Multiple voices: Negotiating pathways towards teacher and learner autonomy

This paper reports an innovative project to develop negotiated, collaborative teaching and learning in higher education as a model for continuing personal and professional development. In foregrounding the ‘voices’ of the various participants in the development of autonomy at three interacting levels, it investigates the design and delivery of a postgraduate programme in ‘Learner Autonomy’ for overseas teachers of English at the University of Nottingham. The paper investigates institutional and contextual constraints, the concept of ‘autonomies’ in in-service teacher education, and the framework and processes of negotiation that evolved. Research data on course participants’ own levels of autonomy were used to uncover and explore issues arising from the personal, cultural and social backgrounds of the course participants, their own students and the module lecturer.