C living the process of a constructivist model is part of the content of the program
C contextually bound part of work (classroom teaching) gives meaning to content and process
C integrated content
C deep engagement with content
Sam
Hausfather
In J. Rainer (Ed.), Reframing Teacher Education: Dimensions of a Constructivist Approach (pp. 63-80). Dubuque, IA: Kendall Hunt.
Teaching involves the process of leading learners to understand and use
content. While content remains the goal of constructivist teachers,
the process of learning becomes both method and goal as well.
In the process of learning lie the roots of our understanding of content
as well as our goal to create independent learners.
The dichotomy between content and process disappears as we take a
constructivist approach to knowledge and teaching.
Content does not exist outside the process of acquiring that content
(Tobin & Tippins, 1993). Controversies
exist in taking this position. These
controversies go to the very heart of our understanding of content and the
ability to teach content to students. As
teacher educators we take a stand on these controversies in how we approach both
the process and content of teacher education programs.
Teacher educators face a philosophical dilemma in differentiating content
and process and understanding how they are intertwined.
We also face a practical dilemma in promoting the collaboration between
education faculty and arts and sciences faculty necessary to bride content and
process in teacher education. In
this chapter I discuss implications of constructivism as a way of thinking about
content, approaches to learning content that derive from cognitive research, and
pedagogical content knowledge as an aspect of teacher education.
Examples that illustrate these elements in the practice of teacher
education are then given.
Constructivism challenges the core of our understanding of the nature of
content (von Glasersfeld, 1993). The
nature of content is our beginning point, the philosophical basis of
constructivism. Constructivism as an epistemology or way of knowing is based
on a theory of the possibility of knowing objective reality (Staver, 1998).
Constructivism confronts the wishes of many disciplines to portray
ultimate truths in a content area, postulating we can not know objective
reality. Constructivism questions
the separation between the observer and the observations, the knower and the
known. “A constructivist
perspective acknowledges the existence of an external reality but realizes that
cognizing beings can never know what that reality is actually like” (Tobin
& Tippins, 1993, p. 4). Empirical theories of truth postulate that knowledge
corresponds to facts in reality. Constructivism
views knowledge as being true in relation to other knowledge in an internally
coherent network. This coherence
view acknowledges that knowledge “works,” without supposing that we can
reveal an objective reality outside the individual and social interpretations of
reality. Not denying an objective
reality, human experience is seen as the only viable connection to the real
world (Staver, 1998). Kuhn (1970)
showed how understandings of the world progressed through revolutionary paradigm
shifts that influenced how we as individuals experience the world.
We know the world through our experiences, through the interface of our
sensation and our constructed meanings of those sensations.
While we would prefer to believe the world corresponds to our experience
of it, constructivism posits that humans interpret the world in ways that cohere
with reality (von Glasersfeld, 1989). Where
a correspondence view implies that reality exists exactly as we perceive it, a
coherence view implies we actively build a collective, internally coherent
understanding of the world that works to explain phenomena (Staver, 1998).
Whether that view actually corresponds with reality is beyond our ability
to distinguish since only our collective perceptions inform our understanding of
reality.
These views raise the most controversial aspects of constructivist
perspectives. If content is a human construction, it can change over time.
Although certain content areas are more clearly linked to human
experience and interpretation as their source (the humanities, arts, and social
sciences), the “hard” sciences including mathematics have the greatest
difficulty with constructivist epistemology.
The humanities and social sciences derive from human creativity and
action and seek to interpret and record human progress, whereas the sciences
purport to exactly map objective reality. A constructivist approach to the
nature of content knowledge should affect how teacher educators look at content
across many disciplines. English,
history, and the social sciences can be seen more as process and the result of
personal viewpoints. Mathematics is
seen as a social construction, and thus open to discourse as a method for
understanding. Science is often portrayed less as a social institution than as
the pursuit of laws for an independent reality that we can explain, predict,
control, and know as true. Constructivism challenges this view, denying our
ability to fully know objective reality (Staver, 1998). The nature of science
will continue to be debated given the various faces of constructivist thought
(Good et al., 1993; Phillips, 1995). If we take a constructivist view of the
nature of knowledge then we need to raise questions about the approach teacher
educators should take in developing teachers’ approaches to knowledge. At the
same time, the natural and mathematical sciences provide some of the greatest
support for educational practices related to constructivism. In this dichotomy lies a source for continued exploration and
discussion between teacher educators and content-area faculty.
Constructivism brings important insights that speak to pedagogical
approaches to learning content. Research
in cognitive science has supported constructivist theory and progressed to the
point that clear implications are apparent in educational practice.
Gaea Leinhardt (1992) has synthesized the cognitive research on learning
that supports constructivism and summarized the implications around three
fundamental aspects: multiple forms of knowledge, the role of prior knowledge,
and the social nature of knowledge and its acquisition.
While each of these aspects has clear implications for school practice,
less has been written about how teacher education responds to these
understandings about learning.
Research on learning has led to the understanding that there are both
different types and amounts of knowledge. Declarative
knowledge of content concepts and principles becomes powerful for students when
it is connected with procedural knowledge of actions and skills (Best, 1995).
Knowledge varies across content areas as we examine the different
arrangements of facts, notations, and reasoning in different subjects.
Knowledge varies within content areas as one looks at how documentation,
arguments or explanations are structured in different disciplines. In addition, metaknowledge, knowing what and how well you
know, is seen as a powerful factor in developing understanding in students (Schoenfeld,
1987). These multiple forms of
knowledge highlight the complexity of learning.
Knowledge is seen as not just information, but an active process,
retained when embedded in some organizing structure (Bereiter, 1985).
When students interact with information, using it in solving problems,
answering questions, or discussing their interpretations, the information
becomes their knowledge, tied to their unique understandings.
The implications of the nature of knowledge for pedagogy point toward
teaching that integrates knowing content with using content, dissolving the line
between content and process (Leinhardt, 1992).
Active, problem-solving approaches should be apparent no matter what the
content approach taken. Since
knowledge also does not exist in isolation, it must be connected to student
prior knowledge and larger contexts in order to be incorporated into the deep
understanding of students. Interdisciplinary
approaches can connect the richness of separate disciplines while acknowledging
their interrelationships and modes of inquiry (Martinello & Cook, 2000).
The separation of schools of education from schools of arts and sciences
within the university often creates a situation where content courses are
disconnected from courses on teaching methods and learning (NCTAF, 1996).
While teacher education has sought to provide more integration of content
with process within teacher education courses, the content prospective teachers
learn in their arts and sciences courses is left separate and inactivated
through the teacher education sequence. Teacher education students often take 50% to 85% of their
course work in the arts and sciences (Gollnick, 1996). Traditionally, arts and sciences courses seldom challenge
students’ prior knowledge and often reinforce a transmission view of
knowledge. A compilation of broad
knowledge is emphasized over in-depth study that would challenge student
misconceptions. Teacher education faculty can work closely with arts and
sciences faculty to plan and implement courses of study that provide strong
disciplinary preparation linked closely with the methods and content of
pedagogical studies. Brooklyn
College of the City University of New York has developed a teacher education
program where students take several three-course sequences made up of a liberal
arts course, an education “bridging” course, and a pedagogy course (Grumet,
1992). The arts and sciences
faculty and the education faculty teaching these paired courses plan syllabi,
readings, and discussions together. Other
teacher education programs have closely examined their own curriculum to
determine the extent to which they model interdisciplinary integration of
content areas and pedagogy. For
example, Berry College is in the process of blocking its education methods
courses to align courses horizontally across a year of similar disciplinary
studies (literacy, inquiry, arts and cultures) and vertically so that college
faculty can plan integrated experiences for students across disciplinary areas.
Learning involves combining what you know with what was taught,
continually connecting prior knowledge with new information (Leinhardt, 1992).
This prior knowledge can facilitate, inhibit, or transform learning.
In reading, comprehension has been shown to depend on what you already
know or want to know (Smith, 1988). Research
into the nature of “children’s science,” the ideas and experiences
students bring into class with them (Driver, Guesne, & Tiberghien, 1985;
West & Pines, 1985), shows students hold tenaciously to their prior ideas. These
alternative conceptions or misconceptions grow out of students’ prior
experiences with the world around them, and can interfere considerably with
teachers’ attempts to foster learning. Research
in mathematics education shows students come to class with effective but
alternative routes to mathematics processes that are often confounded by
teaching (Carpenter et al., 1989). Research
on the construction of history reveal students’ tendency to see historical
events in terms of individuals' personal intentions and interactions and to
ignore the role of societal institutions (Barton, 1997).
The acknowledgment of alternative conceptions held by students has led to
deeper understandings of the process necessary to deal with student
constructions. Teachers need to
surface students’ prior knowledge, connect to it or challenge it, and allow
students to build from and onto their prior knowledge.
Often the results of teaching produce unintended learning outcomes, as
students combine existing ideas with the new ideas presented by teachers
(Osborne & Freyberg, 1985). In
order for students to make use of ideas taught by teachers in the ways teachers
intend, knowledge must present itself as intelligible, fruitful, and plausible.
Beyond these qualities, students may also have to find dissatisfaction
with their current knowledge and its use in understanding (Posner et al., 1982).
This is a clear move away from a “discovery” approach, where students
construct knowledge solely based on their own experience, to knowledge
construction where students have the opportunity to test their knowledge within
a social context, teachers challenge some conceptions, and students involve
themselves in a process of constructing understanding (Watson & Konicek,
1990). Conceptual change
instruction in science has emphasized a lesson format that includes an
orientation phase, elicitation of ideas, restructuring of ideas, application of
ideas, and reviewing change of ideas (Osborne & Freyberg, 1985).
Cognitively Guided Instruction (Carpenter et al., 1989) emphasizes
allowing students to surface their explanations of mathematical processes as the
teacher leads students to see alternative routes to solving problems.
Scardamalia and Bereiter (1985) have developed models for teaching
writing that use a combination of modeling, coaching, scaffolding, and fading.
The use of narrative has been shown to promote students’ historical
understanding and challenge students’ prior conceptions (Levstik & Pappas,
1992).
Teacher education programs are caught in the bind of informing teacher
candidates about the importance of prior experiences and misconceptions while
also having to deal with these candidates’ own prior experiences and
misconceptions about both teaching and content.
The “apprenticeship of observation” (Lortie, 1975) through lengthy
personal experience with schooling prevents preservice teachers from searching
beyond what they already know and from questioning the practices they see (Feiman-Nemser
& Buchmann, 1987). Some teacher
education programs promote conceptual change in their students toward viewing
schools as they could be, not merely as they are.
Experiences that challenge student conceptions of schooling include
provocative readings and discussion (such as Kozol, 1991, etc.), simulations,
and experiences in experimental schools that can give different vision of
education. In their content
studies, preservice teachers’ own misconceptions can also be challenged. Teacher education programs that work with faculty in arts and
sciences to understand the preconceptions students bring to their classes can
promote approaches that will challenge these preconceptions. Through both having their own conceptions challenged and
learning about the prior knowledge of their students, teacher candidates will be
better prepared to provide their students content knowledge linked with student
prior knowledge.
Finally, the social aspect of knowledge provides clear implications in
practice. As outlined above, learning is seen to be an active process of
knowledge construction and sense making. Beyond
that, knowledge is understood as a cultural artifact of people.
It is created and transformed by each individual and by groups of people
(Vygotsky, 1978). As a result,
learning should involve talk, public reasoning, and shared problem solving.
Too often the social environment of schools is counterproductive to
learning (Hausfather, 1996). Instead of a focus on individual achievement, learning
involves social interaction that supports thinking, surfaces prior knowledge,
and allows skills to be used in the context of content knowledge.
Participating in communities of discourse allows students to clarify,
defend, elaborate, evaluate, and argue over the knowledge constructed (Brown,
1994). Many teachers use
cooperative learning as a route to building communities of discourse in their
classrooms. Cooperative learning has been shown to be a powerful vehicle to
improve learning outcomes for students (Slavin, 1996).
Teacher education has a clear role in clarifying a vision of a social
environment supportive to learning. Preservice methods courses can model
collaboration between and among the teacher and students. College teaching has
traditionally stressed individual processes over social processes in learning.
Teacher education needs to provide opportunities where college students learn
within social situations. College students can metacognitively experience zones
of proximal development (Vygotsky, 1978) within college classrooms by working
within cooperative or discourse groups while analyzing their own experiences as
a guide to their teaching. Instructional conversations can occur within the
classic Socratic seminar, where instructor and students together explore
problems as a small community of learners. Pairing students for field experience
placements in schools is one way to promote peer collaboration that fosters
deeper understandings of classroom situations (Hausfather, Outlaw, & Strehle,
1996). Pairing allows more
opportunities for students to get feedback on their classroom behaviors, as
partners observe each other teaching, provide different perspectives on
classroom events, and collaborate in planning. Pairing allows preservice
teachers to see the value of collegial reflection in contrast to the usual
individuality prevalent in schools.
These implications from cognitive science research help us to understand
the difficulty of separating content from process in learning.
Research in teaching has identified the linking of content with the
process of teaching; such links occur as the teacher continually restructures
subject matter knowledge for the purpose of teaching (Cochran, DeRuiter, &
King, 1993). Termed pedagogical
content knowledge (PCK), this concept connects research on teaching with
research on learning, helping determine constructivist approaches to learning
content for teaching.
Lee Shulman (1986) introduced the term pedagogical content knowledge as
“the ways of representing and formulating the subject that make it
comprehensible to others” (p. 9). This
goes beyond knowledge of the content per se to include issues of teaching the
content, including typical curricular choices, powerful ideas, common learning
difficulties, and student conceptions in the specific subject.
Shulman included PCK in the broader knowledge base for teaching, which
included content knowledge, PCK, curriculum knowledge, general pedagogy,
learners and their characteristics, educational contexts, and educational
purposes (Shulman, 1987). PCK
involves the transformation of content knowledge by teachers in ways that allow
learners to construct knowledge during classroom practice.
Teachers derive PCK from their understandings of content, their own
teaching practice, and their own schooling experience.
As such, PCK is closely intertwined with both content knowledge and
pedagogical process knowledge (Van Driel, Verloop, & De Vos, 1998).
Different scholars have included different aspects within their
conceptualizations of PCK, although all agree PCK differs considerably from
content knowledge and that it is developed through an integrative process during
classroom practice (Van Driel, Verloop, & De Vos, 1998).
Cochran, DeRuiter, and King (1993) renamed PCK as pedagogical content knowing
(PCKg) based on a constructivist view of teaching and teacher education.
Their model includes subject matter content and specific pedagogical
knowledge but adds teachers’ understanding of students and of the
environmental context of learning. Understanding
students includes student abilities and learning strategies, developmental
levels, attitudes, motivations, and prior conceptions.
Context includes teachers’ understandings of the social, political,
cultural and physical environment. Teachers
simultaneously experience these four components as they prepare for and progress
through their career.
Research in pedagogical content knowledge reinforces the research in
cognitive science (Cochran, DeRuiter, and King, 1993) and many of the
implications listed above (Ashton, 1990). Teacher
education programs can enhance the development of PCK in teacher candidates by
modeling and sharing teaching decisions and strategies with students, both by
education and content-area faculty. Faculty
should have opportunities to demonstrate and reflect on how they use PCK in
their own teaching (Cochran, DeRuiter, and King, 1993).
Contexts that promote active simultaneous learning about the many
components of teaching within the content area allow for the development of PCK.
These contexts should be similar to classroom environments, which suggest
the incorporation of multiple field-based opportunities within the teacher
education program. Early, continued, and authentic field experiences include
real teaching, much contact with experienced teachers, and reflection and
feedback (Hausfather, Outlaw, & Strehle, 1996).
Although it is difficult to separate PCK from content knowledge, it
appears as though a thorough and coherent understanding of content is necessary
for effective PCK (Van Driel, Verloop, & De Vos, 1998).
Teacher education programs can assist preservice teachers in constructing
a deep understanding of disciplinary content from a teaching perspective so it
can be used to help specific students understand specific concepts (Cochran,
DeRuiter, and King, 1993). This
involves both working closely with arts and sciences faculty to understand
pedagogical perspectives as well as integrating methods courses with or
alongside content courses.
A teacher education program which balances attention
to the process of learning with the content of what is being learned can
ultimately result in helping teachers be better able to understand both their
content and the learning of their students.
Too often content is taught without any attention to process, or process
is taught without a deep understanding of the nature of the content involved.
Teacher education programs seek to find the balance.
We now turn our attention to examples of program efforts that work to
obliterate the lines between content and process.
Many teacher education programs throughout the country have identified
constructivist principles as foundational to their teacher education mission and
goals. As constructivism has taken
hold, programs have worked to understand and create the links between content
and process that are fundamental in constructivist approaches.
We review here several programs at undergraduate and graduate levels that
have given thought to these issues, with the assumption we can learn from the
lessons of individual programs.
Berry
College
There is much in teacher education that is process focused.
This makes sense given the process nature of teaching.
Generally, there is important content as well, such as the theoretical
bases of constructivism in the work of Piaget, Vygotsky, and Dewey.
Berry College’s undergraduate teacher education program tries to
continually mix content with process, so as theories are discussed, applications
can be modeled. The program is
structured to involve a back and forth between college classroom and field
experience, allowing students opportunities to continually test the content of
teacher education against the process of teaching in real classrooms.
There are aspects of the theoretical content where mastery is expected,
both in demonstrations to faculty and on the national certification tests. Assessments are constructed which allow demonstration, both
authentic and traditional.
Subject-matter content (math, science, social studies, phonics, etc.) is
a clear part of the responsibility of an undergraduate teacher education
program. Faculty strive to model
the way they want students to teach this content while at the same time teaching
them the content. Because they cannot teach all the content teachers should
know, the emphasis goes more to big ideas, inquiries, and the attitudes
necessary to help our students become lifelong learners.
This starts with an understanding of the nature of knowledge and how
knowledge changes through time. It
is important to give credence to students’ preconceptions while at the same
time understanding the currently accepted conceptions. Teacher education students must understand how to use the
tools given to them to continue to learn. They
must understand the content deeply in order to teach it.
For teacher educators, paying attention to deep understanding of content
means you cannot cover everything you hope to.
Teachers and teacher educators should not be afraid of exploring their
own understandings and delving on their own to understand further.
The tools at our disposal are powerful to do this, with the web,
electronic encyclopedias, linked communications, etc.
Faculty expect students to do the self-learning necessary to prepare well
to teach others, both in college classrooms and in their field experiences.
Faculty model for students their own attempts to keep up with the
burgeoning knowledge in their fields and their continual revision and updating
of courses. One group of faculty
began a self-study of their attempts to integrate technology in their
teacher-education courses (Strehle, Whatley, Kurz,& Hausfather, in press).
They openly shared with college students their challenges and learnings
as they attempted to use technology in constructivist ways.
And faculty honor student expertise as they learn from student
explorations into particular content. Content
and process become as inseparable as teacher and learner.
What about the teaching of particular content?
College faculty depend on their colleagues in the arts and sciences for
the content background of teacher education students.
Faculty from across the campus were brought together to design the
teacher-education curriculum. Discussion
and debate helped all faculty understand the perspectives each brought on the
role of content and process in teacher education.
At first, arts and sciences faculty questioned the content and rigor of
education courses. As they
participated in the deconstruction and recreation of the teacher education
courses, they participated in and came to understand the links between content
and process that exist in education courses.
Constructivist teacher education cannot occur in a vacuum.
Too often students move from teacher education classes to arts and
sciences classes where behavioristic techniques prevail.
Teacher education faculty continue to struggle with the role of helping
colleagues across campus understand changes in pedagogy.
Historically teacher education has held a low status within colleges and
universities, viewed as a professional school committed to practice instead of
research (Schneider, 1987; Goodlad, 1999).
This is beginning to change as calls for reform of both teacher education
and general undergraduate education are opening to view the entire higher
education experience. In smaller
institutions such as Berry College, the commitment to teacher education has
allowed for long-term curricular and budgetary investments.
We continue to struggle with working with our arts and sciences
colleagues to understand the process aspects of their content teaching.
Teacher education faculty also deal with teacher education students as we
expect them to deal with their own pupils.
This involves surfacing students’ alternative conceptions or
misconceptions, and then building understanding of the alternative conceptions
pupils will bring to the classroom. Content
is thus revealed, making it approachable but challenging.
In the teacher education classroom, an approach to teaching content is
modeled that begins with experiences orienting students to a content issue.
Student ideas are then elicited, and a process of restructuring ideas is
modeled which challenges student ideas and introduces accepted ideas.
Students then have the chance to apply their ideas through experience,
and review their change in thinking. This
“constructivist teaching model” (Scott, 1987) is taught not as a pattern to
be reproduced but as a way of understanding constructivist teaching, allowing
for variety based on context. Students
then explore the understanding of the pupils they may teach.
In science methods for example, students are given the assignment of
interviewing a child about conceptions in one area of science.
The instructor models surfacing alternative conceptions in several
science content areas, providing experiences that challenge student conceptions
and then discussing current scientific views.
Students then watch and discuss videos of child interviews that reveal
specific content misconceptions. Students
research a science concept and interview a child.
They videotape their interview and write a reflective summary on what
they learned about student understandings of science concepts.
College students are amazed at how differently children think about
everyday phenomena.
Although there is clear need for understanding of disciplinary content,
that understanding must become a part of interdisciplinary thinking.
Once one steps outside the classroom, there is little in life that
narrowly follows disciplines. Berry
College is in the process of breaking down course walls, moving all courses to
become “blocks” team taught by professors bringing different perspectives
together. A literacy block will
bring together reading, language arts, and literature.
An inquiry block will share math and science. An integrated arts block will allow social studies, art,
music, and PE to create integrated units. A
foundations block will bring together psychology and education.
Curriculum brokers will ensure that technology, child development,
special education, and second-language learners are integrated throughout all
blocks. Blocks will be integrated
vertically through faculty sharing of expertise and the development and modeling
of interdisciplinary units, with faculty time and expertise choreographed to
“dance” through disciplinary walls. In
this way, content areas will be given meaning within integrated blocks
emphasizing active/inquisitory approaches to knowledge.
Georgia
State University
The Collaborative Master’s Program (CMP) at Georgia State University is
a master’s degree program based on constructivist principles and the work of
Dewey. The ongoing nature of program allows for the following
(Rainer & Guyton, 1999):
|
C living the process of a constructivist model is part of the content of the program |
|
C contextually bound part of work (classroom teaching) gives meaning to content and process |
|
C integrated content |
|
C deep engagement with content |
The process of teaching is the content of the CMP, as teacher education
faculty model constructivist approaches to pedagogy.
Faculty lead students to negotiate the content of the program. For example, work in math methods is begun by discussing
current professional standards in mathematics education (NCTM) and the
relationship of these standards to the teachers’ practice.
As the teachers look at both of these in light of constructivist theory,
they begin to ask questions of faculty and faculty ask questions of teachers.
Together a very ambitious list of topics is generated that the group
would like to explore together. Topics
are sorted into relevant categories, for example, topics such as problem
solving, critical thinking and technology are grouped together with the NCTM
standards on communication and reasoning. After
narrowing the list to a manageable set of integrated concepts, the ideas are
discussed and assigned, including a time line and designation of individuals
responsible for discussions and resources.
Faculty members prepare a “proposed” agenda based on these decisions.
As each class begins, the agenda is presented for additions and
revisions. Faculty contributions
include providing reflective questions, current research on the topics, and an
activity involving children’s literature and physical models.
Teacher’s contributions involve demonstrating effective practice,
reflecting on changes in pedagogy, and sharing resources.
Teachers select one area about which they want to study in some depth,
collaboratively in focus groups. Example
topics have been teaching math, the teaching of reading, culturally relevant
curriculum, assessment and evaluation. These
groups design not only the content they will study, but also the process through
which to study it. Each group has a
faculty advisor for resources, coaching, and guiding.
In addition to documenting the knowledge of mathematics and literacy
teachers gain through this process, they are asked to document their own
learning process. The goal is for
them to be metacognitive and articulate about their own learning process.
The learning frameworks help teachers design their current and future
studies.
When teachers engage in designing the benchmark, rubric, capstone, and
grading process, the understanding of assessment and evaluation becomes
personal. These are probably the
most challenging experiences of the year for teachers in the CMP.
What teachers learn about assessment and evaluation of content becomes
important to them personally. Rather
than learning about assessment and evaluation mostly by reading, they are living
the content through the process of designing assessments of their own learning.
Mansfield
University of Pennsylvania
The teacher education program at Mansfield University of Pennsylvania
works with inservice teachers in their classrooms to contextualize their
content. The program encourages
deep engagement with content.
In an emerging literacy course, students are held accountable for content
by checking that they have completed a log based on chapters.
Five or 10 entries are required depending on the length of the chapter.
The entries include one paragraph about an idea expressed in their own
words and one paragraph about the reactions.
The logs are used in small group discussions and in writing their final
philosophy paper. The latter must demonstrate that they have grasped the
critical content (the five major topics are specified that the paper must
address). The instructor
models this process while collaborating with a local third-grade teacher. Students read about emerging literacy, experience it as a
learner through simulation and modeling, and then have a third-grade writing
partner with whom they experience literacy issues.
Early Childhood Curriculum follows emerging literacy.
The course included nine classes where students must work for two hours
in second grade classrooms. They
are observed on a rotating basis and create lesson plans and reflections after
each class. During the rest of the
course, content is introduced using parts of several NAEYC texts.
Students develop a resource notebook organized around the seven topics
and then make a concept map. This
helps them link information they have learned in many courses.
Mills
College
Inherent in the concept of constructivism are the notions of content and
process. The teacher education
program at Mills College strives to help students think about this dichotomy as
complementary. One program
principle articulates this area as “Teaching for the acquisition and
construction of subject matter knowledge.”
A primary focus of the Mills College graduate-level credential programs
is to help candidates think in different ways about the subject matter knowledge
they already possess. Opportunities
are provided for students to transform their content knowledge into working
knowledge often referred to in the literature as pedagogical content knowledge.
That is, students analyze and reorganize their subject matter knowledge
in ways that will make it possible for them to provide similar opportunities for
their students to organize knowledge. In
addition, candidates construct and reconstruct their own subject matter
knowledge where necessary as a means to obtain and develop more pedagogical
content knowledge in the future.
To emphasize the contrast and dichotomy of process and content, students
engage with content at an adult level while thinking about the teaching of that
content (or process) at the instructional level -- whether it be for a child or
an adult. For example, all
elementary-education students participate in Writers’ Workshop during the
second semester. The semester ends
with a publishing party where a collection of writing with a contribution from
each class member is published. By
participating in writers’ workshop, student teachers think about content and
process in several ways. First they
think about the nature of learning to write; we might consider this content
about learner development. Second
they think about different aspects of writing, like genre, writing conventions,
the process of writing and rewriting. Here,
process is the content. Third they
think about writers’ workshop as an instructional technique, from the
perspective of the learner and the perspective of the teacher.
As learners, they connect this aspect with the developmental content, and
as teachers they connect this aspect with the process of writing and the
pedagogy of writing instruction. This
“activity” helps clarify the dichotomy and overlap of content and process.
In both the methodology classes and in child development classes,
students examine children’s learning of mathematics and literacy and apply
that understanding to thinking about how best to teach the content.
Thus, throughout the program there is a goal of coordinating the nature
of the discipline, children’s learning, instructional practice and an overall
view of the curriculum.
Conclusions
Constructivist approaches to teacher education must deal with the issues
of content and process, acknowledging the vital link between content and its
acquisition. Constructivism challenges some basic understandings of
content knowledge. At the same
time, research supporting constructivist approaches brings insights to teacher
education practice that makes for more powerful teaching and student
understanding of content. An
understanding of the nature of pedagogical content knowledge leads teacher
educators to work more closely with arts and sciences faculty to help students
integrate their experiences in content courses with their experiences in teacher
education courses. Examples at
several teacher education programs reinforce these understandings.
These program examples share an understanding that content and process
are inseparable. Programs
consciously link methods courses with content, focusing teacher candidates on
thinking in different ways about content. Modeling
by teacher education faculty engages students with content while they learn
strategies to teach that content. Content
is negotiated with students, with an emphasis on concepts over facts. Courses are blocked across content areas to model
interdisciplinary teaching and learning. Finally,
efforts are underway to increase collaboration with arts and sciences faculty
toward creating a seamless teacher education program.
Teacher education provides a multiplier effect.
As we model approaches that lead our students to understand content
deeply and to view content and process as inseparable aspects of knowledge
construction, our students gain the perspectives and abilities to move their
students to deeper understandings of content.
Powerful teacher education should lead to students at all levels of
schooling coming to better appreciations of the world around them.
A constructivist approach shows us that content and process are not
dichotomous. As more teachers come
to that understanding, many more students will benefit.
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