Seeing oneself as a teacher: A study of the development of teaching images in a teacher education program

This hypothesis-generating study describes the knowledge or beliefs about learning and teaching verbalized by graduate or undergraduate teacher candidates as they participated in teacher education programs for secondary school teachers. Research focused on two major questions: (a) What knowledge and beliefs about learning and teaching are revealed in the images verbalized (explicitly or implicitly) by teacher candidates? and (b) What experiences in the teacher education programs do teacher candidates identify as contributing to the development of knowledge and beliefs? This study utilized narrative inquiry and analytic constructivist theory in identifying and interpreting the images presented by teacher candidates, particularly noting that images of learning and teaching are based on past and present experiences. Initially, images of learning and teaching for graduate and undergraduate teacher candidates seemed to develop along separate continua but the data analyses suggest that these continua converge for both groups and contribute to the development of their personal practical knowledge. Five hypotheses were generated by the study: (1) Personal practical knowledge may develop along a continuum in which the developing images of learning and teaching converge. (2) Teacher candidates\u27 personal practical knowledge about learning and teaching may be enhanced by participation in a teacher education program with a unified philosophy about learning. (3) The frustration experienced by teacher candidates as they prepare to become teachers may be an important part of the development of their personal practical knowledge about learning and teaching. (4) The process of development of personal practical knowledge with regard to teaching and learning in general may be similar for teacher candidates regardless of whether they enter a teacher education program as a graduate or undergraduate student. (5) The images used by teacher candidates in describing their knowledge and beliefs may be a clear example of their intended practice as teachers in classrooms. Recommendations were made for further research and, in particular, teacher education