About

Prior to becoming a senior lecturer in Initial Teacher Education, I taught across all phases and age groups in special schools in London and Sheffield working with children and young people categorised as having Special Educational Needs and/or Disability (SEND). In the role of a middle leader, I designed and delivered a variety of curricula, including Literacy and Communication, PSHE, Citizenship, Work Related Studies, Life-long Learning in Post-16 provision, and E-Safety, as well as actively contributed to the team responsible for organising and supervising school residential trips for pupils.

Throughout my PhD journey and post-doctoral projects, I have developed a keen interest in qualitative and creative methodologies in research in Education. My main spheres of research encompass co-productive partnerships between practitioners in Education (and often in Health and Social Care) and parents and carers of children/young people involved. However, these partnerships continue to require further development of inclusive approaches to ensure the views and beliefs of parents/carers and children/young people impact the decisions about the provision on offer. Therefore, my research is aimed at the development of reciprocal, empathetic, and inclusive partnerships in Education and beyond. I hope to enable these by utilising co-production as a value-based approach to conceptualise these partnerships within Education. Following a successful small-scale study between parents/carers and practitioners in Education, Health and Social Care, I am currently developing a project that will employ a Community of Philosophical Enquiry as the methodology to encourage and critically evaluate co-productive partnership working in a range of settings, e.g., EYFS, primary, secondary, specialist settings, post-16, alternative provision or respite centres.

Teaching

Department of Teacher Education

College of Social Sciences and Arts

Courses taught

As an educator in Higher Education, I led and taught the ‘Working with others’ module in a ‘flipped classroom’ delivery mode within the Childhood Studies course at Lifelong Learning Centre at the University of Leeds, I led MA in Inclusive Education course and SENDI course at Leeds Beckett University, and I led a range of modules on the BA in Primary Teaching Accelerated Degree course. Within the ITE in the SIoE, I support students in the role of an Academic Advisor and University Link Tutor, and I teach across UG and PG courses, on a range of modules, which include:

Educational Enquiry
Exploring Professional Development
Values and Issues in Education
Developing Professional Practice in Inclusive Learning Environments
Professional Learning 1 and 2
Relationships, Health Education
Personal, Social, and Emotional Development
Understanding Inclusion
English as Additional Language
Reflecting on Approaches to Teaching
Exploring A Specialism Through Collaborative Professional Development
Understanding learning and learners
Philosophy for Children (P4C) - introductory training

Research

• Social and Economic Research Institute

Current research projects 

My recent publications all contribute to the rhetoric of parent-practitioner partnerships and the potential for co-production as a driver for inclusive ways of working together.

Mann, G, Hodge, N., Runswick-Cole; K., Gilmore S., Mavropoulou, S., and Fleming, K (2020) ‘Developing productive partnerships with parents and carers' in L. Graham (ed) Inclusive Education for the 21st Century: Theory, Policy and Practice. Sydney: Allen & Unwin.
Fleming K., and Borkett, P. (2023) 'The potential of co-production', in Thompson, P. and Simmons, H. (Eds.) 'Partnerships with parents in Early Childhood - Today'. Sage.

Current works in progress that have been accepted for publication include:
Fleming, K. and Demissie, F. A. (Eds.) (forthcoming 2023) 'Nurturing ‘Difficult Conversations’ in Education: Empowerment, Agency and Social Justice in the UK'. Bloomsbury.
Mann, G., Fleming, K., Specht, J., and Bobongie-Harris, F. (forthcoming 2023) ‘Parents and teachers working together’ L. Graham (2nd Ed) Inclusive Education for the 21st Century: Theory, Policy and Practice. Sydney: Allen & Unwin.
Fleming, K. (forthcoming 2024) ‘Conceptualising co-productive partnerships with parents and carers’. Bristol University Press.

Publications

Other activities

I am an External Examiner for the Education Studies course at Oxford Brooks University.
I am a member of the Philosophy of Education Society of Great Britain (PESGB). 

Postgraduate supervision

I currently accept expressions of interest for MA and doctoral supervision from potential applicants with interests in qualitative research within the areas of co-productive partnerships in Education, Inclusive Education, critical pedagogies and creative methodologies in Education, Philosophy for Children (P4C), and collaborative and dialogic professional development for practitioners in Education.