Abstract

Further Education (FE) for young people and adults after their compulsory schooling in the UK is focused by government policy towards a narrow skills based agenda. Viewing the purpose of FE as purely economic leaves little space for teachers and trainers in the sector to explicitly consider the opportunities for a moral education as part of this agenda nor for them to consider the morality of their practice (Coffield 2008, 2009). This auto-ethnographic study aims to illuminate the experience of one teacher educator’s practice to create the spaces for FE teachers and trainers to envisage a moral imagination (Narvaez 2006) for themselves and the sector. The FE teachers are students on a part time degree in Education and Training as part of their professional development. This paper focuses upon a teaching and learning activity, ‘The concept map’, that was used by the teacher educator to encourage dialogue between the teacher and student as a way of strengthening their relationship and develop their critical and caring thinking (Noddings 2003). The teacher educator’s journal, artefacts (student’s concept maps) and reflections from the students form the data for this paper. Through thematic analysis it highlights possible mismatches between the intentions of the teacher and the experience of the students raising the concerns that approaches to moral education for FE teachers may be hindered by their expectations of assessment and the role of the teacher educator.