Perspectives on performativity

Re-thinking the idea of scholarly life regarding teacher education means to critically examine the specifics of classroom teaching, respectively pedagogical challenges. School does not exist simply to convey information or expertise. It is a society in which everyone is responsible for in a reflected way participating in diverse relationships to him-/herself, to others and to the world, and, based on diverse forms of knowledge and representation, for actively forming them. Education in the classroom consists also of giving the students an idea of that. Hereby, tacit forms of knowledge and educational practices play an important role. In the concept of “performative play”, teacher education is seen as a linking up of theories in Educational and other Humanities with the everyday practice of teachers. It will be shown that the performative paradigm opens up the possibility to overcome the concentration of a science-oriented education in school on rational, linguistically symbolized knowledge and metrical explanatory models. By this, a model of a science- as well as practice-oriented teacher education will be unfolded that is supposed to be open to diverse cultural modes of learning.