Poetic Inquiry in Pursuit of Truth: Interrogating Mentoring Relationships in Teacher Preparation

• In Event: Embodiment and Action: Centering Identity in Arts Education and Research

Abstract

This paper discusses the rationale for including poetry in teacher preparation programs as a means of encouraging teacher candidates to deepen understanding of students, classrooms, curriculum, and themselves. In his groundbreaking book The Courage to Teach (1998), Parker Palmer asks the essential question “Who is the self that teaches?” (p. 4). Recognizing that the act of writing poetry requires looking and listening deeply, and “offers a means to say what might not otherwise be said” (Cahnmann-Taylor, 2009, p. 14), the presenters developed peer-to-peer professional development workshops in poetic inquiry for college student teaching supervisors to give supervisors access to an approach to understanding the nuances of the teacher candidates’ understanding of their classroom experiences.

Authors

• Amanda N. Gulla, Lehman College - CUNY
  Presenting Author

• Tiffany A. DeJaynes, Lehman College - CUNY
  Presenting Author

• Rabab Abi-Hanna, Lehman College - CUNY
  Presenting Author

• Sarah S. Saltmarsh, US PREP
  Presenting Author