Facilitating Emotional Connectedness in Teacher Education: A Practitioner Inquiry

• In Event: 15.061 - MTCC Roundtable Session Two
  In Roundtable Session: 15.061-5 - Am I OK? Teachers' Anxiety, Emotions, and Mindfulness

Abstract

As co-facilitators of a course for preservice teachers, we strive to cultivate classroom discourse that helps students develop a deeper understanding of social justice in education, specifically addressing systemic racial inequity. Through our inquiry we found that students most often approach course material pertaining to systemic racism with intellectual analysis. However, we were struck by several instances in which students approached the material with emotional connectedness, indicating deep and reflexive learning. We use practitioner inquiry to explore our teaching through a framework of pedagogy of discomfort (e.g. Boler 1999), specifically grappling with how we might facilitate emotional connectedness in our course, with a goal to support students in deepening their understanding of systemic inequity, and cultivating an anti-racist teaching practice.

Authors

• Nastasia Lawton-Sticklor, Clark University

• Katerine Bielaczyc, Clark University