Heidi L. Hallman

Community-based field experiences in teacher education: possibilities for a pedagogical third space

The present article discusses the importance of community-based field experiences as a feature of teacher education programs. Through a qualitative case study, prospective teachers’ work with homeless youth in an after-school initiative is presented. Framing community-based field experiences in teacher education through “third space” theory, the article discusses the value that such experiences have for prospective teachers’ learning. The goals of the article align with the commitment to preparing a future teaching force for the diverse educational settings that they will encounter in the twenty-first century.

Millennial Teacher: A Storied Landscape of Diversity in “New Times”

In this article the authors explore the ways in which the historical location of millennial prospective teachers is markedly distinct from that of previous generations. Through a case study of one prospective teachers life history, millenial themes of globalization and shape-shifting are highlighted and analyzed in relation to one prospective teachers learner biography.

Shifting genres: a dialogic approach to reflective practice in teacher education

Through a Bakhtinian approach, this paper works to highlight concepts of dialogue, genre, and heteroglossia within one beginning teacher’s practice. Through a case study of this pre-service teacher’s reflections over the course of one academic year spent student teaching in US public schools, this article illustrates how reflective practice, framed through Bakhtinian notions of dialogue, genre, and heteroglossia, can unite the consideration of context with reflective practice. Though the goals of this inquiry seek to outline tenets of a dialogic approach to reflective practice, implications importantly suggest ways that teachers and teacher educators, in employing a Bakhtinian conceptual framework to the study of teacher reflection, can continue to stress reflection’s connection to action.

Teacher as ‘Shape-shifter’: Exploring the Intersection of New Times and the Teaching of English Language Arts

This article explores how the current era in which we live, ‘New Times’, a term used to characterize the changing social, economic, and technological conditions of our current era, both affords and constrains the identities of future teachers. The case of Anna Cunningham, a pre-service English language arts teacher, is highlighted as a portrait of the intersection of New Times with teacher identities rooted in content/disciplinary affiliations. Findings suggest the beginning teachers in New Times become adept at negotiating multiple, and sometimes divergent, teacher identities. This negotiation becomes a primary tool in responding to a changing notion of what is means to teach English language arts.

Learning to Teach English Language Learners Through English Language Arts Methods: Findings from a National Survey

This chapter reports on the findings of a nationwide survey on English teacher preparation. Specifically, this chapter highlights English teacher educators’ responses to how the teaching of English language learners (ELLs) has been included, or not included, in the English education methods course over the past two decades. Findings of the chapter illustrate how English teacher educators envision teaching ELLs as part of the field’s domain. Discussion focuses on whether the English methods course should include a depth of understanding of teaching ELLs or whether the field’s presentation of an “awareness” of this topic is sufficient.

Personalized learning through 1:1 technology initiatives: implications for teachers and teaching in neoliberal times

Abstract Situated within the broader context of neoliberalism, this article explores how personalized learning, as tied to 1:1 technology initiatives, prompts changes in teachers’ classrooms and practices. The article draws upon a case study of one novice teacher as a way to view how personalized learning is undergirded by tenets of neoliberalism that ultimately change the relationship between teachers, students, and knowledge. While this article does not dispute the positive effects that personalized learning through technology has offered to many students, it explores facets of how such a change has reoriented the role of the teacher and repositioned knowledge as it relates to classrooms and students.

Preparing English Teachers for Today’s Context: Researching Effective Practice through Methods Courses

Abstract Many situations that affect the teaching of English have been unevenly examined in the scholarship. Asking the question, “What research in English teacher education will address the demands of preparing English language arts teachers for 21st century contexts?,” the authors provide recommendations to the field that will make our work more relevant and propose areas for further study based on current situations in English education in the United States that will move the field forward. The chapter suggests topics for further research centered on the English language arts-specific methods (pedagogy) course that includes exploring the tensions between literacy and English studies, integrating technology, moving theory into practice, the effects of high-stakes testing and assessments, and supporting more diverse student populations.

Rhetoric of the future: Writing and identity at a school for pregnant and parenting teens

Abstract Three cases of students’ writing at Eastview School for Pregnant and Parenting Teens are explored in this article. Through Bakhtinian concepts of rhetoric, heteroglossia, and genre, the article discusses the ways in which Eastview students responded to and refuted societal discourses of teen motherhood through their writing. The term rhetoric of the future is introduced as a way to characterise the link between writing and identity for a group of students considered to be ‘at risk’ of school failure.