“She Is OUR teacher!” Unpacking Teacher Authenticity Through an Asian Immigrant Teacher’s Lived Curriculum

• In Event: Friday Roundtable Session 4:55 pm
  In Roundtable Session: Stories on Sense of Belonging in Educational Relationships (Table 10)

Abstract

This narrative inquiry examines a Korean immigrant teacher’s making and living curriculum through which she reclaimed her authentic self over her 8 years’ of teaching experience in a black-majority high school in the largest metropolitan area in the US. Revolving around two conceptualizations―teacher authenticity and curriculum commonplaces―and using the story constellations approach, the study unfurls her story of becoming authentic at the interwoven net of institutional and personal narratives around the school milieu, students, subject matter, and teacher(s). It emerged through reconfigurations of curriculum commonplaces that being authentic as a teacher is related to becoming a non-replicable, whole, and life-giving self. The work will further discuss how teacher education can help teachers cultivate the sense of being authentic for practice.

Author

• HyeSeung Lee, Texas A&M University