Turning to the Arts to Foster Education Students' Reflections About Teaching Writing

• In Event: Roundtable Session 8
  In Roundtable Session: Arts-Based Research and Interdisciplinarity

Abstract

This arts-based educational research investigates education students' arts-based reflections about their writing tutoring experiences with K-5 children from multicultural backgrounds. The education students had never taught children previously and therefore had difficulty articulating their pedagogy. Thus, I turned to the arts to foster their critical reflexivity. My discovery about what form of inquiry best facilitated the education students’ introspections about their teaching experiences (i.e., e-mail reflections, self-portraits with dialogue, or poetry) concurred with their opinions about their preferred mode of reflection. The study also illuminates the education students’ strong opinions about what mode of inquiry (or, a combination of modes) best facilitated their reflections about their teaching experiences. This discovery opens up emancipating, introspective possibilities for education students and teacher educators.

Author

• Janet C. Richards, University of South Florida