Hello, Discourse; It's me, Chris.

Lester & Gabriel (2014) was quite relevant to my day-to-day: I teach educational psychology to pre-service teachers. Recently, we have dropped the use of a textbook in the course, and for many of the reasons addressed by Lester & Gabriel. The textbook presented a single, oversimplified, and ideological reality of learning theories and their practical applicability. Be it intelligence, "learning styles," cultural differences, or any other phenomenon, the textbook encapsulated the various and dynamic conceptualizations of learning and teaching into a single, naive reality. While I was reassured by Lester & Gabriel's position and agreed with their suggestions, my mind keeps returning to the discourses of how we use textbooks.

While I mentioned earlier that I stopped using a textbook in my teaching. I do not think that this frees me from normalizing and depicting psychological constructs unproblematically. Researchers and theorists, who often happen to be textbook authors, regularly present their findings as unencumbered by the social, cultural, and discursive. Lester & Gabriel cite Carol Dweck whose work on student motivation essentially assigns "mindsets" as particular character traits. And although she represents "growth mindset" as something that can be "learned," it is rarely disentangled from notions of intelligence (whether fixed or fluid) as intrinsic to individuals or as a "recipe for success" (Dweck, 2006). I have stopped teaching Dweck to preservice teachers. While it tugged at their heartstrings, it did little to deviate from textbook discourses surrounding intelligence. 

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I would be happy to see textbooks "invite readers to question the veracity of intelligence" (p. 789). However, that would likely require authors to invite readers to question any number of psychological constructs. For example, many pre-service teachers enter the classroom and never question notions of "multiple intelligences." Rather than worry about the changing the text inside the book, an alternative would be to investigate the discourse of textbooks in use. Though this was outside of the scope of Lester & Gabriel's work, it is briefly noted that instructors should provide opportunities for students to debate the reality and utility of psychological constructs.

How do instructors position psychology constructs (e.g., intelligence) in reference to textbook definitions?

So, in what ways might one approach this? Potter (2004) presents discourse as action-oriented, situated and constructed. While each has its merits, for this case I see discourse as action-oriented as potentially fruitful option. To understand "what discourse is doing" would require an analysis of their talk from a variety of perspectives. First steps to consider: how are textbooks incorporated as material objects and what is the discourse surrounding textbooks (and text) as a tool, motive, rule-bound, or a division of labor in the classroom. In any case, discourse pertaining to ideology and content can create criticism, discovery, or out misconceptions. If textbooks become instruments for criticism and critique, discourse could create classrooms as interactional spaces for collective criticism. 

Deviant cases

Regarding method, investigating the discourse of textbook use might look no different than other studies of classroom talk and interaction. For example, patterns in discourse might model fundamental interaction structures (e.g., 'initiation-response-feedback'). However, Potter's notion of deviant cases might particularly relevant to this case, as one would essential be looking for deviant textbook use. These deviant cases may be, in may ways, similar to the "refutational" texts discussed by Lester & Gabriel.