Taking time,breaking codes: moments in white teacher candidates’ exploration of racism and teacher identity

Abstract

In three narrative vignettes, this paper challenges scholars and practitioners of teacher education to consider ways that our courses do and do not engage white teacher candidates to take on racially conscious orientations. The work addressed in this paper has implications for our understandings of how preservice teachers can learn about racial identity in ways that benefit individual teachers and support their work in schools and communities. These findings buttress previous work in ‘second wave’ white teacher identity research and can translate directly into teacher education course and program design. Simultaneously, this research speaks to the broader literature in teacher education, offering evidence to support the value of extended periods of time for new teachers to build authentic relationships and conduct critical study of self and society in a climate where teacher preparation programs face pressure to reduce credits to degree and intensify their focus on preparing students for externally mandated assessments.     

From LSA to teacher: the value of classroom experience in shaping a ‘teacher’ identity

Routes into teacher training have expanded in recent years, accompanied by a growing interest in schools ‘growing their own’ teachers from amongst support staff. However, little attention has been paid to their transition to the role of teacher. This article investigates influences on identity development and the extent to which personal values are reconciled with professional demands and socially constructed facets of educational practice. Participants were nine staff in one secondary school for pupils with moderate learning difficulties who had undertaken the transition from LSA (learning support assistant) to teacher. Qualitative data were obtained through an online survey and focus group discussion. Findings show that extensive opportunities to experiment with provisional and possible selves, immersion in educational discourse, classroom agency and staff collaboration engender a ‘teacher’ self-concept and positive motivations for LSA career development, and that self-esteem and self-efficacy are strengthened by how an individual’s values align with those of the setting in which they work. Findings may inform school leaders as to the value of training teachers ‘in-house’ and support career development decisions of LSAs, a pathway of potential significance given the current pressures on teacher recruitment and retention.     

Voice,post-structural representation and the subjectivity of ‘included’ students

Aligned with the broader movement from structuralism to the post-structuralisms [Lather, P. 2013. “Methodology-21: What Do We Do in the Afterward?” International Journal of Qualitative Studies in Education 26 (6): 634–645; St. Pierre, E. A. 2009. “Afterword: Decentering Voice in Qualitative Inquiry.” In Voice in Qualitative Inquiry: Challenging Conventional, Interpretive, and Critical Conceptions in Qualitative Research, edited by A. Y. Jackson and L. A. Mazzei, 221–236. London: Routledge; St. Pierre, E. A. 2013. “The Posts Continue: Becoming.” International Journal of Qualitative Studies in Education 26 (6): 646–657], research in disability studies for the past two decades has found ‘the potholes’ [Miller, L., J. B. Whalley, and I. Stronach. 2012. “From Structuralism to Poststructuralism.” In Research Methods in the Social Sciences, edited by B. Somekh and C. Lewin. London: SAGE] of disability rights scholarship. In this paper, I offer a critical research framework in the field of disability studies in education that is theoretical, political and personal. Concentrating on the positioning of disability, I draw on the methodological tools of post-structural representation, subjectivity and constructivist grounded theory to study how discursive practices within (and around) secondary schools shape ‘included’ disabled subjects. In the paper I develop this framework and then demonstrate its application in ongoing research that critically counters the conventions that marginalize particular students in schools.     

‘The conference was awesome’: social justice and a mathematics teacher conference

Professional development comes in many forms, some of which are deemed more useful than others. However, when groups of teachers are excluded, or exclude themselves, from professional development opportunities, then there is an issue of social justice. This article examines the experiences of a group of teachers from a Māori-medium school who attended a mathematics teacher conference. By analysing the teachers’ sense of belonging through their ideas about engagement, alignment and imagination, we are able to describe how different kinds of relationships influence the inclusion/exclusion process. This leads to a discussion about what can be done by the teachers as well as conference organisers to increase these teachers’ likelihood of attending further conferences in the future.     

What does the teacher do?: Constructivist pedagogies and prospective teachers’ beliefs about the role of a teacher

The constructivist pedagogies that are increasingly part of teacher education course work and expectations emerge from an intellectual world where knowledge is seen as created rather than received, mediated by discourse rather than transferred by teacher talk, explored and transformed rather than remembered as a uniform set of positivistic ideas. Increasingly, teacher educators ask new teachers to learn how to elicit and then use students’ existing ideas as a basis for helping them construct new, more reasoned, more accurate or more disciplined understandings. While the role a teacher plays in developing or shaping students’ thinking via constructivist pedagogies is obvious to teacher educators who advocate such strategies, the case of Taylor, a prospective English teacher, suggests that the role a teacher plays when using these strategies may not be at all clear to prospective teachers. Rather than understanding constructivist pedagogies as techniques for thinking with learners, for teaching them, Tayor saw these strategies as ends in themselves. Faced with models of constructivist pedagogies, Taylor concluded that the teacher's role ends when she has activated learners, invited them to talk, successfully engaged their participation. This article describes how she reached this conclusion and explores the ways in which constructivist pedagogies can lead prospective teachers to project a thin vision of their role as a teacher.     

Gender differences in preschool children’s recall of competitive and noncompetitive computer mathematics games

This study investigated whether competitive and noncompetitive educational mathematics computer games influence four‐ to seven‐year‐old boys’ and girls’ recall of game‐playing experience. A qualitative analysis was performed to investigate what preschool children may have learned through their selective recall of game‐playing experience. A difference emerged in six‐ to seven‐year‐old boys’ and girls’ recall after playing a competitive computer mathematics game, such that boys tended to first recall the consequence of ‘winning and losing’ whereas girls of the same age focused on ‘friendship among animated characters’ in the game. Thus, the qualitative results suggest the possibility that selective attention or selective recall might be partially influenced by gender schemas. Based on the recall sequences, educational noncompetitive computer mathematics games may lead to a better learning outcome for older boys.     

Americans ‘support’ the idea of tuition-free college: an exploration of sentiment and political identity signals otherwise

In January 2015, President Obama captured headlines in the US by announcing America’s College Promise (ACP), a policy that would reverse four decades of privatisation in higher education by making community colleges ‘tuition-free’. This research explores the conversation that unfolded across the Facebook pages of various media sources. Key phrases associated with sentiments and communication styles are uncovered using a Bag of Words (BoW) technique. Next, guided by political identity theory, the researchers employ logistic regression to explore variable effects (e.g. source, gender, race, age and political leaning) on communicating: (1) Against ACP, (2) in a Civil manner, and (3) Against/Civil/On-Topic. BoW models suggest those against the policy utilise anti-free-ride, privatisation rhetoric, whereas those using uncivil language attack commentators and groups who counter personally-held political beliefs – while also introducing non-sequiturs from other policies (e.g. healthcare and immigration). The combined communication styles unlocked tokens not found in larger sentiments, such as concerns over student loan debt. Logistic regression illustrates that, depending on sentiment or communication style explored, political identities and memberships associated with source and political alignment significantly affected likelihoods of communicating in the conversation. These findings are linked back to political identity theory.     

Beyond ‘what works’: understanding teacher identity as a practical and political tool

Drawing on previous research that focused upon the formation and mediation of teacher professional identity, this paper develops a model for conceptualising teacher professional identity. Increasingly, technical-rational understandings of teachers’ work and ‘role’ are privileged in policy and public discourse over more nuanced and holistic approaches that seek to understand teacher professional identity – what it is to ‘be’ a teacher. This article seeks to offer an alternative view, presenting the idea that an understanding of the processes by which teacher professional identity is formed and mediated is central to understanding the professional learning and development needs of teachers and advancing a richer, more transformative vision for education. I argue that instrumentalist notions of teachers’ work embedded in neo-liberal educational agendas such as those currently being advanced in many western countries offer an impoverished view of the teaching profession and education more broadly, and suggest that the concept of teacher professional identity holds the potential to work as a practical tool for the teaching profession and those who work to support them in the development of a more generative educational agenda.     

Social media,academics’ identity work and the good teacher

Focussing on academics’ professional identity, this paper analyses the challenges academics experience when adopting new technologies in their pedagogical practices. Notions of ‘economies of performance’ and ‘ecologies of practice’ as well as the concept of liminality are employed to understand this identity work. The paper illustrates how academics welcomed the potential of the web, despite the possible challenge to their authority. The paper argues that the process of changing pedagogical practices is experienced as risky and uncertain by some academics, and that it is a commitment to being a ‘good teacher’ that helped these academics to overcome these feelings.     

The development of a mathematics teacher’s professional identity during her first year teaching

This study is focused on a period that poses several challenges for the development of mathematics teachers’ professional identities and agency: their first year of teaching in schools. During this period, beginning mathematics teachers confront tensions and contradictions among the principles, ideals, and experiences encountered during pre-service education and the demands, and restrictions of their teaching practice in schools. This article approaches this topic by developing an interpretative case study centered on one novice mathematics teacher, Sol. The aim is to describe and understand the development of Sol’s professional identity and agency during her first teaching year. Considering identity development as a diachronic phenomenon, we carry out a narrative analysis of the research data. The findings show that Sol developed her professional identity and agency through a process that gathered together the teaching practices possible inside her school, the positions she could negotiate as a newcomer inside the institution, and the cultural practices and discourses embodied during pre-service education. The results bring to the forefront the profound and tense interactions between the intimate and personal terrain of mathematics teachers and the social and cultural world of the schools where they work. Sol’s case also contributes to understanding the role that a robust pre-service education can play in the development of beginning teachers’ professional identities and in the possibility they could become agents of transformation in their schools.     

‘Supportive’, ‘real’, and ‘low-cost’: implicit comparisons and universal assumptions in the construction of the prospective college-based HE student

This paper first argues for the importance of continued analysis of marketising discourses in Higher Education (HE), both despite and because of their ubiquity. Secondly, the paper looks specifically at college-based HE provision in English Further Education (FE). Using the ‘possible selves’ concept alongside critical discourse analysis, the paper analyses the representations of prospective students on marketing web pages for HE provision in FE colleges. Arguing that the web pages reveal more than just the limited language of HE marketing strategy, the paper highlights common representations of the college-based HE student across policy, research and marketing sources. By exploring both the celebratory and the limiting nature of these representations, the paper therefore asks what the pages’ projections of future or prospective students can tell us about current understandings of English college-based HE.     

On semiotics and subjectivity: a response to Tony Brown’s “signifying ‘students’, ‘teachers’, and ‘mathematics’: a reading of a special issue”

In this response we address some of the significant issues that Tony Brown raised in his analysis and critique of the Special Issue of Educational Studies in Mathematics on “Semiotic perspectives in mathematics education” (Sáenz-Ludlow & Presmeg, Educational Studies in Mathematics 61(1–2), 2006). Among these issues are conceptualizations of subjectivity and the notion that particular readings of Peircean and Vygotskian semiotics may limit the ways that authors define key actors or elements in mathematics education, namely students, teachers and the nature of mathematics. To deepen the conversation, we comment on Brown’s approach and explore the theoretical apparatus of Jacques Lacan that informs Brown’s discourse. We show some of the intrinsic limitations of the Lacanian idea of subjectivity that permeates Brown’s insightful analysis and conclude with a suggestion about some possible lines of research in mathematics education.

Affordability of private schools: exploration of a conundrum and towards a definition of ‘low-cost’

The affordability of private education is a contentious issue. While the extent of ‘low-cost’ private schooling is widely accepted, there is no agreement on what ‘low-cost’ means in this context and how this relates to affordability for poor families. This paper addresses the lacuna in the literature by defining ‘low-cost’ in relation to what poor families could afford if they were to send all their children to school while restricting their expenditure on schooling to a fixed proportion of their total family expenditure. This approach links the definition of ‘low-cost’ to internationally accepted poverty lines. Two examples from recent research in South Sudan and Liberia illustrate the flexibility of the new method. The paper also addresses the ‘conundrum’ in the research literature, which suggests low-cost private schools are unaffordable for poorest families, when the same literature typically shows some of the poorest using these schools.     

A longitudinal study of effects of a developmental teacher preparation program on elementary prospective teachers’ mathematics beliefs

The universal emphasis in mathematics education on teaching and learning for understanding can require substantial paradigmatic shifts for many elementary school teachers. Consequently, a pressing goal of teacher preparation programs should be the facilitation of these changes during program experiences. This longitudinal, mixed methods study presents a thorough investigation of the effects of a distinctive teacher preparation program on important constructs related to prospective teacher preparedness to teach mathematics for understanding, including mathematics pedagogical and teaching efficacy beliefs, mathematics anxiety, and specialized content knowledge for teaching mathematics. The results indicate that the programmatic features experienced by the prospective teachers in this study, including a developmental two-course mathematics methods sequence and coordinated developmental field placements, provided a context supporting teacher change. These shifts are interpreted through the nature and timing of the experiences in the program and a model of teacher change processes. The findings provide insights for mathematics educators as to the outcomes of these programmatic features.     

Building the wall brick by brick: one prospective teacher’s experiences with mathematics anxiety

Mathematics education researchers have investigated mathematics anxiety in prospective elementary teachers. While many of these studies have focused on the bodily sensations and emotions of mathematics anxiety, particularly those felt in assessment situations, opportunities remain to investigate how prospective elementary teachers interpret their experiences with mathematics anxiety and connect them over time to compose personal histories of mathematics anxiety. Currently, over 90 % of elementary teachers in US schools are women, and women have been shown to suffer more from mathematics anxiety than do men. In this article, I analyze how one woman prospective elementary teacher described, explained, and related her experiences of mathematics anxiety across her personal narratives of learning mathematics as a K-12 student and of learning to teach mathematics as a college student in a teacher preparation program. My research demonstrates that experiences of mathematics anxiety may persist beyond assessment situations to influence women prospective elementary teachers’ larger mathematical histories. I also show that women prospective elementary teachers may interpret mathematics anxiety as specific fears (e.g., loss of opportunities for social participation) and may develop particular coping strategies related to those fears. Finally, I point out that while a coping strategy may be used consistently across K-12 mathematics learning and undergraduate teacher preparation, and may even offer a woman prospective elementary teacher some relief from mathematics anxiety, it may also limit her mathematics learning and professional development. To conclude, I present implications of my research for mathematics teacher educators.     

Encouraging the transfer of ‘school’ mathematics to the ‘real world’ through the integration of process and content,context and culture

This paper reports upon a research project which considered the transfer of students' mathematical understanding across different task contexts. The research involved two groups of students from contrasting learning environments. The first environment was characterised by the complete integration of mathematical process and content using open ended activities. The second environment represented a typical English classroom with a content based scheme being predominantly used. The research demonstrated that the procedure and performance of students in response to addition and fraction tasks varied considerably when the context of the tasks changed. This variation suggested that students' perceptions of the contexts were individually constructed and contexts did not have a uniform effect upon the difficulty of tasks. The research also suggested that students who had learned in an environment characterised by the integration of process and content were more able to transfer their learning across contexts. Students who had learned mathematical process independently of content were more likely to vary their procedure and performance in response to the contexts of the tasks. This was considered in relation to the problems of school — real world transfer and the effectiveness of different learning environments.     

Intersections between immigration, language, identity, and emotions: a science teacher candidate’s journey

This study reports a subset of findings from a larger, ongoing study aimed at exploring interactions between teacher identity, learning, and classroom practices in a social justice teacher education program at a selective liberal arts college in New York. This case-study explores the journey of Elena, as an immigrant, a student, and a pre-service teacher candidate towards becoming a social justice educator. Elena reflects upon her school language experiences as an immigrant youth, her learning in a social justice teacher education program, and her field experiences in an international high school. The analysis spans macro-, meso-, and microlevels to explore the ways globalization, particularly immigration, as well as schooling policies for English language learners interact with aspects of Elena’s core identity, particularly in school settings. The findings show some of the ways language and literacy verified and/or denied aspects of Elena’s core identity; specific instances where second language proficiency was cast as power and privilege versus disadvantage according to ethnic, language, and class categorizations; and the struggles Elena, and other immigrant youth may face given the focus on English language acquisition and high stakes accountability in schools, at the expense of students’ primary language proficiency and affirmation of core identity markers.

Power and the ‘autonomous’ principal: autonomy,teacher development,and school leaders’ work

ABSTRACT

One aspect of instructional leadership is the work principals undertake in supporting and developing teachers’ skills and capabilities. This paper examines this aspect of school leadership within a climate characterised by increased principal workloads, heavy external accountabilities, pressure to improve student results, and heightened autonomy which included discourses regarding principals’ increased freedom in staffing decisions. The case studies within this paper focus specifically on principals’ work in relation to the recruitment and development of staff. Policy and discourse suggests that principals have the autonomy to recruit and build staffing teams to meet school needs and improve outcomes, though questions have been raised about how autonomous public schools can be a part of a wider system. This paper explores the role autonomy plays in leadership practices relating to staff recruitment and development. The findings contribute to a body of knowledge regarding the ways principals make sense of and enact their work under highly pressurised school improvement policy conditions.