Writing the queer self: Using autobiography to mediate inclusive teacher education in Canada

Writing the queer self involves locating the self within a broad understanding of queer that recognises a spectrum of sex, sexual and gendered subjects. In this article, I discuss how I write the queer self to link the personal to my positional practice as a gay teacher educator. I overview my work with Agape, which is a focus group that I initiated in my university's teacher education programme to explore sex, sexual and gender differences in education and culture. I explore how I link my queer autobiography to the professional and the pedagogical, and how I use it to engender deliberations about queer presence, representation and place in education. I conclude by speaking on the importance of doing this work as an ethical project for social justice and educational transformation.     

Coming out,rolling over,and playing model: possibilities beyond the trope of queer students “at-risk”

In this article, I explore one lesbian teacher’s ethical dilemmas and resulting disappointment related to the lack of participation by queer students in the Gay Straight Alliance she helped to create. Her dilemmas hinge on the paradoxical subject position of queer teacher in tension with the “coming out imperative” and intersecting with discursive articulations of teacher-as-role model and queer students as a population “at-risk.” Grounded in scholarship that describes the discursive production of queer teacher and queer students, I explore the ways in which one group of queer students resist notions of “at-riskness” and the resulting impact on their teacher.     

Popular culture as emotional provocation: the material enactment of queer pedagogies in a high school classroom

Drawing on the notion of popular culture as a form of queer emotional provocation, in this paper I suggest that attending to the material enactment of queer pedagogies in context enables an understanding of the importance of attending more fully to the emotional ramifications of queer pedagogies. Working within the context of a research project intended to explore the possibilities of destabilising normalising representations of sexualities and genders in a Year 12 New Zealand high school Health classroom, I explore one of several instances of emotionality that characterised the study, and its effects. Despite our best intentions, in the moment, the students, their teacher and I as a researcher experienced challenges in working with the emotional provocations that queer pedagogies engendered. I close by suggesting that attending more closely to the emotional implications of queer pedagogies would have enabled us to mine their pedagogical possibilities more fully.     

Desiring silence: Gender,race and pedagogy in education

In my work with white teachers, predominantly female, I assert that ‘desire’ is functioning to produce silent discourses that serve to perpetuate a continuation of white privilege. Based on a qualitative research study exploring the nature of silences in teacher education classrooms, this paper seeks to explore how desire is functioning to produce such silences and how they can be productively understood. Using the concept of desire as presented by Deleuze, this paper engages a notion of desire that is not spawned from lack but a desire that is generative and seeking, resulting in the production of privilege, power and voice.     

Growth of Reflection in Teaching: Reconciling the Models

Although all teachers are expected to be “role models,” discursive trajectories reaching back to the West’s gay liberation pressure queer teachers to be role models in specific ways – by “coming out” and helping queer students out of their “time of difficulty.” Paradoxically, discourses that construct children as innocent and queers‐as‐a‐threat make it difficult for queer teachers not only to take up these positions as role models but to be visible in schools. In this article, I explore the discourses that shape queer teachers’ understanding of touch, sexuality, confidentiality, the private versus public domain, and pedagogical responsibility within the schooling context. Informed by Foucault, I analyze the interview data of three Ontario queer teachers to investigate the ways in which queers‐as‐a‐threat and teacher‐as‐role‐model influence the negotiation of their ethical dilemmas regarding their student crushes.     

Teaching about queer families: surveillance,censorship, and the schooling of sexualities

In this paper, we investigate primary school teachers’ reflections on addressing the topic of same-sex families and relationships in their classrooms. Informed by queer theoretical and Foucauldian analytic approaches, we examine teachers’ potential use of texts, such as picture storybooks, which introduce representations of same-sex relationships and desire. By employing a case-study approach, our aim is to provide insights into the pedagogical decisions and the heteronormative conditions under which three teachers in the Australian context attempt to deal with the topic of same-sex families/relationships. Attention is drawn to the regulatory surveillance of the parental gaze and the silencing and marginalization of sexual identity issues in order to illuminate the ways in which the micro politics of teaching about queer families and relationships are inextricably linked to broader macro processes governing the institutionalizing influences of heteronormativity, heterosexism and homonegativity. Implications for teacher education are outlined.     

Gender, “Symbolic Domination”, and Female Work: The case of teacher education

In this article I explore the part played by liberal democratic ideology in the regulation of female work, in particular, the work of women teacher educators and contract researchers in British and Canadian teacher education departments. My goal is to examine the relationship between symbolic notions of female domesticity and service as they have been expressed in liberal understandings of the nation state across time, together with accounts of contemporary working life as described by differently positioned women workers in teacher education. Central to the argument I make is the assertion that women's work and its symbolic representation in teacher education constitute powerful symbolic elements in the ongoing regulation of women as non-citizens. In following the work of feminist political theorists and cultural sociologists, I also examine the cultural, material, and social power of historicized visions of the female as “domestic servant”, as daughter of the nation state, and as “deviant non-citizen” as they are reflected in the contemporary working lives of women teacher educators.     

Personality Patterns of Public School Librarians and Teachers

Personality traits of 43 female public school librarians were compared to traits exhibited by 50 female public school teachers. Differences in personality structure were found to exist on four factors of the Sixteen Personality Factor Questionnaire: G and M (p < .05) and I and Q1 (p < .01). Personality of public school librarians and teachers should provide a meaningful variable for study of successful working interaction between the two groups. The implication is that in order to effect a smooth professional relationship between these two groups, school personnel should be aware that a heterogeneity of personality traits does exist.     

Observed classroom quality profiles in state-funded pre-kindergarten programs and associations with teacher,program, and classroom characteristics

In the past decade in the United States, pre-kindergarten programs for four year olds have expanded rapidly as a potentially powerful intervention intended to promote school readiness for children at-risk for future school failure. This paper describes in detail multi-dimensional profiles of observed quality across 692 classrooms in 11 states representing 80% of these available programs and examines teacher, program, and classroom characteristics associated in these profiles. Cluster analysis enabled the detection of patterns that fit profiles of high and low overall emotional and instructional support along with “mid-range” patterns in which emotional support is somewhat higher than instructional support. Associations between teacher characteristics and program characteristics were generally not significant. However, the poorest quality profile was associated with classroom poverty level, suggesting that the children who need the highest quality educational experiences have teachers who are struggling the most to provide it.     

Personality of elite male and female chess players and its relation to chess skill

Whereas a lot of studies examine cognitive processes in chess players, personality profiles of elite chess players are still not described well. The aim of this study was to examine personality of strong chess experts and its influence on chess skill. We tested elite male and female chess players with Freiburg Personality Inventory Revised (FPI-R), which also provides population norms for males and females. Elite male players' personality profile did not significantly differ from the population norms. Female players were more satisfied with life, had less physical complaints and higher achievement motivation in comparison with female population norms. Personality was also related with chess skill but showed different patterns in males and females. Stronger male players were more introverted, while we found the opposite pattern in female players. These results indicate that personality plays an important role in the highest level of complex intellectual activities.     

Teacher judgments at zero-acquaintance: A social accuracy analysis

How accurate are teachers’ first impressions and what moderates the degree of first impression accuracy? In previous teacher judgment accuracy research, teachers judged students who were well-acquainted to them, focusing on single traits. Here, we follow the zero-acquaintance paradigm and apply the Social Accuracy Model (SAM; Biesanz, 2010) to examine teachers’ first impressions regarding students’ personality profiles. Three groups of perceivers (student teachers, experienced teachers and psychology students; N = 285) rated students’ (N = 10) academic self-concept, intrinsic motivation and intelligence based on brief videos. SAM analyses revealed that teachers were accurate regarding the average students’ profile of characteristics (normative accuracy), but were not successful at detecting students' unique personality profiles (distinctive accuracy). Moreover, likeable students and those evaluated as more physically attractive were perceived with higher normative accuracy. Personality similarity and teaching experience were unrelated to accuracy. Implications for teacher judgment accuracy research and educational practice are discussed.     

A teacher like me or a student like me? Role model versus teacher bias effect

Several studies have found that teacher–student gender matching has positive effects on student achievement. However, the underlying mechanisms that explain this effect have not been empirically explored. This paper studies the impact of same gender teachers on academic achievement for a large sample of 8th graders in Chile. I provide evidence that girls benefit from being assigned to female teachers, while there is no negative effect on boys. More importantly, I provide evidence that the positive effect is due to role model effects and not to teacher bias effects.     

中小学教师人格类型与职业认同的关系研究

采用MBTI-M人格类型量表和教师职业认同问卷对中小学教师进行施测。结果显示：中小学教师在人格四维度的倾向性分别为外倾（E）、感觉（N）、判断（J）、情感（F）和思维（T）;在所有调查的教师群体中,ESTJ、ESFJ、ISTJ、ISFJ、ESFP、ENTJ六种人格类型的人数最多;十六种人格类型在男、女被试群体的分布上存在非常显著的差异;不同人格类型的教师在职业认同程度上存在非常显著的差异,ESFJ、ESTJ型人格教师的职业认同显著高于ESFP、ISFJ、ISTJ型人格的教师。建议今后侧重选拔ESFJ和ESTJ型人格类型的专业人员从事教师职业。     

Un/Fixing the Fiend: Queering Pedagogy and Dangerous Desires

The notion of desire in theorizing pedagogical relations has a long tradition within foundations of education. Contemporary scholarship on desire in educational theory is informed by sexuality studies and queer theory. This article both builds and expands contemporary dialogue on desire as informed by some of the debates within sexuality studies, and feminist and queer theory. In this article, I investigate elements of desire that are considered dangerous in pedagogical contexts such as “excess” and “devotion.” I then provide an interpretation of the productive nature of conflict and desire in pedagogical encounters. Finally, I explore the pleasure and pain of desires, tension, and conflict as necessarily dangerous and dangerously necessary elements of learning and pedagogical encounters.     

The contested design of children’s sexual education: queer growth and epistemic uncertainty

In this article, I contend that underneath the 2015 sex-ed debates in Ontario are deep-seated, psycho-socially entrenched problems related to thinking about childhood sexuality. I consider how the topic of sex-ed for children, over and above its actual curricular lessons, is marshaled to accomplish the work of the adult’s psycho-social needs. Methodologically, queer theory and psychoanalytic theories of childhood development are employed for their capacity to place sexuality at the origin of subjectivity. I develop a queer theory of childhood that can provide insight into the transferential attachments adults have to the paradigm of childhood innocence. I also argue that attention to how the figure of the child becomes known and contested through local and transnational exchange can help reveal the impact that sex-ed debates have on racialized and provincial imaginaries of belonging.     

Apple Jumper,Teacher Babe,and Bland Uniformer Teachers: Fashioning Feminine Teacher Bodies

A student teacher group's conversation about teacher clothing as reflective of certain kinds of reprehensible or desirable teacher identities provoked the writing of this article. I use a feminist poststructuralist analysis to explore the three categories of women teachers' dress suggested by the student teachers as signifiers of women teachers' subjectivities discursively produced within the contexts of schooling. The article also challenges the three categories as constructions produced by this student teacher group in their positionality as young, White, middle-class, heterosexual female novice teachers in the Southeast region of the United States. This inquiry highlights the limitations and constrictions of women teachers' institutionalized subjectivities and suggests ways in which these limitations and constrictions offer sites for resistance, specifically in relation to clothing choices that shape and reflect a feminine teacher body.     

论胡三省的治史态度和人格精神

胡三省是宋末元初著名的爱国主义思想家、史学家。他具有坚韧执着的意志人格,求真求实的学术人格,以及讲求气节,忠于国家和民族的政治人格。     

职业院校教师工作倦怠与人格特质的相关研究

本研究旨在考察职业院校教师的人格特征与工作倦怠的关系。采用艾森克人格问卷和高校教师工作倦怠问卷,抽取6所职业院校的421名教师进行测查。结果：（1）职业院校教师的工作倦怠整体水平不严重。男教师在个人成就感降低维度上的得分显著高于女教师,11～20年和30年及以上教龄的教师在组织去人性化维度上的得分显著高于5年及以下教龄的教师,在组织去人性化、情绪枯竭、科研耗尽感,工作倦怠上,已婚教师得分显著高于未婚教师。（2）神经质和外倾性对工作倦怠及其各维度的预测作用均显著,精神质仅对个人成就感降低维度的预测作用显著。结论：职业院校教师的工作倦怠水平较低,人格特质能够较好地预测工作倦怠水平。     

‘You’re actually the problem’: manifestations of populist masculinist anxieties in Australian higher education

In 2016 the world witnessed a consolidation of a western brand of political ‘populist authoritarianism’ that is anti-globalisationalist and creates ‘shared objects of loathing’ in the popular imagination. This article engages with the implications of this affective and masculinist ‘post-truth’ era for higher education and analyses the narratives of teacher educators who teach compulsory classes based on inclusion and diversity. The article uses the work of feminist, Indigenous and queer theorists to explore gendered responses to pedagogical encounters recounted in the data. We offer a reading of these experiences that links white male objections, particularly around the teaching of gender and race, to the growth of neoconservatism that precipitated the contemporary rise of populist authoritarianism. The pedagogical encounters we explore reflect the notion that the Australian white male is a figure who is brought undone by allowing the subaltern to speak.