The Purpose and Promise of Critical Data Activities Through the Eyes of Teacher Educators (Poster 9)

• In Event: Exploring Critical Data Literacy in K–12 Social Studies

Abstract

As this symposium demonstrates, many argue that data science ought to be integrated across the school curriculum, meaning that all teachers should have some level of confidence and competence when working with and teaching about data (Finzer, 2013). Additionally, teachers engage with data for other reasons, such as to explore student assessments or district trends (Mandinach, 2015). Given the increasing ubiquity of data in teachers’ professional practice, it is important to understand how the teacher educators that prepare them for the profession conceptualize and engage with data across the preservice teacher curriculum.
Here we report on the design and implementation of a summer 2023 workshop for teacher educators (TEs) who we supported in incorporating critical, computational data explorations into their planned coursework for pre-service teachers. The workshop was part of [anonymized], a multi-campus effort to introduce culturally-sustaining forms of computing into teacher education programs in a large metropolitan area. We ask: For what purposes did teacher educators, especially those for whom data was not already a major component of their courses, see it fit to incorporate data investigations into their coursework? and, What types of data engagements did TEs construct for the future teachers with whom they work?
Approximately 20 teacher educators with a wide range of experience with data and statistics completed approximately 40 hours of synchronous and asynchronous workshop activities. Sessions introduced TEs to (1) notions of data as social texts and learners’ relationships with such texts (e.g., Wilkerson & Polman, 2020); (2) key aspects of reasoning about measurement, variability, patterns, and trends in data (Rubin, 2021); (3) tools for scaffolding students to engage in these social and statistical aspects of data through discussions, data investigations, and/or data storytelling activities (see Kahn, et al., 2022; GAISE II, 2020; Wilkerson, et al. 2021 respectively); and (4) creating a concrete artifact to be used as part of a data-rich assignment or activity in their own teacher education courses.
Our analysis will draw from a variety of data sources including surveys, video recordings, debriefing notes, and teacher educators’ curricular artifact designs. As facilitators of the workshop and teacher educators focusing on data integration ourselves, we leverage reflexive thematic analysis (Braun & Clarke, 2022) to construct an understanding of key learning goals that TEs identified as well-suited for deeper data integration.
Preliminary analysis reveals a variety of motivations for supporting data investigations in TEs’ courses, including: (1) encouraging prospective teachers to better understand their own teaching context (students, school, district, community) from a variety of perspectives; (2) re-visioning and troubling core theoretical concepts in the courses through data; (3) examining how core course topics intersect with social identity markers (race, income, language); and (4) to engage more deeply with the subject area content that preservice teachers will directly teach to their future K12 students. These emerging motivations highlight a potentially expanded and particularly critical approach to the role and function of data investigation in teacher education, including teachers’ abilities to challenge dominant, exclusionary narratives around data and data literacy.

Authors

• Michelle Hoda Wilkerson, University of California - Berkeley

• Zohal Shah, Digital Promise

• Jacob Barton, University of California - Berkeley