Etta R. Hollins

Revealing the Deep Meaning of Culture in School Learning: Framing a New Paradigm for Teacher Preparation

Abstract The author proposes a model that frames a new paradigm for teacher preparation that facilitates the deep meaning of culture in school learning. Preservice teachers move in cohorts through a six-part process of interrelated program components, employing strategies of introspection and reflective-interpretive-inquiry. During this process, a complex operational definition of culture is constructed that ultimately reveals aspects of the relationship among culture, cognition, and school learning. An operational definition of culture and the data collected by preservice teachers are used to formulate a theory explaining the relationship between culture and school learning. This theory guides reframing the curriculum, redesigning classroom instruction, and creating a more responsive social context for school learning for students from different cultural and experiential backgrounds.

Learning to teach teachers

This paper reports on a study of the practices of a cohort of traditionally appointed teacher educators with the responsibility for facilitating teacher learning and learning teaching. The approach used in this investigation involved a practice-to-theory field experience (PTE), a reflective paper analyzing the PTE, and a shared set of readings on pedagogy for facilitating teacher learning and learning teaching with the PTE as context. The participants in this study were 21 students enrolled in an education doctorate program at a Research I university in the Western United States. The findings from the study revealed that the number of years of experience as a teacher educator was not related to competence or effectiveness. Further, it was found that the combined processes of documenting practice, writing a reflective paper, and engaging in focused dialog with peers based on a shared set of readings, and incorporating the PTE as context enabled participants to think critically and co-construct deep knowledge and understanding of the role of the teacher educator and practices for facilitating teacher learning and learning teaching.

Kindness Is Society

Social justice is a moral position, a philosophical stance, and a social/political movement with multiple dimensions based on the core values that support the highest quality in human life conditions and experiences for all people; where people live together in harmony, with opportunities for full participation in the society; where all contributions are encouraged and appreciated, with freedom from oppression and systematic subordination of members of one group to another; and with access to the collective benefits and resources of the society that enrich and make life meaningful for everyone.