ABSTRACT
Introduction Th is chapter focuses on mutual engagement between teachers (including mentors) and university tutors (UTs) in collaborative inquiries of classroom teaching mediated by lesson studies. Th ese lesson studies involved a recursive sequence of outlined actions in which teachers and UTs planned lessons together, conducted observations, held post-observation conferences, discussed follow-up actions and monitored learning outcomes. Th e mutual engagement involved what Wenger (1998) refers to as “complementary” contributions from the teachers and the UTs. By researching their own teaching, teachers learned to be more refl ective; and by researching teachers’ implementation of ideas jointly formulated by UTs and teachers, the UTs put to the test the validity of the advice that they provided to teachers. In this chapter, we draw on Wenger’s framework of boundary crossing and brokering and activity theory to explore the learning that was aff orded when teachers and UTs crossed their community boundaries and became mutually engaged in pedagogic inquiries.
