Theorizing the Teaching Philosophy in Teacher Education

• In Event: The Transformative Potential of Reflection in Teacher Education

Abstract

This paper makes the argument that the Teaching Philosophy Statement (TPS), as an assessment used in teacher education programs, should be used for much more than assessing future teachers’ capacity for reflective thinking. By conceptualizing the TPS from the perspective of our teachers in training, this paper offers a host of reasons for why teachers should write a teaching philosophy while also describing how to write a teaching philosophy effectively. Based on an approach to teacher education as a form of democratic and liberal arts education, I argue that the TPS should be primarily philosophical and train students to conceptualize the task of teaching as intellectual work—and themselves as intellectuals.

Author

• Eric Luckey, University of Wisconsin - Whitewater