Search results

This paper reports on a three-year study that examined the effect of 9/11 on preservice teachers’ perspectives and dispositions toward global concerns and global perspective pedagogy. Participants responded to a “before” and “after” survey in which they indicated the level of their awareness of global concerns, perceptions of their importance, perceived impact on self, and dispositions toward global-perspective pedagogy. The study utilized both quantitative and qualitative data collection and analysis. The data revealed that 9/11 had a significant effect on preservice teachers that resulted in a shift in perspectives and dispositions toward critical global concerns and teaching about them. The findings highlight the critical importance of preparing preservice teachers to develop global perspectives, cultivate critical knowledge and perceptual understandings of global concerns, and nurture favorable dispositions toward global perspective pedagogy.

This study intended to provide such an opportunity to preservice teachers with a project-based learning (PBL) approach and an inquiry-based pedagogy to engage them in learning science, technology, engineering and mathematics (STEM) knowledge and skills of integration with adding an art component to STEM as science, technology, engineering, arts and mathematics (STEAM) for K-8 children, and developing their own STEAM tasks. The purpose of this project was to explore how STEAM integration in mathematics methods courses influenced K-8 preservice teachers' disposition and knowledge of STEAM integration.

This project used a mixed-research design in data collection and analysis to examine the effects of using the STEAM integration on preservice teachers' knowledge and disposition. The preservice teachers in two EDEL 462 classes in Spring 2019 participated in STEAM learning and development in the inquiry process of four steps of STEAM integration. Data collection includes the pre- and postquestionnaires on teachers' knowledge and disposition.

The results in this study show that the STEAM integration in the mathematics methods courses engaged preservice teachers in four steps of the inquiry process of connection, collaboration, communication and evaluation for STEAM integration using PBL approach. The preservice teachers not only enhanced their disposition in attitude and confidence but also enhanced their knowledge of STEAM integration.

The following conclusions can be drawn from the present study that integrating STEAM components in mathematics methods fosters preservice teachers' creativity, connection, communication, application and teamwork skills, and importantly, it enhances K-8 preservice teachers' productive dispositions and knowledge in STEAM integration.

The results of this study indicate that using math methods courses to engage preservice teachers in learning STEAM integration and designing authentic STEAM tasks in four steps enhanced preservice teachers' attitude and confidence that significantly related to their knowledge of STEAM integration.

These findings have significant implications for the understanding of how to prepare future teachers in STEAM integration in higher education.

A major challenge in teacher education in the United States is how to address the academic and linguistic needs of the growing numbers of emergent bilingual students. A second challenge is how to prepare predominantly White monolingual preservice teachers with little exposure to speakers of languages other than English to educate culturally and linguistically diverse students. With these two challenges in mind, this study examines how a course on literacy, language, and culture grounded in pedagogies of discomfort shifts preservice teachers’ deficit orientations toward emergent bilingual students’ language and literacy resources. Using Ofelia García’s (2009) definition for emergent bilingualism, this mixed-method study was conducted from 2011 to 2013 with 73 preservice teacher participants enrolled at an urban mid-Atlantic university. Quantitative data consisted of pre and post surveys while qualitative data comprised written responses to open-ended statements, self-analyses, and participant interviews. Findings evidence preservice teachers’ endorsement of monolingualism before coursework; however, pedagogies of discomfort during coursework provoke critical reflection leading to significant shifts in preservice teachers’ dispositions toward teaching language diversity in the classroom with implications for teaching emergent bilingual students.

The purpose of this paper is to illustrate the ways in which attention to programmatic vision and coherence – rather than foci on individual courses – might advance the work of justice-oriented, critical English education in important ways. The authors propose that consciously attending to the work of English education on the programmatic level can better enable English educators to cultivate democracy-sustaining dispositions in preservice teachers. Using Grossman et al.’s (2008) definition of “programmatic coherence”, the authors illustrate how one interdepartmental partnership is working to create a shared programmatic vision for English education.

Drawing on Cornel West’s call for the development of a three-piece democratic armor – Socratic questioning, prophetic witness and tragicomic hope – the authors describe their programmatic vision for cultivating democracy-sustaining dispositions in preservice teachers. They show how this shared vision constitutes the foundation for the organization, purpose and sequence of the four-semester cohort program. Finally, the authors describe how this vision helps facilitate meaningful and purposeful symbiosis between field experiences and university coursework.

In an effort to promote replicability regarding programmatic coherence, the authors share structural aspects of their program as well as pose generative questions for colleagues who are interested in approaching the work of critical, democratic English education from the programmatic level.

Addressing the challenges of teacher preparation – especially in this polarized and pitched historical moment – requires shifting the focus from individual courses to a more expansive view that might enable English educators to consider how courses within a program might collectively advance a particular vision of critical and democratic English education.

The purpose of this paper is to report on a collaborative project and study implemented by two teacher educators in an elementary education program. To prepare teacher candidates for field experiences and practicum in a diverse (bilingual) urban school, the program uses coursework to impart asset-based pedagogies and practices.

In this mixed-method case study, this paper examined the awareness and perspectives of preservice teachers (n = 26) to cultural and linguistic diversity and relevant teaching and learning practices. In particular, this study gauged their engagement with multicultural children’s literature in a collaborative interclass activity. The data sources included beginning and end of semester survey responses, notes on participant interactions during the mid-semester collaborative interclass activity and participant retrospective reflections about the activity.

This paper found that teacher candidates showed increased awareness and positive shifts in perspectives. This study also ascertaind that, in learning to become culturally (and linguistically) responsive and sustaining teachers, they benefited from collaborative peer work that focused on learning about multicultural children’s literature, analyzing it and planning to integrate it into their classrooms.

Studies show that culturally relevant literature in schools is beneficial; however, teacher candidates often lack knowledge of such literature and how to use it. This need is especially critical and relevant when learning about and implementing culturally relevant and sustaining practices. The collaborative undertaking discussed in this study fills this gap through co-teaching and interclass activity that brings preservice teachers as a cohort to collaboratively learn about, discuss, reflect on and plan lessons as they prepare to work with students from different backgrounds than their own.

In addition to imparting pedagogical content knowledge, teacher educators have the special responsibility to help future practitioners understand critical, contemporary social issues in our ever-globalized world. The purpose of this article is to describe one teacher education effort that heeds calls from learned societies and accreditation agencies to prepare preservice teachers for their inevitably global classrooms.

The authors – both instructors of a semester-long, required course in a social studies teacher education program – reflect on their practice, outline guiding principles and provide pedagogical examples that encourage preservice teachers to consider complex topics found within global education, while simultaneously helping them reflect on their own positionality.

Most preservice teachers embrace global perspectives in education if provided with opportunities to identify curricular relevance, acknowledge multiple viewpoints, practice continuous reflection, explore global awareness and citizenship, and understand the imperative of accepting responsibility to prepare global citizens.

This manuscript shares successful classroom strategies and learning exercises that have resulted in preservice teacher growth. Teacher educators can and should “globalize” course curricula, equipping social studies teachers with the knowledge, aptitude and skills necessary to teach the next generation of global citizens.

The teacher education course described herein offers a practical approach for preparing a cadre of educators ready to teach in our globalized world.

Traditionally, preservice teacher education has been conducted in college and university classrooms and has relied heavily on what Shulman (1992) called “the twin demons of lecture and textbook” (p. 1). This educational model neglects the importance and strength of preservice teachers’ beliefs about teaching and content (Nietfeld & Enders, 2003; Putnam & Borko, 2000) and has been termed a transmission model in which teaching is telling (McLeskey & Waldron, 2004; Russell, McPherson, & Martin, 2001). The type of knowledge conveyed is considered to be declarative (Sternberg, 1999) or formal (Lundeberg & Scheurman, 1997) and is derived from theory and comprised of facts, concepts, and rules. Whitehead (1929) and more recently Bransford, Brophy, and Williams (2000) reported that this type of knowledge tends to remain inert and is unlikely to be retrieved in the very circumstances that call for its use.

This study aims to examine the outcome of an online project to inform preservice English language teachers regarding the United Nations’ Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs).

A qualitative research method was used to understand participants’ overall knowledge. In total, 30 preservice teachers were selected from a larger pool after considering their grade point averages, sex, university affiliations and geographical backgrounds to ensure a balanced distribution and diversity. Qualitative data were collected through written productions, video recordings and a postproject survey.

Findings revealed that preservice teachers deepened their understanding of SDGs and adopted a positive attitude toward SDGs while increasing their pedagogical awareness and knowledge of teaching English in response to SDGs. They also regarded literary texts as a valuable resource for teaching SDGs.

This study contributes to the literature by demonstrating that literary works are valuable for educating preservice teachers on integrating SDGs. A detailed overview of the project and its outcomes can guide practitioners and teacher educators in integrating SDGs into their education programs and English language teaching.

Research reveals very little about how the supervision of social studies student teachers ought to be enacted. The paper aims to discuss this issue.

Based on the broader arguments for the democratic purposes of social studies, the author argues for the development of the democratic capacities of teacher citizens by creating deliberative and dialogic spaces in social studies field-based teacher education.

Four conceptual dimensions of dialogic pedagogy in the supervision of social studies student teachers are explored: questioning, listening, negotiation, and self-critique.

Because supervision of student teachers is a pedagogical interaction, a pedagogy of social studies field-based teacher education must be grounded in dialogue and deliberation.