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Preservice Teachers' SchoolStories and How They MatterMiriam Hirsch aa Department of Education , Stern College, YeshivaUniversityPublished online: 13 Apr 2012.
To cite this article: Miriam Hirsch (2012) Preservice Teachers' SchoolStories and How They Matter, The Teacher Educator, 47:2, 144-167, DOI:10.1080/08878730.2012.660372
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The Teacher Educator, 47:144–167, 2012
Copyright © Taylor & Francis Group, LLCISSN: 0887-8730 print/1938-8101 online
DOI: 10.1080/08878730.2012.660372
RESEARCH ARTICLE
PRESERVICE TEACHERS’ SCHOOL STORIES
AND HOW THEY MATTER
MIRIAM HIRSCH
Department of Education, Stern College, Yeshiva University
In this article, the author presents an analysis of 23 school stories (Clandinin
& Connelly, 1996) composed by preservice teachers as part of an elective course
in an undergraduate teacher preparation program. Three layers of analysis—topical, thematic, and theoretical coding—provide insight into the contribution
of the school story genre towards understanding the personal practical knowledge
(Clandinin, 1992) of preservice teachers. This research suggests that schoolstories offer generative potential for preservice teachers to make connections
between their own schooling experiences and future practices. This study also
recommends that teacher educators be mindful of preservice teachers’ residualconflict with school personnel, systems, rules, and procedures. Strategies and
practices to address these findings are included.
We all have memories from our childhood years, which have marked usand that we cannot forget. Some of them have a powerful message andas teachers or parents we have much to learn from some of those stories.
—Marina’s story
In the fall of 2006, I designed an elective course for undergraduatepreservice teachers entitled The Literature of Pedagogy, in which stu-dents read and discussed autobiographical and biographical texts1 byand about teachers. I created this course to provide students with an
1Works included 36 Children by H. Kohl (1967/1988), Up the Down Staircase byB. Kaufman (1964), Elaine’s Circle by B. Katz (2005), White Teacher by V. G. Paley (2000),
Savage Inequalities by J. Kozol (1991), and Miss Moffett’s First Year by A. Goodnough (2004).Address correspondence to Miriam Hirsch, Department of Education, Stern
College, Yeshiva University, 245 Lexington Avenue, New York, NY, 10016, USA. E-mail:[email protected]
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opportunity to learn about the social, political, and economic forcesthat drive school organizations, as well as a vehicle to explore thenuances of the teacher’s daily challenges. I wanted my students to seethings both small and big (Greene, 1995), to look from a distance atthe systems and ideologies that shape our educational landscape, andalso to attend to the integrity and particularity of people’s lives. Tocomplement the reading, discussion, and written analysis of the coretexts, I asked the students to individually compose an autobiographicalschool story (Clandinin & Connelly, 1996) to serve as their own personalcontribution to the literature of pedagogy. The preservice teachers’school stories analyzed in this research initiative were born in thisclimate of reflection, inquiry, and seeing small and big.
In Marina’s story (all names are pseudonymous) that introducedthis article, she painted a portrait of her elementary schooling (outsideof the United States) and the challenges she faced in the private schoolshe attended. She vividly depicted a memory of how an overly harshteacher publicly embarrassed a classmate by not allowing her to use therestroom.
Her bladder let go and she wet her skirt as well as the floor. All thechildren were staring at the scene, unable to stop laughing about whathad just happened. The teacher got very nervous and asked Amelia (theclassmate) to clean it up.
Marina explained that the principal came into the class the followingday cautioning the girls to never to speak of the incident again. ‘‘Ifthere is any emergency we should say it clearly to the teacher who wouldbe understanding from now on.’’ Although the events did not directlyhappen to her, Marina has been unable to forget the experience of herfriend’s traumatic episode. The humiliation left a deep imprint in hermemory:
This story marked me during all my schooling years, I cannot forget theattitude the teacher had that day : : : anytime I am in a teaching situation,and I am asked permission to go to the bathroom, I remember that story.
Marina attributed the teacher’s tight control of the classroom manage-ment system as responsible for the pain her classmate experienced. Thismoment of vicarious wounding has life significance for her as it framesher current pedagogic practice.
The purpose of this article is to examine and interpret the assump-tions, biases, and understandings that preservice teachers bring withthem as they embark on their professional pathways, paying specific
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attention to the technical systems that scaffold schooling experiences,and the value-laden meaning that preservice teachers construct to makesense of these significant life moments. Sergiovanni’s (2000) concep-tual distinction between the systemsworld of schooling (including thesystems, routines, processes, and rules) and the lifeworld of schooling(including the norms, values, meaning, and significance) frame theanalysis of the 23 school stories. It has been argued that teachers in-terpret and reinterpret their classroom teaching experiences throughthe lens of their personal practical knowledge (Clandinin & Connelly,1988; Craig, 2006; Olson & Craig, 2001).
It is knowledge that reflects the individual’s prior knowledge and acknowl-edges the contextual nature of that teacher’s knowledge. It is a kind ofknowledge, carved out of, and shaped by situations; knowledge that isconstructed and reconstructed as we live out our stories and retell andrelive them through processes of reflection. (Clandinin, 1992, p. 125)
The primary research question is: What can I learn about the personalpractical knowledge of the preservice teachers by examining their au-tobiographical school stories? This research explores the themes andpatterns that contour the personal practical knowledge of preserviceteachers’ schooling experiences by analyzing the narrative school storiesof three years of preservice teacher cohorts.
Review of the Literature
Preservice teacher candidates enter teacher education classrooms armedwith a storehouse of memories, assumptions, and beliefs derived in partfrom their 12-plus years of schooling and the observations and sensa-tions accrued through prolonged exposure to classroom and schoolexperiences. Lortie (1975) titled this original ‘‘in-the-field’’ experience,‘‘the apprenticeship of observation’’ (p. 61). Levin and He (2008)asserted, ‘‘prior beliefs about the classroom are a strong influenceon these teacher candidates’ thinking before and during their teachereducation program’’ (p. 65). In fact, Richardson (1996, 2003) arguedthat such beliefs filter the professional knowledge teacher candidatesacquire, process, and retain. As a result, He and Levin (2008) positedthat ‘‘knowing their teacher candidates’ beliefs could allow both teachereducators and cooperating teachers to better facilitate teacher candi-date’s development’’ (p. 2).
Within the literature there is some distinction between the useof the following three terms: personal, practical theories (PPTs); personal,practical knowledge; and professional knowledge landscapes. Cornett (1990)
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defined personal, practical theories as the systematic set of beliefs (per-sonal theories), based on personal practices that guide teachers. Forexample, in a recent study of 94 teacher candidates’ PPTS, Levin and He(2008) found that the major source of the teacher candidates’ beliefsabout the classroom appear to stem from family and K–12 educationalbackground.
In contrast, Clandinin’s (1986, 1992) notion of personal, practicalknowledge is a more fluid and layered construction, understood as ‘‘in aperson’s past experience, in the person’s present mind and body, andin the person’s future plans and actions’’ (Clandinin, 1992, p. 125).For example, Clandinin (1989) explored the development of a noviceteacher’s personal, practical knowledge during his first year of teachingkindergarten, analyzing the dilemmas created by the distance betweenthe teaching rhythm of a new teacher and the cyclic nature of school time.
The metaphor of the professional knowledge landscape (Clan-dinin & Connelly, 1995), located at the intersection between personalknowledge and professional knowledge, merges the deeply personalpractical knowledge of teachers with the broader educational contextof the professional space. As Clandinin and Connelly (1995, p. 5)claim, ‘‘It has a sense of expansiveness and the possibility of beingfilled with diverse people, things and events in different relationships.’’For example, Olson (2000) described how three preservice teachersnegotiate their own curriculum stories within the broader professionalknowledge of the cooperating teachers’ classroom spaces, the universityprofessor’s curricular narrative, and the stories handed down by theschool district.
Frequently, teacher educators/researchers may utilize school storiesto tap into the prior knowledge, beliefs, assumptions, or theories thatteacher candidates hold with respect to teaching and learning. Thetreatment of these school stories, autobiographical accounts of school-ing experiences, often present within the literature in two distinct ways:one, as an assignment designed to stabilize the teacher candidate’snarrative account in order to secure a deep and meaningful reflectionof an autobiographical schooling experience (Ellsworth & Buss, 2000;Guillaume & Kirtman, 2010); or two, as a narrative inquiry researchmethod and mode of representation by scholars who co-construct nar-ratives merging both the lived story and the research story, blendingfield texts and research texts (Clandinin, 1986; Craig, 1995; Craig, 2004;Olson, 2000; Orr & Olson, 2007).
The place of the theoretical frame within the narrative or alongsidethe narrative school story is somewhat contested. Kim (2008) warned,‘‘the incorporation of theory into narrative inquiry can over-power anexperiential narrative unless the theory in turn becomes a part of the
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story’’ (p. 4). However, Eisner (1991) reminded us that storytelling with-out interpretation or theoretical framing is limited; social science theoryprovides ‘‘satisfying rationality, raising fresh questions and deepeningthe conversation’’ (p. 95).
This research, which examined a set of 23 school stories composedas a preservice teacher education assignment and interpreted throughthe lens of the systemsworld/lifeworld theoretical frame (Sergiovanni,2000), is situated in the interstitial space between multiple constructs.First, as described in greater depth in the subsequent method section,the student teachers were encouraged to consider their personal prac-tical knowledge as they enter the gates of the professional knowledgelandscape, in the development and construction of an individual schoolstory. However, I did not write their stories blending field and researchtexts; they wrote their own stories, and I honored their voices by workingwith the texts I was given, looking across them independently andcollectively. Second, as described in the following theoretical frameworksection, I adapted a theoretical frame, one most commonly used inresearch with principals (Nelson, de la Colina, & Boone, 2008; Sergio-vanni, 1994), as a lens to find the broad personal practical theoreticalstrokes contouring the data set of preservice teachers’ school stories.
Theoretical Framework
The systemsworld and lifeworld dimensions as advanced by Sergiovanni(2000) are used as a lens to interpret preservice teachers’ school stories.Based on the work of Selznick (1957) and Habermas (1987), Sergio-vanni (2000) distinguished between the technical-instrumental domain(systemsworld) and the moral-values-laden domain (lifeworld).
Culture, meaning, and significance are parts of the ‘‘lifeworld’’ of theschool. This lifeworld can be contrasted with the ‘‘systemsworld.’’ Thesystemsworld is a world of instrumentalities usually experienced in schoolsas management systems. These systems are supposed to help schoolseffectively and efficiently achieve their goals and objectives. This achieve-ment, in turn, ideally strengthens the culture and enhances meaning andsignificance. (p. 4)
Sergiovanni wrote that both worlds have value and import for schools,but cautioned that balance is only achieved when the lifeworld drivesthe systemsworld and not the reverse. The technical world must be inservice of the values of the culture and the community. For example,checking that teachers are in their classrooms on time is an importantmanagerial process within most school systems because schools serve
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in loco parentis and are responsible for the safety and supervision ofchildren. The check is not the critical piece: Worker oversight serves asa mechanism to sustain the desired value of the children’s safety.
Recently, Nelson et al. (2008) examined the experiences of noviceprincipals to find that the current climate of efficiency and account-ability is contributing to the socialization of principals who focus onthe technical aspects of administration over the relational aspects ofleadership. The authors found that ‘‘what novice principals need is bothmore technical information and a better understanding of the human-relational aspects of leadership’’ (p. 697). What about new teachers?In this research the systemsworld and lifeworld domains are used tointerpret the preservice teacher school stories, to attend to the features,interactions, and processes that contour their assumptions about educa-tional practices, structures, and values. Johnson (2008) asserts that thisis especially vital for preservice teacher educators, stating: ‘‘In order tounderstand the process of becoming a teacher or an ‘agent of change,’teacher educators must have a robust and well-rounded understandingof how preservice teachers already see’’ (p. 1). As I held the stack ofnarrative school stories, I wondered, ‘‘What aspects of the systemsworldand lifeworld dimensions of schooling were my students seeing, whatwere they missing, and was there any relationship between the twodimensions?’’
Method
This research project is situated in the personal experience method(Clandinin & Connelly, 1994) of the field of narrative inquiry/inquiryinto narrative (Clandinin & Connelly, 1996, p. 29). It is predicated onthe assertion that people ‘‘lead storied lives and tell stories of thoselives, whereas narrative researchers describe such lives, collect, and tellstories of them’’ (Connelly & Clandinin, 1990, p. 2). This researchmethod is further framed by Polkinghorne’s (1995) conceptualizationof ‘‘analysis of narrative,’’ in which ‘‘narratives are analyzed into themesand categories’’ (Clandinin & Murphy, 2007, p. 636).
Three tiers of data analyses scaffold the inquiry process: topicalcoding, thematic coding, and theoretical coding. The first layer of dataanalysis involved an initial topical coding of the school stories. The goalwas to honor the integrity of each separate text as an intact individualnarrative. Through a close reading of each text independently, I asked:‘‘What is this story primarily about, and when did this story occur,early childhood, elementary school, middle school, high school, or inanother educational context?’’ I also considered whether there was any
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connection between the education track of the preservice student, earlychildhood or elementary, and the context of their selected school story.As Elbaz-Luwish (2007) states, ‘‘Understanding teaching requires thatwe pay attention to teachers both as individuals and as a group, listeningto their voices and the stories they tell about their work and their lives’’(p. 359).
The second layer of data analysis involved thematic coding inwhich I adapted Connelly and Clandinin’s (1990) analytic tools ofburrowing, broadening, and storying and restorying. Burrowing involvesconcentrating on the fine-grained details of the event, whereas broad-ening refers to a broader look at events, character, values, way of life, orsocial and intellectual climate that blurs detail in favor of a general pat-tern. Storying and restorying occurs when the person returns to presentand future considerations and asks what the meaning of the event is andhow he or she might create a new story of self that changes the meaningof the event, its description, and its significance for the larger life storythe person may be trying to live (Connelly & Clandinin, 1990). Usingthis analytic tool set, I looked at each school story independently andcollectively to form thematic clusters. I started with separate discretethemes that were then inductively grouped into larger thematic units,ultimately reducing the data into five different thematic constellations(i.e., ‘‘school is a safe place/school is not a safe place’’).
Finally, the third layer of analysis introduced Sergiovanni’s (2000)systemsworld and lifeworld dimensions to interpret the data set accord-ing to systemsworld/lifeworld dimensions. At this point I considered:‘‘What technical and managerial systems are the preservice teachersdescribing, and what norms, values, and meanings are they identifyingwithin the school stories?’’ And, ‘‘What is the nature of the relationshipbetween the two dimensions?’’ As Olson (2000) reminded: ‘‘It is theenquiry into the stories that creates the educative experience as indi-viduals find new and more expansive ways to interpret their own andothers’ experiences’’ (p. 350).
The following example from one school story is provided to illus-trate the three tiers of the analysis and illuminate the data trail. Nancy,an early childhood major, wrote a school story describing an experiencein second grade in which she lied to the teacher about completing herhomework. She insisted that she left the completed assignment at homeand promised to bring it the next day. The teacher then dumped outNancy’s backpack, found the homework, and berated the youngster infront of her classmates. Layer one, topical analysis, found that ‘‘Theearly childhood major describes a time when she was in second gradeand lied about completing her homework.’’ This was coded as a storyof wounding. Layer two, thematic analysis, found that this story was
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contoured by the themes of ‘‘School is not a safe place,’’ ‘‘School isa world of adults,’’ ‘‘School wounds never heal,’’ ‘‘Who I am/Who Iam not,’’ and ‘‘When I teach I will.’’ Layer three, theoretical analysis,identified systemsworld rules of assessment, communication, and disci-pline and the lifeworld values of care, dignity, relationship, and respect.The episode also exemplified the pattern of systemsworld/lifeworldfeedback. The preservice student attributed the teacher’s method ofcommunication as responsible for diminishment of lifeworld values andis able to translate that to her future classroom interactions.
I believe that teachers who frighten their children and bellow instruc-tions to them are doing so because they are playing the power strugglegame. They are afraid to lose the power held in the classroom and willgo through outlandish and meaningless measures to get the messageacross to the children. Once I learned that this is a possible reason forhumiliating students, I am more aware of it in my own classroom, whichwill help me use positive language and criticism with my students.
The data analysis process began as I jumped into these texts and livedwithin them, acquainting myself with the nuanced features of theirtopography, and familiarizing myself with the main characters, theirvoices, and their actions. When I thought I knew the contours of theterrain well, I jumped out of the story to think deeply about what I hadexperienced in the sojourning. I acknowledge the situated nature of mystance in the development, analysis, and interpretation of these schoolstories. ‘‘I am twisted into this narrative and do not stand as an outside‘objective’ voice’’ (Phillips, 2001, p. 267). This research represents myjourney within and across these lived experiences as a visitor to thesespecial places, who collects and represents the school stories of thesefuture teachers, and theorizes about the message of these passages forteacher educators and teacher education. ‘‘My hope is that, in the re-telling, issues and questions might be raised to further the conversationof teacher education as a conflicted space of knowing and learning’’(Phillips, 2001, p. 267).
Data Source
Twenty-three school stories composed by preservice students in an un-dergraduate New York State certified preservice teacher education pro-gram during 2006–2008 comprise the data source for this research.The preservice students were all Jewish females ranging in age from18–22, who attended public schools or private day schools throughoutthe United States (California, Florida, Illinois, Massachusetts, Maryland,
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New York, New Jersey, West Virginia) and other countries includingVenezuela and Morocco. Since the course was listed as an educationelective and a late entry elementary education requirement, the popu-lation varied by year (see Table 1), including those at the beginning ofthe teacher education sequence and those at the end. There was a mixof both early childhood (n D 8) and elementary (n D 12) majors, witha few education minors (n D 3) the third year, when the departmentinitiated an education minor.
The school stories were drawn from the students’ experiences inschool settings spanning early childhood through the student teachingpracticum, and were written across the course of a semester using awriting process approach (Calkins, 1986). Each student was encouragedto find a meaningful story nugget from their educational experiencesfrom early childhood through the present; one that they wanted torevisit and mine for deeper reflection and analysis. The student wasrequired to write and rewrite, completing three drafts and a final copy.Sometimes a student began with one story and became disinterestedafter one or two drafts, finding another episode to work with. Sometimesa student wrote about a few related events, such as one phenomenalteacher and one dreadful educator, and sometimes a student dove deepinto a singular experience such as being held back in kindergarten.
The students took turns reading their stories out loud in classand listening to feedback from their classmates. As the drafting processbecame more formalized (from the first year of this project throughthe third), I developed a series of guidelines and questions to propel
TABLE 1 Story Context of Student Cohorts
Student cohort
2006 2007 2008
Story context EC E EC E EC E EdM Total
Early childhood 1 1 2Elementary 3 1 1a 2 1a 8Middle school 1 1 1 3High school 1 1 4 1 2a 9Year abroad 1 1College 1 1a 2
Note. EC D Early childhood track; E D Elementary track; EdM D Education minortrack.
aRefers to stories that span two contexts.
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the story development (see Appendix). My role in this process was toencourage the students to develop their story nuggets with greater detailand reflection by looking ‘‘inward, outward, backward, forward, and sit-uated within place’’ (Clandinin & Connelly, 2000, p. 49). I commentedon the narratives both orally in class and in writing on the drafts,sometimes noting simple editing errors or awkward phrases, other timesasking questions like, ‘‘Did you ever tell your parents that the teacherdid that?’’ or ‘‘What else do you think that the teacher could have donein that circumstance?’’
In terms of ethical considerations, I acknowledged my position inthe construction of the school stories, as I worked with each student tofind and develop a story nugget for this assignment. Clandinin & Mur-phy (2009) limn the nature of the narrative researcher’s role: ‘‘We, asnarrative researchers, are part of the phenomena we study. As narrativeresearchers, we study a world that we have helped create’’ (p. 601).Moreover, at the end of the semester I collected the final copy of theschool story with informed consent documentation that asked the stu-dents for permission to include their stories in a research project. Stu-dents were instructed that the consent form would not be viewed untilafter grades had been submitted, so that students were assured that theirconsent to participate would not bear on their academic performancein the course. Twenty-three of the 25 students granted permission.
Results
The 23 school stories ranged in length from 4 pages to 13 pages; cre-ative flourishes included illustrations, photographs, fictitious newspaperclippings, poetry, and even an old high school assignment. The narra-tives varied across different schooling situations from early childhoodthrough the student teaching practicum (see Table 1), with almost halfof the stories occurring during the high school years and about onethird occurring during the elementary school years. There was littlerelationship between the education track of the preservice teacher andthe school context of the story. Elementary track students wrote aboutearly childhood experiences and early childhood students wrote aboutjunior high experiences.
Topical Coding
Layer one analysis, topical coding, found that the topics of the storiesranged widely from attending a new school, the death of a friend, anddealing with abusive teachers to the immigrant experience, high school
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TABLE 2 Layer One Analysis: Story Topic by Student Cohort
Student cohort
Story topic 2006 2007 2008 Total
Personal or interpersonal growth 4 3 5 12Wounding 6a 1 3 10Special teacher 1a 1 0 2
Note. aOne story was coded twice.
pranks, and coping with learning disabilities. The 23 specific storieswere aggregated into three topical domains: personal or interpersonalgrowth, wounding, and special teacher (see Table 2). The majority ofthe stories (n D 22) revolved around moments of personal or interper-sonal growth or wounding.
Thematic Coding
Layer two analysis, thematic coding, yielded five thematic constellations(see Table 3) that were further divided into respective polarities; in somecases both ends of the constellation were represented. The thematicconstellations lend contour to the narratives and offer a representationof the complexity of the data. In following section, I provide descrip-tive examples from the school stories to concretize the thematic coding.
School is a Safe Place/School is not a Safe PlaceSome students (n D 4) reported a sense of community and security
throughout their school organizations where teachers remained a partof their lives even after graduation. As Na’ama wrote about her schoolclassroom, ‘‘It was a place of refuge for me.’’ Many students (n D 12)described being bullied by teachers who publically humiliated them forminor infractions, such as lying about homework or performing poorlyon tests. Dina remembered, ‘‘I had started school with the hopes that itwould turn out to be a great learning experience, but quickly learnedthat that would not be the case. Every day brought a new or renewedfrustration.’’ One student even had the sense that ‘‘the school knewwhat went on and did nothing.’’
School is a World of Children/School is a World of Adults‘‘It was what happened between the lessons that I remember so
clearly.’’ Children’s friendships and cliques shaped school experiences
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TABLE 3 Layer Two Analysis: Thematic Constellations
Thematic constellationNumberof stories
School is a safe place/School is not a safe place 22School is a safe place 4School is not a safe place 12Both 6Neither 1
School is a world of children/School is a world of adults 20School is a world of children 7School is a world of adults 9Both 4Neither 3
Some wounds heal/Some wounds never heal 14Some wounds heal 2Some wounds never heal 11Both 1Neither 9
Who I am/Who I am not 16Who I am 10Who I am not 1Both 5Neither 7
When I teach I will/When I teach I will not 11When I teach I will 5When I teach I will not 6Both 0Neither 12
with emotional ups and downs to which even caring adults were not privy.In some cases the preservice students remembered this with fond nostal-gia (‘‘My class was like a family’’), while in other cases these memorieswere overlaid with sorrow (‘‘I didn’t really have that many friends’’; ‘‘Iwas heavy and the other girls were thin, they teased me.’’). In severalschool stories special teachers were the key figures who transformed thechild’s experience of school, merged both worlds (n D 4), and left alasting memory. Margot penned, ‘‘There was nothing more powerfulthan seeing Mrs. K act in a way which reflected the things she taught.’’
School Wounds Heal/School Wounds Never HealA few students (n D 2) justified teacher insensitivities and over-
came the traumatic experiences of schooling. Dina made sense of her
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experience: ‘‘He had probably been putting me down through the yearto motivate me to do better.’’ And Melanie recalled the public sortinginto extended time assessment groups: ‘‘As horrible and humiliatingas the experience was, it gave me the comfort of realizing I wasn’t theonly one who had ADD.’’ However, many students (n D 11) have neverforgotten the pain. ‘‘She pulled the chair from under me as I was aboutto sit down : : : she had broken my coccyx, which to this day still bothersme.’’ One student still regretted repeating pre-kindergarten, ‘‘Now thatI am 22 years old, repeating Pre-K sometimes bothers me because I amthe oldest out of all my friends.’’
Who I Am/Who I Am NotIssues surrounding identity figured prominently in many of the sto-
ries (n D 16). Some preservice students described feeling isolated fromtheir classmates. ‘‘I had come from the top of my class in Venezuela tobeing part of the ESOL and Special Ed program. How is not speakingEnglish and having mental disabilities similar?’’ Anxiety surroundingdifference in terms of individual appearance, achievement, or interestwas common. ‘‘Although I tried not to draw attention to myself, I stoodout in lots of ways.’’ After being assigned to a classroom for studentswith learning disabilities, a student remembered feeling, ‘‘What is thisplace? Why am I here? This is not the place for me. I always thoughtI was normal.’’ The school stories were also an opportunity for thepreservice students to trace their own destiny from student to teacher.For example, one student wanted to be a teacher because she couldpersonally identify with those children ‘‘who are struggling to keep upwith the majority.’’
When I Teach I Will/When I Teach I Will NeverStudents (n D 11) desired to emulate favored teachers: ‘‘When I
become a teacher and have students of my own I hope that I am ableto affect them as profoundly as he affected me,’’ and railed againstpractices of the despised, ‘‘I hope to never inflict the damage that wasdone to my self-confidence on my future students.’’ One student wasespecially cognizant of the need for teachers to avoid embarrassing astudent at all costs: ‘‘Embarrassing a child in school not only ruins arelationship between the teacher and child, but it leaves a lasting markon the child.’’
Theoretical Coding
The third and final layer of analysis, theoretical coding, considered therepresentation of systemsworld/lifeworld expression and the relation-
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TABLE 4 Layer Three Analysis: Systemsworld/Lifeworld Codes
Codes DefinitionNumber of
stories
Systemsworld
Assessment Practices related to assessment 7Communication Oral or written forms of communication 5
Class assignment Assigning a student to a class 12Curriculum design Related to formal or informal learning
experiences, resources, or pedagogy
10
Discipline Formal consequences for student actions 7
Physical environment Maintenance of school facility 4Initiation Acclimating a student to a new school 2
Supervision Supervision of students 5Support for learning Accommodating student learning needs 5
Teacher tenure System of teacher tenure 1
Lifeworld
Care Shows care or lack of care for people,objects, organizations or events
23
Contribution Extending or denying opportunity to make adifference
4
Dignity Shows dignity or lack of dignity for person 16Education Values or devalues education 10
Honesty Displays or lacks honesty 3Integrity Is ethical or unethical 4
Openness Presents or does not present openness topeople or ideas
3
Relationship Values or devalues relationships betweenpeople, objects, organizations, or events
22
Respect Shows or does not show respect for people,objects, organizations or events
15
Trust Builds up or diminishes trust betweenpeople
10
Understanding Demonstrates a desire to understand ordismiss deeper comprehension of people,
objects, organizations or events
6
ship between the two dimensions. Table 4 presents 10 systemsworldcodes and 11 lifeworld codes found across the 23 school stories. Themost common systemsworld codes were class assignment (n D 12),curriculum design (n D 10), assessment (n D 7), and discipline (n D
7). The most common lifeworld codes were care (n D 23), relation-ship (n D 22), and dignity (n D 16). Table 5 presents three pat-terns of systemsworld/lifeworld relationships across the set of 23 sto-ries: systemsworld drives lifeworld, lifeworld drives systemsworld, andsystemsworld/lifeworld feedback.
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TABLE 5 Layer Three Analysis: Pattern ofSystemsworld/Lifeworld Relationships
PatternNumber of
stories
Systemsworld drives lifeworld 11Lifeworld drives systemsworld 9Systemsworld/lifeworld feedback 10
Systemsworld Drives LifeworldEleven stories described incidents where systemsworld mechanisms
were responsible for the diminishment of lifeworld values. For example,a student who ate an apple in a room where no food was alloweddescribed the system of discipline inflicted by the principal and the en-suing diminishment of dignity, relationship, trust, and understanding.
She gave me the most severe detention possible: a Sunday detentionduring finals time. I was to find my own 45 minute ride to school, andwould have to help the custodian until the school was completely clean,taking away precious studying time. Mrs. Z. thought it necessary to giveme the harshest detention given in order to ‘‘teach me a lesson’’; she didnot even pause in order to hear my side of the story. She assumed I wasat complete fault and deserving of such punishment.
In another example, a student remembered how one teacher as-sessed student learning and simultaneously undermined care, dignity,relationship, and respect.
When a student was unable to answer a question or did not do thehomework the teacher would yell at and embarrass him or her in frontof the whole class. Not every student experienced this misery. Thosestudents who always got the answers correct were promptly rewarded withjaw breakers. The only problem with this was instead of passing the jawbreakers to the student he threw them. Several times he hit students inthe head because they were unable to catch the sweet reward.
A third example of this pattern was found in Serina’s school storyabout a traumatic recess game. In this episode the lack of appropriatesupervision reduced the lifeworld values of care, trust, and education.
The game was a violent version of ‘‘Tag.’’ The rules of the game weresimple, the boys chased the girls and when they caught the girls they put
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them in jail. On first glance the game appears harmless and originally itmay have been just a way for the boys to show off, but it evolved to includeviolence. The jail, a part of the playground that formed a ‘‘U’’ shape, pre-vented the captives from escaping. For some reason, for these boys, cap-turing and terrifying the girls was not enough; brute force was used to en-sure that no girl escaped until it was time to return inside the classroom.
The game was not one any girl wanted to play, but the boys did not takethis into consideration. If a girl was outside, and the only way you couldstay indoors was if you were sick, then the girl was in the game. If a girlrefused to run away and just stood still the boys would grab her arms andpull her into the jail. Every girl learned it was better to run and try tohide. The teachers and assistants were nowhere in sight, and even if thegirls told them later we all knew nothing would be done. The teachersnever stopped the game. They would sit inside the office, only checkingon the playground randomly.
It shocks me that this game was never stopped, maybe it was, but notsoon enough. I had come to believe that I remembered the game asmore brutal than it actually was. It was not until a friend asked me if Iremember the trauma of kindergarten : : : I was surprised to discover thatthe game was part of the reason she switched schools a year later, she wasstill terrified of the boys in the grade.
Lifeworld Drives SystemsworldEight stories presented the pattern where lifeworld values shaped
systemsworld practices. In her story Kaylie recognized the school ad-ministration cared deeply enough about her educational developmentto intervene between her and her best friend (class assignment). Sherecalled a conversation with the school psychologist:
You and Erica are too close. We are going to try and separate you twointo different classes for the rest of the year and see how it works out : : :
trying to hold back tears, I told her I didn’t understand why we had tobe separated and I promised to her that we would never talk in class ordisturb the class again.
When Kaylie looked back on the school’s decision to separate her fromher friend, she realized that while she was initially devastated, that thedecision was in retrospect crucial to her own social growth.
I realized that there are so many nice and friendly girls that I can befriends with, and just because I am best friends with Erica that doesnot mean that I cannot have other girl friends. This lasted for the restof second grade and for the subsequent years in elementary and highschool as well.
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Several students remembered how schools that valued makinga contribution to society instituted community service obligations orvolunteer activities (curriculum design). In her school story, Amyexplained:
I did not understand or appreciate what volunteering did for the personyou were working with; or for how it made you feel about yourself.
Through the volunteer program I learned so much. Two years later I stilllook back on those experiences and I’m very thankful that I got a chanceto participate in people’s lives like that. I made a difference and nothingcan replace that feeling. I have a different outlook on volunteering now.I would recommend it to anyone.
Helen’s experience overcoming stage fright provided another ex-ample of the lifeworld driving systemsworld pattern. In this narrative,the teacher cared for Helen’s educational development enough to takea hard line on the course requirements:
I went up to the teacher and spoke to her and told her that I did notthink I would be able to take this class and when she asked why I told herbecause I was unable to speak on stage to a crowd. She told me that I didnot really have a choice : : : it made me angry that she did not considermy feelings and that it was just matter of fact this is what I have to do: : : :
I did improve my public speaking skills, and am able to speak in classwithout the fear of sounding uneducated or shy.
Systemsworld/Lifeworld FeedbackThere were nine stories that presented a pattern of feedback be-
tween systemsworld practices and lifeworld values. The feedback patternwas characterized by linkage between systemsworld mechanisms andlifeworld meaning and the author’s translation of their lived experienceinto a refinement of systemsworld practices. Common to this pattern,preservice teachers learned from an episode and applied the insightback into their imagined future classroom practices. ‘‘This is the storyof how one event in my fourth grade career has changed my personalgrowth and development and my entire outlook on teaching.’’ Onepreservice teacher wounded by the pedagogy of her own teacher vowed,‘‘I hope never to inflict the damage that was done to my self-confidenceand self-esteem on my future students.’’ Other preservice teachers de-scribed more specific approaches to particular systemsworld processesof communication, class assignment, or discipline: ‘‘If I was the teacher Ithink I would have spoken to the child privately and reminded him/herabout the rule against eating candy in school.’’ ‘‘I don’t think children
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should repeat pre-K if they cannot sit still or they do not share.’’ Andanother preservice teacher commented:
To me, the way in which to do this is to remain calm, hear the differentsides, make no assumptions, avoid embarrassment and only then if neces-sary, should the consequences be laid out and met. To give harsh punish-ments to students who are completely undeserving characterizes in waysthat should not be. Every student deserves a say and respect. We are eachdifferent and deserve to be treated as individuals with care and compas-sion and not only with discipline. It is a difficult balance to meet, however,to ensure a student’s success this is the way in which it must be done.
The three layers of coding—topical, thematic, and theoretical—presenta complex tapestry of the tensions, assumptions, and insight interwovenwithin and across the 23 school stories. In the next section, I discussthe contribution and implications of this research for preservice teachereducation.
Discussion
The analysis of 23 preservice teacher narratives provided a lens intothe personal, practical knowledge of preservice teachers, and exploredhow they make sense of their own schooling experiences as they ap-proach their future careers and educational practices. This researchfound that school stories may be a generative vehicle for teacher educa-tors to encourage connections between preservice teachers’ experiencesof schooling with assumptions about teaching and learning, but alsosuggested that teacher educators be mindful of residual conflict thatcharacterized many experiences with school personnel, systems, rules,and procedures.
School Stories Yield Generative Potential
It is our experience of an institution that determines our attitude towardit, affects what we do with it, the degree to which we integrate it intoour lives, into our sense of who we are. We need to pay attention to theexperience of going to school. (Rose, 2009, p. 32)
The collective set of school stories drew attention to the moments ofschooling that seem to have made a difference in the lives of thesefuture educators. The authors of these narratives recollected momentsof schooling that transformed their lives, ruined their days, or markedtheir relationships with subject matter. As Karen reflected:
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I will admit that I did not take the religious studies in my high schoolvery seriously. They were not presented in a way that made it possible forme to have taken them seriously. The teachers were inexperienced anddid not seem interested in teaching a bunch of girls in a school buildingthat resembled a one-story farmhouse. Teachers are most of the reasonthat a child enjoys learning. If the teacher does not seem interested inthe subject matter or the student, the student will not be interested tolearn from that teacher.
This research suggested that the documentation of the memories intothe school story genre was a viable resource for preservice students to re-visit the personal, practical knowledge from their schooling experiencesfrom an incipient, pre-professional vantage point. This perspective of-fered future teachers the opportunity to generate connections betweentechnical processes and systems and significant sources of value andmeaning, as they made sense of the choices and outcomes that shapedtheir personal schooling histories. In this study many students were ableto refine their understanding of systems of schooling by using theirown experiences to imagine future classroom practices and policies. AsPenelope commented,
In my future as a teacher, if my class has to face death I will do the samething as my teacher, Mrs. Stein did. I will explain that we must do allwe can do to help the student out. I will also take any questions thatmy students have about death and try to answer them to the best of myability. I think it’s important for a teacher not to only teach what’s onthe curriculum but sometimes she must teach about life.
This research advocated for the construction of deliberative assignmentsthat merge past schooling experiences with future pedagogic practicesand asserted that the school story genre may offer promising directionsfor preservice teacher preparation. However, many school stories in-cluded experiences where the systems of schooling implemented viapoor teaching, incompetent administrators, or careless directives miti-gated the student’s sense of dignity, trust, respect, and relationship withschools and educators. In the next section, I consider how this aspectof the personal professional knowledge of preservice teachers may offera more curious challenge to preservice teacher educators.
School Stories House Residual Conflict
This research found that many of the school stories expressed conflictedrelationships with school systems, processes, and personnel. The narra-tives, redacted by the authors’ memories of the events, emotions, and
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interpretations, exposed how injustices linger in the personal, practicalknowledge of the future teachers. The future educators harbored strongemotions about being held back in kindergarten, labeled as specialneeds student, or humiliated in front of their peers. This research raiseda concern about the preservice teachers’ reduction of confidence in thesystems of schooling to protect, care, and support student learning. Howwill the mindscape of these negative experiences affect relationshipswith educational administrators and organizations?
With respect to preservice teachers on the cusp of the often chal-lenging first few years in the classroom, this aspect of personal practicalknowledge may be especially salient. The autobiographical storehouseof schooling experiences in which preservice teachers feel helpless, de-moralized, and immobilized (‘‘Dread was a feeling I mastered,’’ writesKaren) may not be the ideal source of personal practical knowledgeupon which to filter and inform teaching and learning practice. How-ever, Olson (2000) reminded us, ‘‘preservice teachers are uniquely po-sitioned on the professional knowledge landscape’’ (p. 172). Perhaps, itis precisely at this juncture that additional professional knowledge aboutthe broader context of school structures, personnel, and processes maybe beneficial to balance out some of the scar tissue.
Conclusion
Narrative and biography can be used to understand how early experiencespaint the portraits of ‘‘teacher’’ that students bring with them to teachereducation. (Pajares, 1992, p. 328)
This analysis of narrative research animated firsthand accounts of thepersonal practical knowledge of preservice teachers. It provided insightsinto the visceral moments in the pathways of beginning teachers and ex-plored the contribution of autobiographical reckoning. Clandinin andConnelly (1988), Olson and Craig (2001), and Craig (2006) assertedthat preservice teachers scaffold their professional knowledge landscapethrough their personal practical knowledge. This research suggestedthere may be limitations to this way of knowing and that teacher educa-tors consider expanding preservice education programs in two distinctways. First, encourage preservice students to cycle from reflection andinterpretation back into redesign of school systems, structures, rules,practices, and policies. Emotional energy can be translated directly intoapplied or imagined practices. Questions such as, ‘‘What else could havebeen done?’’ or ‘‘Who else could you or your parents have turned tofor help?’’ may facilitate the expansion of the professional knowledge
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landscape. Second, include complementary knowledge of the largerschool organizational reticulum, and how to successfully navigate thelandscape of schooling as an educational professional. Case studies, roleplay, policy analysis, site visits, and observations of school personnelin addition to teachers are recommended to expand the preservicestudents’ sense of possibilities and alternatives within school structuresthat support teaching and learning.
‘‘To be deliberate in our approach is to open a space wherestudents can wander, experiment, and story themselves as teachers dur-ing the transition into the profession’’ (Phillips, 2001, p. 276). Theauthor acknowledges that this research may be limited by the personalcharacteristics of the preservice student population and that of her ownpersonal practical knowledge. ‘‘Where we’re coming from as well aswhat we’re up to affects the way we see things’’ (Meier, 2002, p. 40).Additional research on preservice teacher school stories from a morediverse and wider variety of preservice programs is indicated.
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Appendix: Thoughts for Draft 2
Listed below are some general suggestions that may apply to your firstdraft. Please note that these are suggestions and may not apply to allstory ‘‘nuggets’’ at this point in time. As you work on Draft 2 pleasetake note of the following with regards to form and content:
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FormPlease type and double space.Include page numbersCreate a meaningful titleUse pseudonyms for people, places, schools, etc.Pay attention to spelling & grammar (READ OUT LOUD to yourself or
another person to see if it makes sense and to catch errors!)
ContentDescribe the relevant context. What is the important background infor-
mation for the reader to know?Get specific & particular. What did it look like? Sound like? Feel like?Is there ‘‘speech’’ that may advance, nuance, or situate the school story?Can you contrast this episode with another episode?Is this theme repeated in another school experience of yours?Consider multiple perspectives. What did your teacher, parents, or friends
think of this episode?
What message should the reader take away?Think BIG. What is the central issue or theme that you think is im-
portant for student teachers or others who care about schools toremember?
What is the underlying core issue of your story? Is it about lying orcliques or the power of a teacher’s words? What matters to you inthis story? What do you think the reader can learn from this schoolstory? How does this story inform our understanding of teaching andlearning, schools, students, teachers, education, etc?
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