Preservice Elementary Teachers’ Identities and Beliefs Related to Creativity and Artistry in Education

• In Event: Sunday Roundtable 9:45 am
  In Roundtable Session: Teachers' Practices and Experiences in Arts Education (Table 7)

Abstract

The discourses preservice elementary teachers engage when talking and writing about creativity and artistry in education can shape their students’ creative and artistic opportunities. As preservice elementary teachers forge new professional identities, they can engage in critical self-reflection to interrogate their identities and beliefs related to creativity and artistry. This ethnographic case study explores how eight preservice elementary teachers in a graduate childhood education course talked and wrote about their identities and beliefs related to creativity and artistry in education. Findings show participants invoked negative and positive discourses as they shared a variety of identities and beliefs. These findings have implications for how teacher educators prepare preservice elementary teachers to foster children’s creativity and artistry.

Author

• Graham Johnson, Fordham University