Education Practices and Challenges

Metaphor research in education examines how teachers and students conceptualize learning through the figurative language they use to describe their experiences, revealing assumptions about authority, knowledge, and the purpose of schooling that more literal accounts tend to obscure. The disruptions of the Covid-19 pandemic intensified this inquiry, as educators worldwide were forced to articulate what distance learning felt like in practice, generating a rich body of testimony about what was lost, adapted, or unexpectedly gained. Qualitative researchers working in this space draw on interviews, reflective writing, and narrative analysis to surface patterns in how metaphors shape professional identity and pedagogical decision-making. Open questions include whether the metaphors teachers hold can be deliberately changed to shift classroom practice, and how the language educators reached for during crisis might inform more durable reforms to teaching and professional development.

Works

63,099

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140,549

Keywords

MetaphorsTeachingLearningEducationCovid-19 PandemicDistance Education