MSET Ed Research Group Discussions – June

We are looking forward to welcoming you to our June research discussion. We have rescheduled this discussion to Monday 15 June 2-3.30pm for this to be a hybrid event.

A room has been booked at Deakin Burwood Corporate Centre (BC, Level 7/221 Burwood Hwy, Burwood VIC 3125) for those who would like to attend this event in person. For more information about how to get there, please see https://www.deakin.edu.au/about-deakin/locations/corporate-centres/burwood

These discussions are also online via Zoom https://deakin.zoom.us/j/87077153433?pwd=Msgrc63HTu3PtEsPJ1LIed5E1KMxD7.1&from=addon

Discussion 1. Teachers as Interlocutors of Agrarian Futures Vishal Kumar, Assistant Professor, Manipal University Jaipur

Science education is increasingly expected to prepare learners for socio-ecological crises, yet environmental issues in classrooms often remain detached from the lived realities of communities most affected by them. Focusing on agrarian contexts in northern India, this research-profile talk examines teachers as community-rooted interlocutors who mediate scientific knowledge, local experience, and climate-related concerns. Drawing on work across scientific literacy and teachers’ engagement with agrarian communities, it shows how teachers’ dual identity as educators and community members can open pathways for climate change education beyond the classroom. The talk argues for place-based, future-facing, and community-engaged science education. 

Vishal Kumar is an Assistant Professor in the Department of Liberal Arts and Social Sciences at Manipal University Jaipur. His research lies at the intersection of science education, scientific literacy, environmental education, and community-rooted pedagogy. His work examines how community teachers engage with socio-ecological crises, particularly in agrarian contexts in India. His current research explores teacher agency, climate change education, language education for engineers, and pedagogical designs that connect scientific knowledge with lived community realities and future-oriented sustainability learning.

Discussion 2.  Echo Fragments as Diffractive Practices for Relational Teacher Agency in CCE – Fernanda Rezende, Research Fellow, Deakin University

Climate Change Education is increasingly understood as an ethically and affectively charged pedagogical terrain shaped by planetary entanglements. Drawing on Guattari’s ecosophical thinking, Haraway’s notion of response-ability, and Larrosa’s understanding of experience, this research-profile talk approaches climate education not as knowledge transmission, but as events of relational becoming. It explores how teacher agency is enacted within theseentanglements, examining how multi-modal fragments of classroom experience can productively disrupt individualized notions of agency and foreground its relational and emergent character. Grounded in qualitative research in primary and secondary science classrooms, the talk introduces “Echo Fragments”—short texts, sounds, images, gestures, and movements—as a diffractive methodological practice developed collaboratively with participating teachers. By looking at how educators engage with these fragments reflectively through questions of resonance and affect, the presentation demonstrates how Echo Fragments can support collective reflection, ultimately positioning science and climate change education as an ecosophical, ethical, and situated practice of response-ability.

Fernanda Rezende is a Casual Research Fellow and PhD Candidate at Deakin University. Her research lies at the intersection of climate change education, science education, environmental education, posthumanist methodologies, and teacher professional learning. Her work examines how relational teacher agency is enacted within socio-ecological entanglements through walking-as-method, place-based approaches, and qualitative research. Her current research explores “Echo Fragments” as diffractive practices, ecosophical thinking, and pedagogical designs that connect classroom experience with ethical engagement and response-ability in contemporary science education.

Posted Jun 1, 2026