113generated creativity dispositions such as risk-taking attitudes, resilience, flexibility,
fluidity and avoidance of premature closure in their material exploration practice.
The final insight related to establishing trusting relationships and the potential for
lifelong learning practices (Wade-Leeuwen, 2016 , 2011 ) to develop between the
mentor and mentees, as well as between each other.
Findings from this research show what appear to be new synergies emerging
when intentionally allowing time and space for preservice teachers to think, experi-
ence together and reflect more deeply on their professional practice. In other words,
they discover new ways of being together during their professional experience. As
an outcome of the study, all preservice teachers voiced an awareness of the com-
municative space as one where the mentor teachers, teacher educators and preser-
vice teachers engage and negotiate the phenomenon of learning to be an effective
teacher.
Vignette 2: Learning to Be (Managing Diversity
in Perspectives During Professional Experience)
Nurturing the mentoring space requires both the university-based teacher educators
and the preservice teachers being available to ‘be’ and to ‘learn’ from each other.
Approaching mentoring from this pedagogical frame refocuses everyone’s role in
the mentoring space. Co-authors of this chapter Hadley and Andrews refer to
research conducted since 2012 with Diploma students entering their first university
professional experience at a metropolitan university. This research focused on these
students ‘learning to be’ in the university system and their understanding of profes-
sional experience. This research enabled a space for the university teacher-based
educators and the preservice teachers to navigate the process of ‘learning to be’.
When university teacher educators prioritise the development of knowledge and
practice, other important areas such as nurturing quality mentoring relationships
and the facilitation of communicative spaces that enable genuine opportunities for
‘learning to be’ can be neglected. By being involved in this research and running the
workshops, we found that our, and the preservice teachers’, beliefs and practices
shifted as we developed skills in ‘learning to be’. This required rethinking what we
‘thought’ we knew about these students and opening up communicative spaces to
hear their ways of being (Hadley & Andrews, 2012 ). Since this research began, the
strategies for opening up this communicative space have included additional work-
shops, online discussion forums and, since 2016, an online module that was avail-
able to all Diploma students 1 week before the semester began.
The original workshops in 2012, and subsequent adaptions, gave us insights into
the preservice teachers’ knowledge, skills and fears. These spaces for additional
communication also provided opportunities for them to get to know us and to feel
more comfortable with us. By expanding our approach, we found these interactions
(that offered experiences above and beyond normal tutorial classes) made us appear
7 Reconsidering the Communicative Space: Learning to Be