"How Do You Know When Chaos Is Chaos?" Comparing Parents' and Teachers' Ideas of Control of Latinx Children

• In Event: AERA Roundtable Session 12
  In Roundtable Session: School Policy and Praxis: Vital Voices, Disparate Viewpoints (Table 13)

Abstract

Drawing on data from the multivocal video-cued ethnographic Agency and Young Children Study, we compare parents’ and teachers’ ideas about agency and teacher control in the education of young children of Latinx immigrants. Parents and teachers shared a belief in the importance of order and teacher control in the classroom but had very different rationales for these beliefs. In their focus group responses, Latinx immigrant parents shared a deep concern for their children's learning while teachers focused on their personal preferences and pressure around standards and testing. These findings highlight the need to support teachers in reflecting on and deepening their practice to also center children’s learning and children’s agency and deemphasize the desire to control children’s bodies.

Authors

• Molly E. McManus, San Francisco State University

• Kiyomi Sánchez-Suzuki Colegrove, Texas State University

• Jennifer Keys Adair, University of Texas at Austin