Reenvisioning Democratic Pedagogy and Epistemology With Teacher Action Research: Reclaiming the Teaching Profession

• In Event: Roundtable Session 19
  In Roundtable Session: Teacher Education in Dialogue With Paulo Freire

Abstract

This presentation is a about a self-study of the author’s own teaching of an Action Research course to in-service teachers enrolled in a Master’s program in Curriculum and Instruction. Freire’s Pedagogy of Freedom is used to ground and boost course participants to envision democratic education, pedagogy, epistemology and research to counter the neoliberal/neoconservative agenda of corporate takeover of public education. This presentation includes the course participants of the latest two semesters. The results show that teachers embrace the study of their own practice with enthusiasm and ownership, but are pessimistic about real-life application. The author challenges them to instead take action to defend the teaching profession by facilitating their engagement with varying degrees of risk.

Author

• Myriam N. Torres, New Mexico State University