Practicing Resistance: Teacher Responses to Intergroup Aggression in the Classroom

Teachers are frequently advised to respond when they hear remarks that reflect anger, contempt, or disgust towards members of historically marginalized communities. However, there is little research on how teachers respond to such remarks. Focusing specifically on classroom talk about sexual identity, this study investigates how teachers responded to students who overtly expressed anger, contempt, or disgust towards LGBQ people. Data were collected on three teachers’ classroom practice, including teacher interviews, daily logs, and classroom observations. Findings indicate that variations in teachers’ responses to overt student bias reflect variations in underlying theories of how people unlearn their biases. This study suggests that grounding research on teachers’ responses to students’ biases in knowledge about how people learn might reveal new directions for research on ways to counter bias in the classroom.