ExPANDing Practice: Cultivating Preservice Teachers' Critical Dispositions

• In Event: Challenging the Status Quo: Critical Professional Development in K–12 and Teacher Education

Abstract

Objectives: This paper introduces an original tool designed to engage preservice educators in reflective practice to develop critical dispositions. By using the tool for strategic structured analysis of case stories (scenarios based on real experiences of preservice and practicing teachers), aspiring educators can identify and interrupt inequities that originate in policy and are perpetuated in practice.
Theoretical framework: Critical dispositions foster characteristics that support a justice-oriented approach to teaching. Among teachers, critical dispositions promote an orientation toward engagement/struggle; a preference for questions over answers and inquiry over facts; and an awareness that educators make countless decisions in myriad, ever-changing contexts.
Critical dispositions address multiple expectations that often require teachers to enact conflicting roles.To support candidates’ development of critical dispositions, educators first assess the dispositions candidates bring into teacher education programs (Almerico, Johnston, Henriott, & Shapiro, 2011) and then create curricula and opportunities to support the development of those dispositions in critical, meaningful, and authentic ways (Da Ros-Voseles & Moss, 2007).
Methods: Undergraduate teacher candidates in two required courses at a public university participated in the study based on the question: How can analysis of structured simulations influence the development of critical dispositions in teacher and administrator candidates? The study protocol employed the EXPAND framework, which refers to a multi-phase analytical process in which participants Explain the situation, identify the Perspectives of key people involved, consider the Assumptions of those personnel, imagine information that is Not there, and then determine what they might Do next.
The qualitative methodological approach involved content analysis of participants’ analyses of critical incidents, case stories, and reflections. Using a grounded theory and constant comparison to identify themes, data were analyzed separately by co-researchers to identify codes, and then coded separately to ensure reliability. All data were coded, and compared across types to generate findings.
Data sources: All participants completed three phases of the research. They:
● Used the ExPAND framework to analyze Case Stories.
● Wrote a Critical Incident Report based on their fieldwork experiences.
● Used ExPAND to analyze the Critical Incident in relation to a theoretical framework.
Participants generated data throughout the course of the semester, allowing analysis of data that spanned individual development in relation to the protocol.
Results: Analysis of data indicates that structured analysis of case stories and critical incidents cultivates critical reflection. Participant narratives indicate that application of the ExPAND framework 1) enhances their understanding of alternative perspectives and 2) fosters explicit connections between the conceptual framework and critical incidents.
Scholarly Significance: Reflective practice allows professionals to approach future situations and cases more adeptly in the face of changing and uncertain contexts (Flyvjberg, 2001; 2006; Schon, 1983) and reflective practice holds a place in both theoretical and empirical education literature on teacher development and teacher quality (Berliner, 2001; Hayden, 2013; Shulman & Shulman, 2004). Research has demonstrated that linking the complexities of K-12 events, issues, and challenges through vignettes and critical in-class discussion may hold important implications for disposition growth in teacher education programs (Da Ros-Voseles & Moss, 2007).

Author

• Julie Gorlewski, University at Buffalo - SUNY