Teaching about Teaching: Purpose, Passion and Pedagogy in Teacher Education

257 Pages·1997·0.89 MB·English

by  Tom Russell

Teaching about Teaching

Teaching about Teaching:
Purpose, Passion and Pedagogy
in Teacher Education
Edited by
John Loughran and Tom Russell

The Falmer Press
(A member of the Taylor & Francis Group)
London • Washington, D.C.
UK Falmer Press, 1 Gunpowder Square, London, EC4A 3DE
USA Falmer Press, Taylor & Francis Inc., 1900 Frost Road, Suite 101,
Bristol, PA 19007

© J.Loughran and T.Russell, 1997
All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored
in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic,
mechanical, photocopying, recording or otherwise, without permission in writing
from the Publisher.

First published in 1997

This edition published in the Taylor & Francis e-Library, 2003.

A catalogue record for this book is available from the British
Library

ISBN 0-203-45447-2 Master e-book ISBN

ISBN 0-203-76271-1 (Adobe eReader Format)
ISBN 0-7507-0708-9 cased
ISBN 0-7507-0622-8 paper

Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data are available
on request

Jacket design by Caroline Archer

Every effort has been made to contact copyright holders for their
permission to reprint material in this book. The publishers would
be grateful to hear from any copyright holder who is not here
acknowledged and will undertake to rectify any errors or omissions
in future editions of this book.
Contents

Acknowledgments vii
Foreword by Gary D.Fenstermacher viii
Introduction 1
Chapter 1 An Introduction to Purpose, Passion and Pedagogy 3
John Loughran
Section 1: Principles and Practices Which Shape Teaching
about Teaching 11
Chapter 2 Practicing Theory and Theorizing Practice in Teacher
Education 13
Robert V.Bullough, Jr.
Chapter 3 Teaching Teachers: How I Teach IS the Message 32
Tom Russell
Chapter 4 Teacher Education as a Process of Developing Teacher
Knowledge 48
Jeff Northfield and Richard Gunstone
Chapter 5 Teaching about Teaching: Principles and Practice 57
John Loughran
Section 2: Challenges in Teaching and Learning about Teaching 71
Chapter 6 Teaching Teachers for the Challenge of Change 73
Anna E.Richert
Chapter 7 Learning to Teach Prospective Teachers to Teach
Mathematics: The Struggles of a Beginning Teacher
Educator 95
Cynthia Nicol
Chapter 8 Teaching and Learning in Teacher Education: Who is
Carrying the Ball? 117
Peter Chin
v
Contents
Section 3: Rethinking Teacher Educators’ Roles and Practice 131
Chapter 9 Learning about Learning in the Context of a Science
Methods Course 133
Garry Hoban
Chapter 10 Teaching to Teach with Purpose and Passion: Pedagogy
for Reflective Practice 150
Vicki Kubler LaBoskey
Chapter 11 Advisor as Coach 164
Anthony Clarke
Section 4: Conversations about Teacher Education 181
Chapter 12 Obligations to Unseen Children 183
The Arizona Group: Karen Guilfoyle, Mary Lynn
Hamilton, and Stefinee Pinnegar
Chapter 13 Storming through Teacher Education: Talk about
Summerfest 210
Allan MacKinnon, Michael Cummings and
Kathryn Alexander
Section 5: Conclusion 227
Chapter 14 Becoming Passionate about Teacher Education 229
Tom Russell
Notes on Contributors 236
Author Index 239
Subject Index 241

vi
Acknowledgments

We are most grateful for the time, help and support from Airlie and La Verne.
We would also like to acknowledge the support of our Deans of Education (Rena
Upitis and Richard White) who also share the passion for teacher education which
is so important for our pre-service programs to continue to attempt to address the
needs and concerns of pre-service teacher candidates.
John Loughran and Tom Russell
September, 1996

vii
Foreword
Gary D.Fenstermacher
In these times, it is much in vogue to speak of silenced voices. The reference is
typically to the voices of teachers, women, children, or members of minority
groups. It also applies to the voices of teacher educators. We hear the voices of
university researchers, of law makers, and of policy analysts, speaking about
what teacher educators do or fail to do, but we do not often hear the voices of
teacher educators themselves. This book begins the remedy for lopsided talk
about teacher education.
In the chapters that follow, you will ‘hear’ teacher educators discussing their
own work. They describe their aspirations for the teachers they teach, their methods
for realizing these aspirations, the concepts and theories that ground these methods,
and the tribulations and triumphs encountered in the course of their work. These
are remarkable essays, for they are at once intellectually engaging and refreshingly
personal. This duality of thoughtful abstraction and personal experience permits
the reader who has taught teachers to both identify with and learn from the authors.
These chapters can be read for profit and for pleasure, a treat too often absent from
academic literature.
When the editors asked if I would prepare some prefatory material for this
book, I agreed not so much because I have a high opinion of forewords (I do not),
but because I wanted to read these writers as quickly as I could lay my hands upon
their work. I know most of them, professionally if not personally, and I anticipated
with pleasure the receipt of their manuscripts. Not only was I not disappointed in
what I read, I was delighted with what I learned for my own teaching. The
manuscripts arrived just as I was putting together a foundations course for secondary
level teacher education students. The course I designed is different from the ones
taught previously because of the work contained here.
Having said that, I know I should tell you how it is different, but I will not. At
least, not yet. You see, like so many teachers I know, I am more comfortable talking
to you about my efforts after I have tried them. They do not have to succeed; they
simply have to be—to get a life, if you will—before I will talk much about them.
The reason for my stance becomes evident as one reads these chapters. We learn
by doing and by reflecting on what we are doing. In some ways, we may be said
not to know what we are doing until we have done it. As we engage in an activity,
it becomes increasingly clear to us what we are about, providing we do not go
about it naively or thoughtlessly. Thus I will refrain from telling you what I am
trying to do, because I am not yet sure just what it is.
After it is underway or nearly finished, when I am clear enough about it to
viii
Foreword
attach words to what I am doing, then I will tell you. I will be sad if it fails, though
that will not keep me from telling you about it. Whether I succeed or fail is not
what keeps me from revealing what I am doing; it is, rather, the absence of sufficient
experience with the activity to be able to express it clearly. As I try out the ideas
gained from this book, and gain sufficient feel for them to attach reasonably accurate
descriptive terminology to my activities, I create the conditions for reflection. Some
will argue with this phrasing, saying that reflection need not or should not await
the right words (here is where such notions as tacit, pre-cognitive, ineffable, and
pre-conscious are tossed into the mix). We need not contest the point here, however,
for all are likely to agree that reflection cannot be long sustained without expression
in words. By naming what I am doing, I create the basis for sharing it with others,
for analysing it myself, for asking others for their help or advice, and for changing
my practice.
Now we venture on to contested ground, for there are those who would argue
that the naming itself is the act of critical engagement, whereas others contend that
how we are engaged in the naming is the act of critical engagement. There are vital
differences here. These differences speak to the sense of wonder these essays evoked
for me. Let me see if I can capture my puzzlement with sufficient clarity that you
come to share it with me.
Within the community of teacher educators, there are a number of families.
One of these families is concerned with preparing teachers who will impart their
content efficiently and expertly, accompanied by high levels of acquisition by the
students. Another family believes that teachers must know how to assist students
to develop a critical understanding of society, so that they do not merely reproduce
the given culture. A third family contends that the construction of meaning is the
essence of teaching and of learning; members of this family prepare teachers to
assist students in becoming makers of meaning. Still another family consists of
those who believe that the essence of teaching is in reflecting on experience and
reconstructing practice following reflection. This book consists primarily of work
from members of this fourth family. They might be called the Schön family, after
the person who appears to have given identity and coherence to this family. However,
it includes members who exhibit varying degrees of consistency with Schön’s
ideas, so it might be more accurate to call them the Reflectivist family.
Although it is of some value to understand that the contributors to this volume
exhibit sufficient commonality to be grouped into a family, that is not an insight of
much significance. What is worth more, I believe, is understanding how the families
differ from one another. Of particular interest to me is how the Reflectivist family
differs from a fifth family, one I will call the Analyst family.
The Analysts hold a high regard for reflection, but are not content with the mere
act of reflection. Instead, they insist on standards for reflection. These standards
vary from one family member to another. Some Analysts argue for a standard of
truth, or at least validation by agreement between the initial claimant and other
observers of the same phenomenon. Others contend for an analytic framework,
wherein the activity of reflection is held accountable to some standards of procedure
and outcome. Still others press for the transitive nature of reflection, averring that
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