Conceptualizing Religious and Spiritual Meaning-Making in Teacher Education: Broadening Visions of Vocation and Educator Formation

• In Event: AERA Roundtable Session Friday 1:45 pm
  In Roundtable Session: Faith, Pedagogy, and Leadership in Catholic Education

Abstract

Recognizing the significance of religion and spirituality to identity and meaning-making, I develop a conceptual framework in this paper for examining pre-service teachers’ religious/spiritual meaning-making through their teacher education experiences. I then contextualize the framework in Catholic theologies of vocation and discernment in a developing study examining 1) How do Catholic pre-service teachers describe their experiences through public teacher education programs? and 2) How are Catholic pre-service teachers making meaning of their public teacher education experiences in relation to their religious and spiritual identities and practices? By offering both the broader framework and its contextualized application, I propose an approach to educational research that considers religious/spiritual identities and their potential to support justice-oriented teacher education.

Author

• Katherine M. Ward, Michigan State University