Preservice Teachers to Inservice Teachers: Teaching for Social Justice
Open Access
- Author:
- Wilt, Brian James
- Graduate Program:
- Curriculum and Instruction
- Degree:
- Doctor of Philosophy
- Document Type:
- Dissertation
- Date of Defense:
- June 25, 2007
- Committee Members:
- Debra M Freedman, Committee Chair/Co-Chair
Miryam Espinosa Dulanto, Committee Member
John Daniel Marshall, Committee Member
Edgar Paul Yoder, Committee Member - Keywords:
- Social Justice
Antioppressive Education
Critical Multiculturalism
Diversity
Power
Privilege
Oppression - Abstract:
- The purpose of this research project was to explore how preservice teachers, who are now currently inservice teachers, who took an undergraduate secondary education course with a focus on teaching for social justice, currently, make sense of what it means to teach for social justice. The participants in this study took the same secondary education course for preservice teachers which focused on critical consciousness raising experiences in order to promote teaching for social justice in classrooms. My participants took this course when they were working on their undergraduate degrees in education. This course was the one course in the education program that brought together students in each of the content specific discipline areas of the program—mathematics, science, social studies, language and literacy, and world languages (Bullock, 2004). The course was taken the semester prior to student teaching and occurred during the first 10 weeks of the semester followed by a five-week practicum (Bullock, 2004). In order to conduct my research project I solicited sixteen secondary education teachers, who were previously enrolled in the same undergraduate teacher education program (mentioned above) at a major university in the Mid-Atlantic region of the United States to volunteer to participate in this study. The inservice teachers all took the same secondary education course as preservice teachers which focused on teaching for social justice. There were many factors that influenced the participant’s perspectives about teaching for social justice as well as the degree to which they taught for social justice. All these factors—the undergraduate course rooted in critical consciousness raising experiences, sociocultural structures, political structures, contextual influences, hidden curriculum, teaching stance, teaching praxis—connected to power, privilege, and oppression through issues such as race, ethnicity, class, culture, sexual preference, language, ability, etc. Both participants self-admittedly teach for social justice, however, the degree to which this takes place varies depending on their respective perspectives on what it means to teach for social justice. Jim does not teach for social justice and is less inclined to trouble and challenge dominant perspectives because he is uncomfortable with difference. He also does not understand the sociocultural mechanisms that reproduce hegemony and is part of the complicit process rather than part of the solution. Neil teaches for social justice to a certain degree and is more inclined to trouble and challenge the status quo and hegemonic mechanisms. However, he does this by teaching for the other (Kumashiro, 2002) and teaching about the other (Kumashiro, 2002) but does not teach in a manner that is critical of privileging and Othering (Kumashiro, 2002). This study suggests that more research is needed in order to explore and understand how teachers who have an awareness of teaching for social justice actually teach for social justice. This exploration and understanding needs to look at the broad scope of the influences on teachers and how these influences impact teaching for social justice. In addition, teacher education programs must emotionally and structurally embrace curricula rooted in social justice in order to promote teaching for social justice in a way that preservice teachers can also embrace and incorporate in to their teaching praxis. If preservice teachers are to do this they need to understand approaches like education for the Other, education about the Other, education that is critical of privileging and Othering, and education that changes students and society (Kumashiro, 2002) in order to teach for social justice.