Metaphors We Teach By: Unpacking “Good Intentions” to Cultivate Thriving

• In Event: Preservice Teacher Perspectives

Abstract

This paper initially sought to answer two questions: How do teacher educators navigate pre-service teachers through the crisis (Kumashiro, 2004) that their "good intentions" might rely on and reify the notion of "broken" students, families and communities? And how do we, as teacher educators, fall short in our own "good intentions" and navigate those crises for ourselves within our classrooms, departments, and colleges? By analyzing journal entries of pre-service teachers in an Introduction to Elementary Teaching course at their institution, the authors found the presence of metaphors in teacher education as instrumental to pre-service teachers’ conceptions of “good teaching” and therefore necessary to investigate when considering the continuing tensions between teachers, students, families, and communities. Preliminary findings advocate to make explicit the metaphors we teach by (Lakoff & Johnson, 2003), at both the K-5 and the teacher education level, to combat tensions of broken students, families, and communities.

Authors

• Melissa Surrette, University of Minnesota, Twin Cities

• Keitha-Gail Martin-Kerr, University of Minnesota-Twin Cities