Engaging with (Student) Teachers’ Perspectives: (Missing) Representation, Experiences of Exclusion and Pedagogical Understandings

• In Event: Situating Complexities of (Missing) Representation in Teacher Education for Social Justice: U.S. and German Contexts

Abstract

This paper focuses on (student) teachers’ perspectives to explore the complexities of (missing) representation, experiences of exclusion and (transformative) understandings of teaching. We raise questions about the “international phenomenon” that teachers are “predominantly drawn from majority-group socio-demographic backgrounds” (Keane et al., 2022 p. 5; e.g. Donlevy et al., 2016). The paper addresses “significant absences” (Mc Daid et al., 2022, p. 211) in teacher education research by unfolding empirical questions concerning the ways student teachers in initial teacher education as well as teachers in schools “navigate and negotiate heteronormative, racist, classist, ableist, and other discourses and practices” (ibid.). With regard to previous research on teacher education, constructions of student teachers as a homogeneous group and (re)productions of binary, essentialist notions have been increasingly criticized (Heinz, 2015; Rosen & Jacob, 2021).
The paper addresses the need for intersectional perspectives (Goodwin & Keane, 2022), based on findings from two studies: (1) a biographical study on student teachers’ pathways to teaching in the German context and (2) a case study exploring the care oriented pedagogical practice of a Black male teacher (Author & Co-author, 2022). In the first study, biographical-narrative interviews with student teachers from different teacher education programs in Germany were analyzed based on the principles of biographical case construction (Rosenthal, 2018). Student teachers’ biographical experiences of exclusion refer, for example, to ‘othering’ based on a monolingual habitus in German educational contexts (Gogolin, 1997) that question abilities and belonging. The second study explores care oriented pedagogical practice of a Black male teacher in depth. The case study was based on interviews, observation and questionnaires. Findings indicate the influence of multiple subjectivities, race, and gender on the teacher’s practice (Author & Co-Author, 2022). Based on a critical reflection on the specific analytical foci and research contexts (Clarke et al., 2018), this paper focuses on teacher candidates’ biographical experiences as well as care oriented pedagogical practice of a Black male teacher. This allows us to engage with (student) teachers’ perspective to critically reflect on (in)visibility in teacher education and schools along the continuum of different institutional contexts.

Authors

• Ann-Kathrin Arndt, Leibniz University Hannover

• Chrystal S. Johnson, Purdue University

• Bettina Lindmeier, Leibniz University Hannover

• Isabel Sievers, Leibniz University Hannover