Teacher Candidates' Identity Construction as Collective Movement Along Zones of Sense

• In Event: Cultural Historical Perspectives on Identity: A Tool for Dismantling Inequality and Promoting Just Educational Possibilities

Abstract

1. Objectives

Learning involves expanding who we consider we are (Holland et al., 1998; Ligorio, 2010). Teacher candidates’ identities develop through the socially-mediated learning actions while in preparation programs (Urzúa & Vásquez, 2008). During this time, candidates’ past knowledge and experiences collide with new ones, becoming resources to imagine being teachers. The outcomes of candidates’ learning experiences diverge because sensemaking is based on cultural factors (Esteban-Guitart, 2021). There is a need to better understand how teacher identities develop and the role of sensemaking in identity processes (Sfard & Prusak, 2005; Urzúa & Vásquez, 2008; Varghese et al., 2005).

Using multimodal data from a graduate course, this paper explores: (1) How do participating candidates progressively identify as teachers while in a graduate course? And (2) How do they engage in sensemaking about teaching?

2. Theoretical frameworks

Learning to identify as teachers can be understood as the link between “actual identities”, or those that are presently accepted; and “designated identities”, which are expected to be realized (Sfard & Prusak, 2005). Candidates engage in sensemaking processes in their trajectories from actual to designated identities while in programs. Candidates’ competence manifests as sensemaking leads to producing singular meaning out of the larger complex sense, or “zones of the sense” (Vygotsky, 1987, p. 276).

3. Methods and Data Sources

This qualitative study included twenty-three teacher candidates enrolled in a course within their two-year graduate program. Most candidates had recent immigrant backgrounds and limited to no prior teaching experience. The semester-long course centered on curriculum/instruction for inclusive bilingual education and met weekly for two hours.

Data consisted of three “identity artifacts” the candidates used to explore their teacher identities (Leander, 2002). These included: (1) “pre-post collage” to multimodally reflect on curriculum; (2) clay-mediated curriculum metaphor during the first part of the course; and (3) the “learning artifact” when, toward the end of the course, candidates reflected upon learning experiences while growing up using one “artifact”. All three also included a written description.

The analysis involved reading through the data, refining definitions, and coding segments manifesting, (1) identity teaching statements, and/or (2) manifestations of sensemaking.

5. Results

The comparison of pre-and-post collage creations showed that the course assisted candidates in increasingly identifying as teachers. Candidates’ references to mediators for this change centered on the ways the collective “present” experiences impacted them, but there were fewer explicit connections to the past. The present experiences included the collective student teaching work alongside course theories/readings. A few candidates also made references to the clay curriculum metaphor, which suggests the impact embodied learning experiences have for identifying as teachers. There was no evidence that the candidates were aware of the ways past experiences influenced their designated identities.

6. Significance

The learning process connecting candidates’ actual and designated identities is not well understood. This paper suggests the potential of embodied identity texts and of present experiences while highlighting the need to emphasize past experiences. This is fundamental in this year’s AERA invitation to explore the evidence people use “to construct […] truth”.

Authors

• Patricia Martínez-Álvarez, Teachers College, Columbia University
  Presenting Author

• Anu Kajamaa, University of Oulu
  Presenting Author