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One way in which we have suggested that a high quality of praxis can be sup-
ported is through adopting a critical stance when teaching the skills of mentoring.
Mentorship communities can support their membership in questioning the different
skills involved in being a teacher, whether that be aligning with the requirements of
an education system or learning the curriculum and how to teach it. Any of these
skills of teaching can and, we argue, should be subjected to critical (philosophical
and moral) questioning for the development of a higher quality of praxis. Mentorship
spaces, as formally convened communities of teachers (one-to-one or group), pro-
vide a promising space within which this questioning can occur.
In this chapter, we have focussed upon the mentoring of preservice teachers
within the online space. The online space provides even more opportunity to control
the design of a community: its membership, the space within which it occurs and the
way that members interact. However, designing for a high quality of praxis in the
online domain adds further complications. How can a high quality of praxis be sup-
ported within the different types of mentorship that exist? An example of the
TeachConnect platform has been described where group, peer and one-to-one men-
torship were all present. However, our experiences in designing and building this
ecosystem for mentorship have uncovered a range of critical questions that we
struggle to address. For example, the participants in our online space seem to be
more willing to engage in discussion of specific technical aspects of teaching prac-
tice and less willing to engage in a deep and critical discussion about how these
aspects of teaching practice relate to the different contexts of the classroom, school,
community and nation.
The contribution of the chapter is to identify the potential of online mentorship
as a support mechanism for mentor-mentee discussions that go beyond the technical
aspects of teaching to the deeper epistemological and critical questions. We begin to
address questions like what would an online community of teachers that support a
high quality of praxis look like? What are the preconditions for dialogic communi-
ties of teachers to begin engaging in deep discussions about the values underpinning
their practice? And finally, how can we reconcile the desire for fluid roles of mentor-
mentee within a community of equals whilst also supporting groups of teachers by
preparing them for facilitation of a high quality of praxis? It is our belief that we
should continue to explore how critical theory can align with online mentoring and
open up the discussions between teachers and designers about the potential of the
online space.
References
Australian Institute for Teaching and School Leadership. (2011). Australian pro-
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australian-professional-standards-for-teachers/standards/list
Ax, J., & Ponte, P. (2008). Praxis: Analysis of theory and practice. In J. Ax & P. Ponte (Eds.),
Critiquing praxis: Conceptual and empirical trends in the teaching profession (pp. 1–118).
Dordrecht, The Netherlands: Sense.
N. Kelly et al.