Introducing you to our key learning fields

Exploring the interrelationship among educational objectives, content, and methods through lesson design, Methodologies of Lesson Study

The study of educational methods, or the field of Didactics, is an academic field that explores educational practice from theoretical and principled perspectives. Its scope extends beyond questions concerning the technical principles of teaching to include the study of classroom communication, children’s learning experiences both inside and outside school, teachers’ engagement with those experiences, and curriculum design at various levels.

 

This research group investigates the interrelationship among educational objectives, content, and methods through the design and practice of lessons in various school subjects. In other words, we explore questions such as: Why do we teach foreign languages? What does it mean to learn history? How should we understand the contemporary world? How should we view nature? These questions are examined through the “lesson” as a space where students, educational content and materials, and teachers come together. Through this process, we seek to construct theories of curriculum and educational content organization. At the same time, this approach also invites us to reconsider the underlying epistemologies of language, history, and natural science upon which each subject is based. In addition, we critically examine the methodologies of lesson study itself and aim to reposition it within an empirical scientific framework that moves beyond the unproductive dichotomy between qualitative and quantitative approaches.

 

Let us work together to explore forms of lessons and curricula in which everyone can share the joy of intellectual discovery and in which both students and teachers can enjoy learning.

We welcome students who:

- are not easily satisfied with lessons and who can be “constructively demanding” learners;

- wish to think critically and fundamentally about teaching and learning subjects they are either good at or struggle with;

- seek to carefully interpret children’s responses and teachers’ discourse in actual classroom practice.