Home | Business News | Browse by Publication | A | Academic Exchange Quarterly

Preservice teachers learn to do action research.

Article Excerpt
Abstract

This research addresses the challenge of preparing teachers for diverse classrooms and explores the use of action research as one strategy for preservice teacher preparation that can offer teacher candidates tools for working to meet student learning needs.

Introduction

This research focuses on the development of action research as a habit of mind that is responsive to issues of student diversity in the elementary classroom. While typically seen as a form of professional development commonly used with practicing teachers, pushing this work into the teacher preparation program supported teacher interns in developing teaching practices that were responsive to issues of classroom diversity. Our research explored our efforts to simultaneously help students in our internship year course on reflection and inquiry to develop the habit of mind to become teacher researchers as well as explore best practices to meet diverse student learning needs in the classroom. Teacher candidates are often focused on themselves as learners when they come to the classroom for early teaching experiences. Supporting and fostering inquiring practices was our tactic to help teacher candidates move beyond this and begin to focus on their efforts with individual students in the classroom.

Action Research in Teacher Education

New teachers and their students face many educational challenges in public school classrooms around the country. The diversity of students along multiple dimensions continue to grow, challenging teacher educators to address differences in perspective and experience. Thirty-nine percent of the public school student population was of minority status in the year 2000 (Hodgkinson, 2002). Students are different from their teachers along many social and cultural dimensions including race, ethnicity, socioeconomic status, culture, and language because current and prospective teachers are predominantly white, middle-class, monolingual European-American women (Villegas & Lucas, 2002).

However, the diversity between students and teachers is commonly seen as a challenge rather than a strength or opportunity (Taylor & Sobel, 2001). Many teachers are choosing to return to the suburban schools of their childhoods rather than undertake teaching careers in the urban and diverse schools (Taylor & Sobel, 2001) and discovering that many suburban schools are also becoming increasingly diverse (Zehr, 2001). Therefore, it is inappropriate given the ongoing demographic changes to prepare teachers for a monolingual and monocultural society. Yet teacher educators may find it challenging to help teacher candidates learn to incorporate a diversity stance because of the strength of preservice teacher beliefs as they enter a program of teacher education. (Wideen, Mayer-Smith et al. 1998; Feiman-Nemser 2000). It is critical to help teacher candidates come to understand that diversity is a rich concept including variation in ethnicity, culture, language, socioeconomic status, race and ability.

One strategy to deal with these challenges is to give teacher candidates the tools to do...

View this article FREE - Now for a Limited Time, try Goliath Business News
Free for 3 Days!