Strategic alertness and expanded awareness within sophisticated conceptions of teaching

Recent research into teaching in higher education has established what appears to be a nested hierarchy of conceptions of teaching moving from teacher-focused to student-focussed categories. We draw here parallels with the intellectual development of students to suggest a process of expanding awareness in academic staff of the relation between learning and teaching, which leads to strategic alertness to `teachable moments' as they occur in the classroom. A case study of the one lecturer's changing conceptions of learning and teaching is presented in detail and related to the literature both of the nature of conceptions and of schoolteachers' knowledge and beliefs about teaching. This analysis provides a fuller description of what may underlie sophisticated conceptions of teaching and leads to a discussion about how conceptual change may be encouraged in academic staff.