Session Information
10 SES 12 C, Research on Values, Beliefs and Understandings in Teacher Education
Paper Session
Contribution
Our interest is in memories which qualified and pre-service teachers tell about their own teachers. Research has pointed out that teacher memories are meaningful for becoming a teacher (e.g. Mitchell and Weber 1999). However, we do not know enough about how practising and future teachers themselves discuss and reflect upon the meanings, those memories have for their teaching. In our presentation, we therefore ask what are teacher memories, how are they expressed and how, if at all, do they influence teacher practices in the present?
We use memory materials from both Finland and England in our presentation. Both pre-service and post-service teachers have recalled their teachers. Finnish students of education wrote about their teachers in course essays and a group of teachers collectively recalled their teachers. Also, several teachers wrote as a request that asked people to recall their teachers was published in a Finnish magazine. Thirty English B.Ed. (undergraduate) students wrote about their own memories of teachers and a small school community, including teachers, teaching assistants, parents and administrators, reflected on memories of teachers. Our use of materials from both Finland and England makes it possible to look at these memories across cultures. In our presentation, we will discuss the possible shared and different contents in the memories. This has also presented interesting methodological challenges for analyzing qualitative data in multiple cases across different cultures and in different languages.
Our understanding of teacher memories will by implication help us to understand how teachers experience the world of the classroom and how teachers make sense of both positive and negative student experiences. Beattie (2001) identifies the holistic nature of the process by which teachers construct meaning in their early and continuing development as professionals. This is built upon the social and narrative experiences of pupils and teachers. Crossing an artificially constructed gateway at qualification does not recognize the subtle nature of teacher development over a longer period of time. We understand that becoming a teacher is more than learning particular techniques and skills, it is a holistic process of identity-work. The significance of narratives in identity-work has been well established in educational research (e.g. Elbaz-Luwisch 2005). Dealing with one’s memories of teachers is part of this identity-work and is concreticized in stories that are told, listened and shared of one’s experiences by oneself and with other people. Philosophically, there are important epistemological questions posed by the impact of previous knowledge (memories of previous teachers) or our interpretation and construction of meaning in the present (current practice as a teacher).
In our paper, we look at becoming a teacher in different cultural settings as we are studying memories of teachers both in English and Finnish context. We wonder whether there are culturally specific or indeed universal aspects of teachers’ meaning-making which transcend domestic and state boundaries. Social constructivist interpretivist paradigm underpins this research. There are also emancipatory aspects in this research as our aim is to empower people to know and understand themselves and their experiences.
Method
Expected Outcomes
References
Bakhtin, M.M. (1986). Speech genres and other late essays. Austin, TX: University of Texas Press. Beattie, M. (2001). The art of learning to teach: pre-service teacher narratives. Merrill, Prentice, Hall: New Jersey. Bruner, J. (1986). Actual minds, possible worlds. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press. Day, C. (2004). A passion for teaching. London: Routledge and Falmer. Denzin, N.K. and Lincoln, Y.S. (eds.) (2005). The Sage Handbook of Qualitative research. (3rd. Edition). London: Sage Elbaz-Luwisch, F. (2005). Teachers’ voices: Storytelling and possibility. Greenwich, Connecticut: Information Age Publishing Inc. Hyvärinen, M., Hydén, L.-C., Saarenheimo, M. and Tamboukou, M. (eds.) (2010). Beyond narrative coherence. Amsterdam, Phil.: John Benjamins Publishing Company. King, T. (2003). The truth about stories. Toronto: House of Anansi Press. Miles, M.B. and Huberman, A.M. (1994), Qualitative Data Analysis. An expanded sourcebook. (2nd. Edition). London: Sage Mitchell, C. and Weber, S. (1999). Reinventing ourselves as teachers: beyond nostalgia. London: Falmer Press. Ochs, E. and Capps, L. (2001). Living Narratives: creating lives in everyday storytelling. Cambridge: Harvard University Press Paul, J. L., Christensen, L. and Falk, G. (2000). Accessing the intimate spaces of life in the classroom through letters to former teachers: a protocol for uncovering hidden stories. In J. L. Paul & T. J. Smith (eds.) Stories out of school. Memories and reflections on care and cruelty in the classroom. Stamford, Connecticut: Ablex Publishing Corporation, 15-26. Riessman, C. K. (2008). Narrative methods for the human sciences. Thousand Oaks: Sage. Rogers, T, Marshall, E. and Tyson, C.A. (2006). Dialogic narratives of literacy, teaching, and schooling: Preparing literacy teachers for diverse settings. Reading Research Quarterly 41 (2), 202–224. Strauss, A., and Corbin, J. (1998). Basics of qualitative research: Techniques and procedures for developing grounded theory (2nd Edition). Thousand Oaks, CA: Sage.
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