Preservice and Inservice Curricula
Developing Critical Capacities for Social Justice in Teacher Candidates
Paper Presentation in a Themed Session Paul Vellom, Allison Hart Young
As preKindergarten-12 educational contexts in the US and around the world become increasingly more diverse, it is ever more critical for teacher candidates to examine and explore their own identity and positionality. Our undergraduate teacher education program attracts candidates who are predominantly White, middle-class, CIS-gendered, heteronormative, and able. They hail from towns and cities in which they are most often positioned as part of the dominant identity group. Our concern is that public schools do not reflect these privileged identities. This paper describes the practices of two teacher educators responsible for introductory coursework in a traditional teacher education program. Our goal is to develop practitioners who are reflective and who see themselves as agents of social change. Developing anti-racist perspectives through the study of their own identities is central to this goal. Work by Arao & Clemens (2013), DiAngelo & Sensoy (2014), and Nieto (2008) helps to frame this work. Our introductory courses are important environments in which to develop our students’ critical and analytical thinking about their identities, the nature of schools, and the profession. We do this by troubling their privileged identities and positionalities, to engage them in learning about social justice (Harro, 2013; Tatum, 2013; McDermott & Samson, 2005). Through assignments like a demographic analysis of their hometown, readings focused on identity and identity development, and Freire’s (1973/1990) Pedagogy of the Oppressed we hope to dispell the notion of “colorblindness” and to develop in our students a more grounded and responsive view of themselves.
Foregrounding Teacher Agency in a Teacher Education Programme
Paper Presentation in a Themed Session Ansurie Pillay
In a world often filled with uncertainty, teachers need to be empowered not just with disciplinary knowledge and pedagogical tools, but also with an understanding of how to make a social difference to the lives of their learners, irrespective of context or resources. This paper reports on a study that foregrounded teacher agency within a South African teacher education programme. The study, underpinned by critical pedagogy, involved working collaboratively with pre-service teachers within a participatory action research design. The study found that pre-service teachers responded positively to lecture-rooms that were perceived to be safe and respectful of their views. By foregrounding agency, they felt empowered to make decisions and access resources, and they embraced challenges perceived to be valuable. By the end of the study, they recognised that teachers can serve as primary resources in schools if they empowered themselves with deep content knowledge, effective pedagogical skills and an understanding of how to make a social difference. They also understood the need to engage learners, scaffold learning, build on prior knowledge, affirm histories, and enable a classroom where learners’ contributions are valued. Ultimately, foregrounding teacher agency required the pre-service teachers to critically reflect on their practices, confront their prejudices, and ascertain the underpinning philosophy shaping their practices.
Embracing Culturally Responsive Pedagogy: How Educational Leaders Instill a Belief about Cultural Responsiveness in Their Teachers
Paper Presentation in a Themed Session Douglas Hermond, Tyrone Tanner
Gay (2010) defines Culturally Responsive Pedagogy (CR) as instructional applications that help educators “improve the academic achievement of students from diverse racial, ethnic, cultural, linguistic and social-class groups." These pedagogical approaches take into account the “discontinuities between the school culture and the community cultures of low-income students and students of color." Despite the frequency of CR in the literature, its practice is not widespread, even though most educators are cognizant of it. We conjecture that educators have not internalized CR as a part of their knowledge-belief system, thus, when faced with classroom challenges, they abandon CR for conventional approaches. In 2002, Muijs and Reynolds verified that teacher beliefs impact their behavior. Given this connection, we expect teachers to behave based on their beliefs. Consequently, the question remains, what informs an educators’ beliefs about CR, and how can this be internalized? To answer this question, we identified ten educational leaders of majority-minority urban schools that are experiencing academic success and whose teachers consistently practice CR. This inquiry helps us understand how educators scaffold CR into their knowledge/belief system. With this knowledge, we will be able to equip educational leaders with processes to influence educators to internalize CR as a part of their philosophical repertoire.
