Developing socially just pedagogy: what might be the role of learner agency and creativity?
Pedagogy has been identified by government and in academic research as a key element of solving the enduring problem of educational inequality in England. Within sociology of education, a response to educational inequality has been to identify the need for more socially just pedagogies (Lupton & Hempel-Jorgensen, 2012) to disrupt current ‘default’ pedagogy, which contributes to reproducing inequalities. While test results dominate policy and public discourse about outcomes, there is less focus on the role of education in developing pupils as agentic learners. Research has shown that schools located in disadvantaged areas may be more likely to adopt performative pedagogies in which pupils’ agency as learners is highly constrained in contrast to schools in less disadvantaged areas. This arguably has significant implications for pupils’ engagement with learning, their learner identities and development as socially critical and active citizens. 
 
Existing socially just pedagogies, such as productive and critical pedagogies and ‘funds of knowledge’ aim to place learner agency at their centre. However, while these pedagogies make important contributions to developing learner agency in various ways, the literature on creative pedagogy offers a unique perspective on learner agency through its central elements of relevance, ownership, control and innovation and through the concept of possibility thinking which foregrounds enquiry, risk-taking and developing creative thinking by moving from the question of ‘what is’ to ‘what might be’ (Craft et al, 2012). The presentation will explore how these aspects of creative pedagogy, in dialogue with existing socially just pedagogies, can support the development of pupils’ non-attainment characteristics in disadvantaged schools, through developing learner agency.
Reciprocity between narrative, questioning and imagination in the early and primary years: examining the role of narrative in possibility thinking
Abstract The concept of possibility thinking (PT) as a driving force of creativity has been investigated both conceptually and empirically for over a decade in early years settings and primary classrooms in England. In the first wave of qualitative empirical studies, play formed part of the enabling context. Criteria for episode selection for PT analysis were that episodes exhibited children immersed in sustained focused playful activity. During the second wave of PT studies, the research team's attention was drawn to children's imaginative storying in such playful contexts and it emerged that consideration of narrative in PT might prove fruitful. The current paper revisits key published work, and drawing on data previously analysed for features of PT, seeks to explore how narrative might relate to the current theorised framework. Fourteen published PT episodes are re-analysed in order to consider the role and construction of narrative in PT. The new analysis reveals that narrative plays a foundational role in PT, and that reciprocal relationships exist between questioning, imagination and narrative, layered between children and adults. Consequences for nurturing children's creativity and for future PT research are explored.
Creative learning conversations: producing living dialogic spaces
Background: ‘Creative learning conversations’, are methodological devices developed in two co-participative qualitative research projects exploring creativity and educational futures at the University of Exeter in England. Sources of evidence: Framed by Critical Theory, the projects, one on dance education partnership, the other on student voice and transformation, sought to open space between creativity and performativity to initiate emancipatory educational change. This was undertaken over the course of five years in English primary and secondary schools, prioritising humanising, wise creativity. Purpose: This paper re-analyses data and methodological processes to characterise and theorise creative learning conversations in terms of social spatiality and dialogue. The characteristics are: partiality, emancipation, working from the ‘bottom up’, participation, debate and difference, openness to action, and embodied and verbalised idea exchange. Main argument: This re-analysis theoretically adapts Bronfenbrenner's ecological model (The ecology of human development; Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1979) to situate layered engagement. Utilising Lefebvre's conceptualisation of lived space (The production of space; Wiley-Blackwell, 1991) and Bakhtin's work (Problems of Dostoevsky's poetics; ed. and trans. Caryl Emerson; Minneapolis: University of Michigan Press, 1984) on open-ended dialogue, the paper theorises creative learning conversations as producing living dialogic spaces. Conclusions: Creative learning conversations are a way of contributing to change, which moves us towards an education future fit for the twenty-first century. From a living dialogic space perspective, a creative learning conversation is the ongoing process without forced closure of those in the roles of university academic, teachers, artists, students co-participatively researching and developing knowledge of their ‘lived space’ together. Given traditional lethargy in the educational system as a whole commitment to changing education for better futures demands active involvement in living dialogic space, where our humanity both emerges from and guides our shared learning.