Working in Corners, Spaces, Bends and Turns: How Transdisciplinary Approaches and Attitudes Might Challenge and Shape the Practices of Educational Developers and Early Career Academics

Abstract

This chapter explores ways in which educational developers in higher education settings might transcend a role which is frequently characterised by hovering on the borders of disciplines and departments. Critical thinking and theoretical underpinning is used to analyse and evaluate a case study account of in-depth discussions between one educational developer and four early career academics in the natural sciences which focuses on initiatives seeking to fill the space between natural science pedagogies and educational development work. The emergence of an adaptation of a framework based on Carper’s (Nurs Adv Nurs Sci 1(1):13–24, 1978) ways of knowing illustrates how in the words of Nicolescu (The transdisciplinary evolution of learning. http://perso.club-internet.fr/nicol/ciret, 1999) “a new vision and a new lived experience” might be forged.