Themes

The Arts Learning and Teaching Research (ALTR) Group staff  have earned a successful reputation within a variety of different contexts. Much of ALTR’s focus is across the following themes:

Knowledge, Pedagogic and Andragogic Research

This theme is centrally concerned with explorations of the relationships between knowledge, pedagogic and andragogic (adult learning) theory and practice. Within this theme the research interrogates knowledge creation and knowledge transfer. How knowledge, pedagogy and andragogy interact can produce implications for curriculum design and implementation within the Arts and Humanities. The theme may draw on teacher research, reflective practice, art-based research, anthropology, literary and cultural studies, ethnography, philosophy, psychology, and educational theory.

Subject-Specific Pedagogic Research

The Subject-Specific Pedagogic Research theme addresses issues in a range of subject areas across the Arts and Humanities. Questions of particular and distinctive subject pedagogy and learning are at the core. A research interest within this theme is developing understanding of research-informed ways to promote effective pedagogical practices in quite different subject areas and at different levels of education (including arts education). This work draws not only on subject-specific educational research which draws out the distinctive nature of the subject but may also relate to research in the areas of philosophy, psychology, and sociology. In Arts the area of art as research within learning and teaching may be of particular interest within this theme for example.

Learning and New Technologies Research

The Learning and New Technologies Research theme actively explores the development and application of the use of technologies within the Arts and Humanities. This theme includes investigating the efficacy of new technologies for learning and teaching in both formal and informal contexts. The research within this theme is typically multi-disciplinary and may be methodologically innovative in its approach using both qualitative and quantitative approaches.

Policy, Economy and Society Research

This theme focuses upon socio-political contexts of the Arts and Humanities within an educational context. This theme provides a focal point for research relating Arts and Humanities learning to political, social and economic contexts, locally, nationally and internationally. This work may draw on theoretical and methodological resources from art, philosophy, anthropology, literary and cultural studies, economics and sociology, using both qualitative and quantitative approaches, applied research and is undertaken from a variety of policy-relevant perspectives.