Teacher Candidates (Un)Learning Individualized Constructions of Trauma for Students of Refugee Background

• In Event: Multilingual Students and Equity

Abstract

Trauma has become invariably connected to the narrative on refugees in a way that constructs them as needy despite understanding themselves as capable actors. The purpose of this research is to examine how K to 12 teacher candidates understand students of refugee background in spaces where they are learning to teach. Data including interviews, observations and course work were collected from teacher candidates from five cohorts in a course preparing them to teach multilingual students. Translanguaging and anti-racist, trauma-informed theories informed this research. Findings suggest that candidates learned to construct racialized children of refugee background as traumatized through some of their coursework, but, at times, questioned what they were learning and described translanguaging practices as liberating the children.

Author

• Katie Brubacher, University of Alberta
  Presenting Author