Discerning Curricular Dissonance: Preservice Teachers' Efforts Toward Localizing and Diversifying Curricula Through Community Field Experience

• In Event: Fairmont Roundtable Session Two
  In Roundtable Session: Place Consciousness in Curriculum and Praxis (Table 2)

Abstract

This qualitative study explores a collaborative teacher education field experience, working with a community organization to develop curricula surrounding stories of local Black history. Centering critical pedagogy of place (Gruenewald, 2003) this research considers the social and spatial perspectives of two preservice teachers through a phenomenological lens. Employing ethnographic approaches, including interview analysis, teacher educator reflection, and artifact elicitation, findings reveal relationships among these preservice teachers’ expressions of curricular agency and descriptions of their educational spaces. These oscillating, often dissonant relationships highlight curricular possibilities and limitations for expanding narratives through justice-oriented curriculum development in elementary teacher education. I offer a phenomenon of curricular dissonance through analysis of preservice teacher experiences, discerning these tensions through a truth-seeking community-engaged curricular project.

Author

• Elaine Marhefka, University of New Hampshire
  Presenting Author