“Poetry is happening but I don't exactly know how”: Literacy Subject Leaders’ perceptions of poetry in their primary schools

Evidence suggests (Ofsted, 2007) that the role of the Subject Leader is crucial in how well poetry is taught in schools. This paper attempts to provide some insights on “what it is like” to coordinate poetry teaching in a primary school. Some of the data confirm elements of the findings from earlier research on the state of poetry in schools, particularly concerning space in the curriculum, teacher subject knowledge and personal interest in poetry. However, we attempt to show that, much to the surprise of some of the Subject Leaders, where poetry teaching in the participants’ schools was perceived to be successful it was often nourished by the combined enthusiasm and ‘zeal’ of the teachers and children experiencing poetry together, which in turn was maintained by an empowering synergy of professional/personal pleasure and engagement with poetic texts experienced by some of the teachers while in school.     

Personality profiles and dogmatism in undergraduate teacher education students

A sample of 435 junior education majors in a large Southwestern university were given the 16 Personality Factor Questionnaire and the Opinion Scale. Correlations were computed between these two scales, and a profile of personality factors was developed which defined the nature of authoritarianism or dogmatism. A step-wise multiple regression analysis revealed that an accurate prediction formula for dogmatism could not be developed from the personality factor scores. Implications for teacher education programs include research to determine if treatment programs can be developed to change a student's degree of dogmatism, and the importance of screening procedures which include an assessment of open-mindedness.