Rupturing the Status Quo of Instruction: Lines of Flight in First-Year Teaching

• In Event: 25.012 - The Curriculum of Lines of Flight in Transformative Pedagogies: Resistances in the Age of Neoliberalism

Abstract

Objectives:
The purpose of this study is to use a rhizomatic lens to investigate the ways a beginning special education Biology teacher, June, worked with her students and her context to enact learning from her pre-professional preparation. The study is guided by the question, “How does a Special Education Biology teacher construct her teaching practices in her first year of teaching?”

Theoretical Framework:
The study draws on concepts from rhizomatics, a non-linear theory of social activity (Deleuze & Guattari, 1987) emphasizing an image of thought and activity that is connected, a-centered, multiple, and dynamic. Specifically, in this study we employ the concepts of assemblage—a mixture of human, material, and discursive elements that work together to produce particular activity (Deleuze & Guattari, 1987; Author, 2015) and lines of flight, or temporal ruptures of the status quo (Deleuze & Guattari, 1987; Author, 2016).

Connection to literature:
This study is informed by literature regarding the challenges of instruction in the first year of teaching (e.g., Allen, 2009; Kagan, 1992; Veenman, 1984; Author, 2015), particularly enacting constructivism-informed, socially-just pedagogies (e.g., Beck, Kosnik, & Rowsell, 2007). These studies show that multiple elements (the teacher herself, her students, school context) influence the teaching practices enacted by new teachers in various ways. Although many researchers have described the complex relationship between teacher learning and practice (e.g., Cochran-Smith, 2003; Opfer & Pedder, 2011), fewer studies have investigated how the multiple levels of factors new teachers must navigate work together to impact their practices.

Mode of inquiry:
The proposed study is a case study (Stake, 1995) that draws from post-qualitative perspectives (St. Pierre, 2011). We collected 13 teacher observations of two units of instruction over five months, observation debrief interviews of approximately twenty minutes each, and three one-hour semi-structured interviews. We used situational analysis (Clarke, 2003) to analyze data sources and generate June’s case.

Results:
Despite facing multiple challenges, elements of June’s assemblage--enabling circumstances (e.g., instructional supports available to June and small classes), June’s own qualities and responses to adversity, and her relationships with students--enabled her to construct teaching practice that “plugged in” several elements of equitable teaching she had learned in her pre-service program. As a result, June’s lessons almost always involved student-led inquiry of some kind. June was also able to engage in productive negotiations with her students that, over time, contributed to their feelings of success in academic activities and willingness on their part to engage in the instructional activities she planned. We suggest that these lines of flight, reconstructed over time, ruptured the status quo of instruction in an urban, special needs classroom.

Scholarly Significance:
June’s case is an example of how ongoing interactions between teacher, students, context, and other setting elements can produce unexpected results. June’s experience with her students holds valuable insight for working with marginalized student populations who may resist more learner-centered experiences. Further, an analysis of June’s practices as co-constructed lines of flight disrupts neoliberal notions of the autonomous teacher who “does” teaching as a linear transaction.

Authors

• Kathryn Jill Strom, California State University - East Bay

• Adrian D. Martin, New Jersey City University

• Charity Mack Dacey, Montclair State University