ABSTRACT
Widening participation (WP) as a field of research has been studied and contested for over two decades. Related international reports by the Council of Europe (1996) and the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization (UNESCO) (1998) focused on access to higher education. In addition to this, in the UK, WP may include the further education sector, as exemplified by the Kennedy Report (Further Education Funding Council, 1997). WP has been described as a portmanteau concept (Watson, 2007). With WP’s foci on disadvantaged learners and equal opportunities of access to higher education lamentably little has been researched on the duality of learning and teaching. Kettley (2007, p. 343) argued for a re-conceptualisation of the WP field grounded in a holistic approach. This approach involved empirical research studying the “social processes shaping higher learning ranging from those that promote (bridges) to those that inhibit (barriers) differential participation in, progression through and outcomes from HE for certain individuals and social groups”. This statement provides this chapter with intellectual spaces to explore a potential bridge to the research of WP via quality teaching.
The conceptual frameworks are drawn from researchers on teaching knowledge via a process of recontextualization. Regarding teacher training, the frameworks on the enhancement of teaching quality include ‘multimodality’ and reflective peer review. The study uses empirical data from a project on occupational pedagogy and another on a structured approach to improving teaching via the use of digitally recorded pedagogic sessions. The discussion section uses the re-evaluated data sets to argue for the importance of quality teaching to broadening and advancing the field of WP. It uses curricula examples to argue for a more critical definition of teaching knowledge and the findings to offer a pedagogical solution to improving teaching quality. It finally indicates the contributions and implications for related stakeholders.
