Preservice Teachers' Literacy Histories: Negotiating Tensions Between Past and Present

• In Event: Preservice Teachers' Understanding and Self-Efficacy With Literacy

Abstract

This qualitative research examined how a group of pre-service middle school teachers constructed conceptions of literacy, enacted literacy pedagogy, and negotiated their role as teachers as they engaged with literacy as a situated social practice, over the course of a two-year teacher education program. This paper will examine the intersections between pre-service teachers’ literacy histories, their experiences in literacy teacher education, and their evolving conceptions of literacy. As the pre-service teachers’ conceptions of literacy steadily broadened they began to identify points of tension between their school literacy histories and the approach to literacy modeled in their teacher education studies, which provoked them to rethink what counts as literacy.

Author

• Lydia Menna, University of Alberta