Preserving social justice identities: Learning from one pre-service literacy teacher
Abstract
Identities that include social justice stances are important for pre-service teachers to adopt in teacher education so they may meet the needs of all future students. However maintaining a social justice identity can be difficult when pre-service teachers are confronted with an evaluator without a social justice stance. This article examines how one pre-service teacher preserved a social justice identity by actively resisting racial and cultural stereotypes of students in her student teaching field experience. Analysis of language data illustrates that pre-service teachers can enact social justice pedagogy in elementary classrooms and preserve a social justice identity. This report reveals that teacher educators can support pre-service teachers in the process of sustaining social justice identities.
Reference
Ticknor, A. (2015). Preserving social justice identities: Learning from one pre-service literacy teacher. Reading Horizons, 53(4), 1-23.
Journal
Reading Horizons
Analysis
Is this article part of a larger project or series of studies?
yes
Does this study draw on a large, preexisting data set?
no
Research Approach
Geographic Setting
- Southeastern United States
Institutional Context
Certification Level
Programatic Focus
Research Location Context
Preservice Participants
- Undergraduates (university based program)
Preservice Sample Size
1
Duration of Data Collection
Data Sources
- Document Analysis
- Interviews
Data Analysis Tools
- Discourse Analysis (Gee, 1999 framework)
Researcher Positionality
- inside (staying their own students)
Research Questions
This article examines how one pre-service teacher developed a social justice identity and resisted pressures to conform to existing literacy pedagogies in a practicum field experience then preserved this identity in a later student teaching experience.
Is this research question explicit from the manuscript? Yes