This paper reports on the research project "Shifting conceptualisations of knowledge and learning in the integration of the new New Zealand Curriculum (NZC) in initial and continuing teacher education", which was funded by the Teaching and Learning Research Initiative of the New Zealand government. The project maps the learning processes of practitioner-researchers in their initiatives in the integration of the new NZC in their teacher education practices. The project is informed by discursive approaches that emphasise the instability of signification and the location of the subject in language. It used a range of specific conceptual and pedagogical tools designed to bridge theoretical debates relevant to the implementation of the NZC and the research itself. This research focuses on teacher educators' narratives and strategies used to negotiate their theories/practices and subjectivities within the complexities and constraints of their own narratives, institutions and communities. The first part of this paper provides a brief overview of the theoretical and methodological frameworks of the research, and three of the conceptual tools used to bridge theoretical debates. The second part presents a snapshot of one case study, offering a situated analysis of a small part of the data collected in a graduate teacher education course focusing on social and cultural studies. This paper is written with a view to illustrate the benefits and challenges of engaging with theory through conceptual tools developed with the aim to create different possibilities for the production of meaning around pedagogical practices in teacher education. (Contains 3 figures and 2 tables.)