Funds of Knowledge: Prospective Teachers' Ideas and Praxis

• In Event: Sheraton Roundtable Session 5
  In Roundtable Session: Finding the Words for Freedom and Justice: Negating Silence and Misinformation in Teacher Education

Abstract

Data from this first phase of a qualitative study reports on prospective teachers’ ideas and praxis about funds of knowledge (FoK) theory after completion of a course on FoK theory within their initial teacher education in New Zealand. In the course, FoK theory gave student teachers (STs) a conceptual framework to consider students and teaching, and begin to develop an agentic disposition which countered deficit theorizing. The class size, pedagogical approach in the course, and opportunity for STs to apply FoK theory on field experience and see benefits for themselves were instrumental to the high value that STs assigned an FoK approach. Nuanced ways in which STs interpreted and applied FoK indicate variations in STs’ orientation to students.

Author

• Linda Mary Hogg, Victoria University of Wellington