again Bulfin is emphasising the advantages of written conversation rather than solitary reflexive writing. 

“An important part of this was finding a language to frame our experiences and give them shape. As  a result, we were able to see further than we could see alone” (p. 48).

Bulfin is aware that as he was learning about teaching in this way he was also learning about learning.

“Writing such as this is important for many reasons, not in the least because it provides a sense of distance from which it is possible to critique practices, discourses and assumptions, especially one’s own (cf. Kamler, 2001). Despite the content, our writing and conversations are always fuelled by a desire to understand why things are the way they are and how we might go about changing some of them…We work to create a dialogic space (often online), where we can begin to imagine possibilities and to find support to teach (and think) in different ways” (p. 53).

“There are many issues associated with ‘written conversation’ as opposed to physical conversation that have implications for participants in any exchange: power and authority, access and disadvantage, to name just a few” (p. 55).

“In order to reflect on and write about their interests and concerns, many teachers require active support, encouragement and opportunities…otherwise they might not ever speak or write ‘out’ ” (p. 55). This is of course my biggest challenge today – How can I support and encourage my peers and in turn, early career teachers, on this exciting and rewarding road to professional learning?

It is significant that Bulfin chooses to take of professional learning rather than professional development. It seems crucial to remind teachers that PD occurs as a result of LEARNING, real personal learning, from the inside out, not from hours of sitting in lectures or seminars where somebody pours out info or lesson plans.

“in the end, there are opportunities for professional learning in all experience, but I believe that this learning must also include efforts at pushing back against the pressures and dilemmas teachers live and work with everyday. I am thinking not only about the need to resist the prescriptiveness of narrow in-service professional development, but working out ways in which we can push back the ‘normalising’ practices of mainstream schooling which can squeeze the life and hope out of both students and teachers” (p. 55).

Bulfin calls for cooperation in these issues between educators, teacher associations, the government and universities.

“Teacher conversation, collaboration, and writing have the potential to generate learning opportunities that are more meaningful than professional development as typically conceived by governments and schools. The processes that I have been describing better recognise the complexity and professionalism of teachers’ work and knowledge, and the contextual factors that play such an important part in any workplace. This said, the kinds of conversations and writing that I am arguing for really only become critically useful when participants are engaged in sustained theoretical reflection about their work. Such learning is not just a matter of ‘talking’ or ‘working together’ or scribbling journal notes about how a lesson may have gone – important though these activities may be. It is about self-reflexive, practice based inquiry that contributes to our knowledge as a profession” (p. 56).

Bulfin, S. (2005). Conversation + collaboration + writing = professional learning. In B. Doecke, & G. Parr (Eds.), Writing = learning (pp. 40-58). South Australia: Wakefield Press.