"What Is His Family Situation?" Teacher Education Students' Coded Language Use to Describe Classroom Behavior

• In Event: Moscone Center North Roundtable Session 6
  In Roundtable Session: Racialized Research Perspectives in Education

Abstract

• White female teachers have been shown to hold negative attitudes and low behavioral expectations toward their students of color, expressing this through coded language when discussing student classroom misbehavior. This leads to the question, do teachers use more coded language when examining challenging classroom behavior for black students than white students? Ten female teacher education students were given a set of vignettes varying on race and sex depicting students with common classroom behavior challenges and were asked what additional information would be helpful to them in dealing with the misbehavior. Findings indicate that as the severity of the student behavior presented in the vignettes increased, participants used more coded language for black students than white students.

Author

• Nicole L Lorenzetti, The City University of New York