ABSTRACT
In this chapter I now turn my attention to teachers and the qualities and attributes they will need to take enquiry forward. I consider the pivotal role of teachers in school and system development. I look at individual teacher roles and collaborative ones, both within schools and across schools. I examine the dispositions and practices required so that teachers can get the most from their adoption of practitioner enquiry practices, to benefit them and their learners. What attitudes and dispositions do teachers need when using enquiry, and which can they expect to develop as they progress. I consider the work on transformative learning and how this is developed and exhibited through identity by Knud Illeris’s Transformative Learning and Identity (2014) and some of the messages from this research for teacher professional development. I also consider how we keep engagement with practitioner enquiry meaningful as well as proportionate and manageable for teachers. I consider how we need to reconceptualise what it means to be a professional educator with a commitment to career-long development. Collaboration needs to be embraced by all and professional dialogue used to develop understandings and cultures. Like school leaders, teachers need to be driven by values and a moral imperative to improve what they do. They need to be committed to professional growth and making a difference for all learners, embracing teacher leadership, teacher agency and the development of adaptive expertise.
