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TEACHER CANDIDATES CONSTRUCT UNDERSTANDINGS
ABOUT DIVERSITY: FOUR CASE STUDIES OF DEVELOPING
MULTICULTURAL THINKING AND ACTIONS

presented by

Anita Kaye Lapp

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mmi

 

 

TEACHER CANDIDATES CONSTRUCT UNDERSTANDINGS
ABOUT DIVERSITY: FOUR CASE STUDIES OF DEVELOPING
MULTICULTURAL THINKING AND ACTIONS
By

Anita Kaye Lapp

A DISSERTATION
Submitted to
Michigan State University
in partial fulfillment of the requirements
for the degree of

DOCTOR OF PHILOSOPHY

Department of Teacher Education

1997

ABSTRACT

TEACHER CANDIDATES CONSTRUCT UNDERSTANDINGS
ABOUT DIVERSITY: FOUR CASE STUDIES OF DEVELOPING
MULTICULTURAL THINKING AND ACTIONS

By

Anita Kaye Lapp

As the population in the United States becomes more culturally diverse, teacher
candidates must be prepared for working in classroom settings where there are
significant differences between themselves and their students. This study explores the
student teaching experiences of four teacher candidates as they construct understandings
about diversity in the context of a culturally diverse classroom.

Two major questions guided the study: (1) What differences did teacher
candidates confront between themselves and their students as they engaged in the
personal process of constructing meaning about diversity; and (2) What development
took place regarding the multicultural attitudes and behaviors of teacher candidates as
they confronted differences between themselves and their students?

This study was completed through multiple data sources including interviews,
journal entries and classroom observations. A constant comparative analysis approach
was used to describe, analyze and compare the data across the four case studies. Six
broad forms of diversity were used to organize the data: (1) ethnic and racial; (2)
language; (3) socioeconomic; (4) exceptionalties; (5) gender; and (6) family patterns.
An existing model developed by Nieto (1992) was adapted to categorize the
development of multicultural attitudes and behaviors.

Conclusions drawn from the findings suggest that (1) understanding how
prospective teachers perceive and deal with differences between themselves and their

students is complex; (2) teacher candidates may seem homogeneous but they do differ

in how they view the world and how they respond to diversity; (3) it is valuable to place
teacher candidates in culturally diverse classroom settings but some student teachers are
not ready to be placed in a setting where there is too wide of a gap in the differences
between themselves and their students; (4) prospective teachers identify and confront
diversity but do not reflect on these issues in the context of equity, power and justice;
and (5) becoming a multicultural teacher is more than prescribing certain knowledge,

Skills and dispositions.

ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

I am very appreciative of the support I have received from family, friends and

colleagues throughout my graduate studies. To the following persons I extend a special

thank you:

To the four teacher candidates who participated in this study: Thank you for being

so willing to let me document your stories during student teaching.

To my guidance committee: Thank you for your willingness to support me across
the miles from Goshen, Indiana to East Lansing, Michigan. Laura Roehler, chair of
my committee was extremely helpful throughout the dissertation process. Her
wisdom and graciousness have been invaluable to me. Without her, this work
would never have been completed. Douglas Campbell has been key to my
understanding of qualitative research. He also spent considerable time reading
dissertation drafts and giving me the kind of feedback I needed to proceed with my
work. I also appreciated the time that Linda Anderson gave to me at the beginning
of the dissertation process as she helped me think through the proposal for the study.
I am also grateful to Margaret Gallego who gave me the opportunity to begin

research in the area of preparing teacher candidates for multicultural settings.

iv

To my colleagues at Goshen College who have supported me throughout my
graduate program-~Marilyn Bayak, John Smith, Kathy Meyer Reimer, Susan
Weybright, Kathryn Aschliman, Barbara Stahly and Marg Mast: Thank you for
always being there to share in my progress as well as in my fi'ustrations. I offer a
special thanks to Judith Davis, who read and edited my work at a time when I

needed it the most.

To my family: Thank you for being supportive of me from the very beginning of my
graduate studies. My parents, Edwin and Marcella Stalter, provided me with the
confidence to complete the program. They also provided the physical space for me
to work at the critical times of data analysis. I am so appreciative of their thoughts
and prayers along the way. My husband, Jerry, and my children, Rachel and Jay,
have my deepest thanks. They encouraged me to continue despite the time and

energy it took away from family life. I’ll always be grateful for their support.

TABLE OF CONTENTS

LIST OF FIGURES ....................................................................................................... x
CHAPTER 1

INTRODUCTION AND PURPOSE ............................................................................. 1

Background and Need for the Study .................................................................. 2

Diversity in Classrooms ........................................................................ 2

Teachers and Diversity .......................................................................... 3

Preparing Teacher Candidates for Diversity in Classrooms .................. 5

Developing a Multicultural Perspective ................................................ 6

Statement of the Problem .................................................................................. 8

Purpose of the Study/Research Questions ......................................................... 8

Definition of Terms ........................................................................................... 9

Culture ................................................................................................. 10

Multicultural Education ....................................................................... 10

Scope and Limitations of the Study ................................................................. 11

Preparation for the Study ................................................................................. 12

Pilot Study Description ........................................................................ 12

Pilot Study Data Collection ................................................................. 14

Pilot Study Findings ............................................................................ l4

Significance of the Dissertation Study ............................................................ 17

Overview of the Dissertation ........................................................................... 18
CHAPTER 2

REVIEW OF RELATED LITERATURE ................................................................... 19

Range of Diversity Within Classrooms ........................................................... l9

Racial and Ethnic Diversity ................................................................. 20

Linguistic Diversity ............................................................................. 23

Socioeconomic Diversity ..................................................................... 25

Exceptionalities ................................................................................... 27

Gender Diversity .................................................................................. 28

Diversity in Family Patterns ................................................................ 29

The Process of Becoming a Multicultural Teacher ......................................... 31

Research on Preparing Teachers for Diversity ................................................ 38

Determining Attitudes, Beliefs and Perceptions About Diversity ....... 39

Increasing the Cultural Knowledge Base ............................................ 43

vi

Direct Interactions with Culturally Diverse Student Populations ....... 45

Summary .......................................................................................................... 48
CHAPTER 3
DESIGN AND METHODOLOGY ............................................................................. 50
Design of the Study ......................................................................................... 50
Setting and Population of the Study ................................................................ 52
Hathaway Elementary School ............................................................. 53
Chambers Elementary School ............................................................. 53
The Participants and Their Classrooms ........................................................... 54
Tamara ................................................................................................. 55
Jeremy .................................................................................................. 55
Nancy ................................................................................................... 56
Leah ..................................................................................................... 56
Data Collection ................................................................................................ 57
Initial Interview With Each Student Teacher ...................................... 57
Journal Entries From Each Student Teacher ....................................... 58
Researcher Classroom Observations/Fieldnotes ................................. 58
Interview With Each Student Teacher
After Researcher Observations ......................................................... 58
Final Interview With Each Student Teacher ........................................ 59
Data Analysis ................................................................................................... 59
Summary .......................................................................................................... 61
CHAPTER 4
FOUR CASE STUDIES .............................................................................................. 65
TAMARA
Background Information .................................................................................. 66
Differences Identified ...................................................................................... 70
Racial and Ethnic ................................................................................. 72
Language ............................................................................................. 81
Socioeconomic .................................................................................... 82
Exceptionalities ................................................................................... 83
Gender ................................................................................................. 85
Family Patterns .................................................................................... 86
Development of Multicultural Attitudes and Behaviors .................................. 89
Racial and Ethnic ................................................................................. 90
Language ............................................................................................. 92
Socioeconomic .................................................................................... 92
Exceptionalities ................................................................................... 93
Gender ................................................................................................. 93
Family Patterns .................................................................................... 94
Summary .......................................................................................................... 95

vii

JEREMY

Background Information .................................................................................. 98

Differences Identified .................................................................................... 101
Racial and Ethnic ............................................................................... 102
Language ........................................................................................... 1 1 1
Socioeconomic .................................................................................. 1 1 1
Exceptionalities ................................................................................. l 12
Gender ............................................................................................... 1 14
Family Patterns .................................................................................. 114

Development of Multicultural Attitudes and Behaviors ................................ 117
Racial and Ethnic ............................................................................... 117
Language ........................................................................................... 120
Socioeconomic .................................................................................. 121
Exceptionalities ................................................................................. 121
Gender ............................................................................................... 122
Family Patterns .................................................................................. 122

Summary ........................................................................................................ 123

NANCY

Background Information ................................................................................ 126

Differences Identified .................................................................................... 130
Racial and Ethnic ............................................................................... 131
Language ........................................................................................... 139
Socioeconomic .................................................................................. 139
Exceptionalities ................................................................................. 140
Gender ............................................................................................... 145
Family Patterns .................................................................................. 145

Development of Multicultural Attitudes and Behaviors ................................ 146
Racial and Ethnic ............................................................................... 147
Language ........................................................................................... 148
Socioeconomic .................................................................................. 148
Exceptionalities ................................................................................. 149
Gender ............................................................................................... 150
Family Patterns .................................................................................. 150

Summary ........................................................................................................ 151 ‘

LEAH

Background Information ................................................................................ 154
Differences Identified ........................................................................ 157
Racial and Ethnic ............................................................................... 158
Language ........................................................................................... 162
Socioeconomic .................................................................................. 163
Exceptionalities ................................................................................. 165
Gender ............................................................................................... 168

viii

Family Patterns .................................................................................. 169

Development of Multicultural Attitudes and Behaviors ................................ 176

Racial and Ethnic ............................................................................... 176

Language ........................................................................................... 178

Socioeconomic .................................................................................. 178

Exceptionalities ................................................................................. 179

Gender ............................................................................................... 180

Family Patterns .................................................................................. 181

Summary ........................................................................................................ 182

CHAPTER 5

SUMMARY OF THE FINDINGS, CONCLUSIONS AND IMPLICATIONS ....... 185

Summary of the Findings - Research Question #1 ........................................ 188

Individual Case Studies ..................................................................... 188

Tamara ................................................................................... I 88

Jeremy .................................................................................... 190

Nancy ..................................................................................... 192

Leah ....................................................................................... 193

Across Case Studies .......................................................................... 194

Summary of the Findings - Research Question #2 ........................................ 200

Individual Case Studies ..................................................................... 200

Tamara ................................................................................... 200

Jeremy .................................................................................... 203

Nancy ..................................................................................... 205

Leah ....................................................................................... 207

Across Case Studies .......................................................................... 210

Conclusions ................................................................................................... 215

Implications for Teacher Educators ............................................................... 218

Suggestions for Further Research .................................................................. 222
APPENDICES

A Elementary Curriculum Studies Course Syllabus ................................... 226

B Interview, Journal and Observation Guides ............................................. 230

LIST OF REFERENCES .......................................................................................... 237

LIST OF FIGURES

Distinguishing charcteristics of differences in Six areas of diversity ........... 63
Level of multicultural attitudes and behaviors ............................................. 64
Tamara: Levels of multicultural attitudes and behaviors ............................. 97
Jeremy: Levels of multicultural attitudes and behaviors ............................ 125
Nancy: Levels of multicultural attitudes and behaviors ............................. 153
Leah: Levels of multicultural attitudes and behaviors ................................ 184
Summary of differences confronted ............................................................ 199
Summary of levels of multicultural attitudes and behaviors ....................... 212

CHAPTER 1

INTRODUCTION AND PURPOSE

Teachers currently joining the work force face the challenge of teaching
students who are more culturally diverse than in any other time in our country’s
history. While this population of students can be described as heterogeneous, the
teaching force remains fairly homogeneous--mainly Euro-American, middle-class,
monolingual and mostly female (Zeichner, 1992). As a result of dissimilar cultural
backgrounds, differences often exist between how and what students and teachers have
come to know about themselves and the world (Cochran-Smith & Lytle, 1992).
Teacher education programs must meet the challenge of preparing prospective teachers
for culturally diverse classrooms so that all students can experience educational
success. However, knowledge of how to prepare teacher candidates for these settings
is scant and the factors affecting that preparation are complex.

This dissertation study is rooted in the assumption that learning to value
diversity is a personally constructed process which is shaped by each teacher’s history
and experiences. The study documents the lived realities and personal journeys of
four teacher candidates from a midwestem small liberal arts college as they student
taught in culturally diverse classroom settings. It is an inquiry into the ways in which

these prospective teachers became aware of differences, what they thought about these

2

differences and how these reflections and thoughts translated into action in the
classroom.

This chapter discusses the background and need for the study, introduces the
questions that guided the research, defines relevant terms, and discusses the scope and
limitations of the study. The chapter also describes the pilot investigation that

provided background information for this study.

WM
11' "Cl

During the past few years, Americans have been reminded repeatedly that the
population in the United States is rapidly becoming more diverse. The make-up of our
elementary and secondary school population reflects these same societal Shifts, leading
to a growing amount of attention given to the topic of differences among students.
Theorists, researchers and educators who study and think about differences within the
context of schools and classrooms have a variety of understandings about what and
who Should be included in this talk about diversity.

Paine (1990) suggested that “while race and class were the salient categories in
public discourse about diversity in the 1950’s and 1960’s, today language,
handicapping, learning style and other categories have entered a more comprehensive
discourse about the educationally relevant ways in which people can differ” (p. 2).
Nieto (1992) added the perspective of ethnicity, social class, religion and sexual

preference.

3

While no single definition of diversity exists, particular forms of diversity
seem to have significant impact on teaching and learning in today's classrooms. These
include (1) racial and ethnic differences as a result of demographic shifts in the United
States; (2) a variety of English dialects or other languages; (3) a wide range of
socioeconomic backgrounds; (4) various exceptionalities resulting in special education
needs; (5) academic outcomes that differ for males and females; and (6) differences in
family patterns.

Teachersandllixersitx

AS teachers confront differences between themselves and their students, there
is the potential of bringing discontinuity to social interactions, the curriculum and
expectations for appropriate school behavior. In addition, differences between
teachers and students are often the cause of miscommunication between teachers and
parents. The more students and their families vary from the standards, values, culture
and background of the teacher, the greater is the dilemma.

Teacher candidates come into teacher education programs looking at the world
through a set of beliefs (Rokeach, 1968) or constructs (Kelly, 1955) which represent
what they think about specific issues, attitudes which convey what they feel, and
values which are comprised of the beliefs and attitudes they hold strongly enough to
act upon (Haberman, 1992). These beliefs grow out of personal experiences in their
homes, families and community cultures which frame their understanding of the world
and their actions. Clark and Peterson’s (1986) research suggested that the belief

systems of teachers are conceptual structures and visions that give teachers reasons for

4

acting as they do. Sometimes these beliefs are consciously held, other times teachers
may not be aware of the reasons that form the foundation for their actions in the
classroom.

Cushner, McClelland and Safford (1992) suggested that teachers are often
culture-bound and are unwilling or unable to look beyond their own world view. Most
people--teachers included--exhibit a strong tendency to believe that their own cultural
tradition represents the “best way.” Teachers do expect some differences among
students in their classrooms; their dilemma is what to make of these differences. As
noted by Sleeter & Grant (1994):

We are often threatened by or want to change those who differ from
ourselves and whom we do not understand. Our classrooms often have
students who do not look like us, talk like us, or think like us--who have not
had some of the experiences we have had. Students may have grown up in
neighborhoods unlike our own. Some may not show much interest in
learning things we personally value. Some, because of hearing
impairments, visual impairments, reading difficulties, and so forth, may not
have acquired knowledge that we take for granted. However, as teachers,
we very often want to make our students more like us (p. 41).

Learning to teach is not easy under any circumstances and it is especially
difficult to reconcile new perspectives with previous ideas and experiences from one’s
own background and schooling. Grant (1991) found that both preservice and inservice
teachers ask for “tips” to help them teach the diversity of students in their classrooms.
They usually “want a recipe for teaching students whom they believe to be culturally
deprived or culturally different; or they want a list of ‘do’s and don’ts that will keep
‘these students,’ as they are often referred to, on task” (p. 237).

Valuing and affirming diversity as well as building on differences in the
learning community, however, does not happen by prescription. No one can tell

teachers precise ways to meet the needs of all students and no one can “empower

teachers to respond to cultural diversity” (Cochran-Smith & Lytle, 1992, p. 113).
Becoming a multicultural teacher who values diversity is, as Banks (1989) suggested,
a personal process in that what is learned and validated takes place only in personal

interaction with those who are different from us. Cochran-Smith (1995a) noted that
in order to learn to teach in a society that is increasingly culturally and
linguistically diverse, prospective teachers, as well as experienced teachers
and teacher educators, need opportunities to examine much of what is
usually unexamined in the tightly braided relationships of language, culture
and power in schools and schooling. This kind of examination inevitably
begins with our own histories as human beings and as educators; our own
experiences as members of particular races, classes and genders; and as
children, parents and teachers in the world. It also includes a close look at
the tacit assumptions we make about the motivations and behaviors of other

children, other parents, and other teachers and about the pedagogies we
deem most appropriate for learners who are like us or not like us (p. 500).

E'IICI'IED"'CI
Although diversity has always been a part of schools, especially urban schools,
since the development of teacher education programs, particular attention has not been
focused on preparing teachers to work within diverse classrooms except as a result of
legal mandates (Carter & Larke, 1995). Brown v. Board of Education and Titles VI
and VII of the 1964 Civil Rights Act called attention to the need for the education of
preservice teachers for environments where diversity prevailed. Research began to
emerge on characteristics of urban schools which were often described as "deprived,"
"ghetto schools," "disadvantaged," and "culturally deprived." Not until the late 1970's
and early 1980's did researchers and educators begin to take a more positive view of
diversity and to advocate that teacher education programs pay attention to the need of

preparing preservice teachers for a wide variety of diverse settings. In recent years,

6

more research has addressed this need, but the number of studies is still quite limited.
Grant and Secada (1990) examined the literature related to the preparation of
preservice teachers for culturally diverse classroom settings and noted that there is
limited research for two reasons:
First, it suggests the marginal status and low importance that has been given
to research on the preparation of teachers to work with diverse student
populations...lndeed, most of the journal articles we found were not in what
would be considered mainstream, professional outlets. At best, this
suggests great insensitivity among those engaged in the peer-review process
for such journals. At worst, there is blatant bias against research efforts
involving teacher education predicated on the existence of diverse student
populations. Second, though we looked for research to answer our basic
question, we found ourselves having to struggle with gaps in the field, and

with the lack of cumulative findings in programs of inquiry...(Grant &
Secada, 1990, p. 404).

D l . I l l . l l E .

The research available does stress that prospective teachers most often come to
teacher education programs with "little very direct experience with people from
backgrounds different fi'om their own...in addition, they tend to view diversity as a
problem rather than a resource...” (Zeichner & Baker, 1995, p. 72). It is often difficult
for teachers to know how to talk about diversity in thoughtful ways (Paine, 1990), and
as a result, differences among students are reduced to personality factors like
motivation. Changing perspectives involves a process of moving from a monocultural
perspective to one that is multicultural and that has a fundamentally different
framework for understanding differences.

A primary focus of change is the concept of multicultural education which

serves as a way for educators to consider alternative ways of thinking about teaching

7

and learning for groups of students who are culturally diverse. Growing out of the
1960’s and early 1970’s civil rights movement, the multicultural education concept
has continued to expand as educational theories and practices are directed towards
bridging differences in race, culture, language, social class, gender and disability in
schools and classrooms. (N ieto, 1992).

While there are differences in how the concept of “multicultural” is defined by
theorists, researchers and educators, there is an emerging consensus that in order for
all students to experience educational equity there must be changes in school
curriculum and teaching materials. Teachers must accommodate the various learning
styles of students and provide a rich variety of resources and materials that reflect
different perspectives. The multicultural attitudes and behaviors of teachers and
administrators must be nurtured and the goals, norms and culture of the schools need
to be revisited (Banks, 1993b). Changes in teacher education programs which are
preparing teachers for work in culturally diverse classrooms are also needed. This
means that teacher educators must become informed about the process of taking on a
multicultural perspective and applying it in culturally diverse classroom settings.

Wurzel (1988) contended that the process of becoming a multicultural person
begins by having contact with other cultural groups. As teachers and students from
different cultural orientations interact, conflicts will emerge. Wurzel noted that

in American classrooms, cultural conflict is evidenced most often when the
value, behavior, and knowledge patterns which minorities and international
students learn at home clash with the values of the majority culture. The
ways in which this clash of cultural patterns is manifest may range from
seemingly simple and concrete things such as the use of language, to more

abstract processes, such as the advocacy of different values. The
consequences of cultural conflict in the classroom may range from subtle

8

misunderstandings which affect individual learning to the withdrawal of
students from the educational system (p. 7).

While cultural conflict is not particularly comfortable or pleasant to encounter,
it is necessary for any kind of growth to take place so that existing cognitive frames
can be altered. In his theoretical discussions of cognitive development, Piaget argued
that disequilibrium is necessary for assimilation of new knowledge. Wurzel (1988),
building on the work of Piaget, suggested that disequalibrium in the multicultural
process occurs when previously held beliefs, knowledge and attitudes are challenged
or invalidated. As teacher candidates come into contact with children who come from
very different backgrounds than their own, they will encounter situations that will
cause them to struggle intellectually and emotionally with these differences. During
this process, teachers have an opportunity to change their views on culture and to

consider altering their teaching practice as a result.

Siatemmtnfthehnblem

The basic problem is teaching people to teach others who are different fi'om
themselves. The problem has three facets: (1) teachers who are now entering the work
force face the challenge of teaching a population that is more diverse than in any other
time in our country’s history; (2) teacher education programs must meet the challenge
of preparing these teachers; and (3) knowledge of how to prepare them, however, is

scant, and the factors affecting that preparation are complex.

WWW—01153119115
Two major questions guided this study: In the context of teaching in
culturally diverse classrooms, (1) What differences did teacher candidates confront
between themselves and their students as they engaged in the personal process of

constructing meaning about diversity? and (2) What development took place regarding

the multicultural attitudes and behaviors of teacher candidates as they confronted
differences between themselves and their students?

First, while it is clear from previous research and from personal teaching
experiences that teachers confront differences between themselves and their students,
there has been little documentation concerning the nature of these differences within
the context of teaching practice. I was interested in documenting specific instances
where differences were particularly challenging to these teacher candidates. Were
there particular forms of diversity that were more challenging than others to individual
student teachers or that developed as pattems across the case studies? My second goal
was to explore the personal process that these teacher candidates undertook in
constructing meaning about the differences they confronting as they interacted daily
with their students in the classroom. How did the teacher candidates respond to
specific situations? Were there patterns of development regarding multicultural
attitudes and behaviors of individual teacher candidates or across the case studies?

While preparing teacher education candidates for diverse classrooms is and
will remain complex and multifaceted, this study does have implications for teacher
educators who are working to make substantive program changes which will better
help them understand and address the process of becoming multicultural in perspective

and practice.

11 fi . . [I
While the concepts of “culture” and “multicultural education” have multiple
definitions, the following descriptions convey the meaning and spirit of the way these

are used in this dissertation study:

10
cum

The notion of culture seems basic to this study since culture determines so
much of who we are and how we perceive ourselves, which in turn has a great deal to
do with how we view persons who are different from ourselves. Cushner, McClelland
and Safford (1992) defined culture as a collective process since it is constructed by
human beings as they interact with one another. Persons in particular groups socially
construct their ideas, attitudes and values in a hierarchy of what is most important to
the group. Young & Adler (1997) suggested that culture is the “whole of humanity’s
intellectual, social, technological, political, economic, moral, religious and aesthetic
accomplishments” (p. 23). Those of us who live in the United States belong to a
changing complex macroculture but within this larger culture are smaller units called
microcultures. Cultural identity may be shared in these microcultures based on traits
and values learned as part of our “ethnic origin, religion, gender, age, socioeconomic
level, primary language, geographic region, place of residence (e.g. rural or urban),
and disabilities or exceptional conditions” (Gollnick & Chinn, 1994, p. 23). We may
be part of several microcultures at the same time. It is within this framework, that the

concept of “culture” is used throughout this study.

”1.! IE] .

9

There are numerous ways to describe the concept of “multicultural education.’
In reviewing the literature, Gay (1995) found a strong consensus regarding a
description of multicultural education as
a concept, a framework, a way of thinking, a philosophical viewpoint, a

value orientation, and a set of criteria for making decisions that better serve
the educational needs of culturally diverse student populations. As a

ll

“concept, idea, or philosophy,” multicultural education is a set of beliefs
and explanations that recognizes and values the importance of ethnic and
cultural diversity in shaping lifestyles, social experiences, personal
identities, and educational opportunities of individuals, groups and nations

(p. 28).

This is the broad perspective from which I conducted my study. People are not
all the same; furthermore, they do not want to be. However, cultural differences exist
which do profoundly impact our understandings of ourselves and the world.
Recognizing various forms of differences among students is essential but it is the way
we think about these differences, the value orientation we bring to diversity, that really

matters.

5 lI"' ElSl

Limitations to this study include:

(1) Data were collected over the entire student teaching period (August-November)
via field notes, interviews and observations but only at certain points rather than daily.
Student teachers had experiences and reflections about daily events which may not
have been captured in the data.

(2) In the pilot study, a second researcher participated in the data analysis. For the
dissertation study, data were gathered and triangulated through multiple sources but
events were viewed through the lens of only one researcher.

(3) While I was not their supervisor during student teaching, the student teachers were
members of at least one class that I had taught in their teacher education program.
This relationship could have had an impact on the data, particularly that gathered in

student interviews. However, since there were multiples sources of data collected in a

12

variety of circumstances, it appears likely that this relationship did not have significant
bearing on the patterns which emerged over time.

(4) As the researcher, I came to the study with certain assumptions about teaching and
learning as well as with particular notions about the kind of value orientation that
teachers need for teaching in diverse classroom settings. These biases are
acknowledged in this chapter through the definitions of key concepts and terms.

(5) The intent of this study is to inform, not to predict. It is meant to be a contribution
to the complex, multifaceted on-going discussion of preparing teachers to work in
diverse classroom settings. While it is a descriptive report that does have implications
for programs of teacher education, it does not draw particular conclusions on what are
the most appropriate ways to prepare teachers for these settings. It also does not
attempt to isolate specific dispositions, traits, skills and knowledge that are perceived
to be effective qualities of teachers whose students come from diverse backgrounds. It
does, however, address the kinds of conflicts that may emerge for teacher candidates
as they teach students who differ from themselves; the process that they go through as
they attempt to assimilate new information/experiences into previous knowledge; and

their development toward becoming a multicultural teacher.

Brenaraticnfcuhesmdx
E 'l S l D . .
In order to explore possible directions for this study, I set up a pilot
investigation in which I gathered information on student teachers during the semester

before student teaching. This preliminary data gathering has provided a great deal of

13

information on the initial responses of the teacher candidates to course work on
multicultural issues along with field experiences in a culturally diverse classroom
setting. The pilot study served as a beginning point for me in identifying particular
issues which emerged for teacher candidates as they worked with children whose
backgrounds differ from their own and it provided rich background information on
teacher candidates which informed the dissertation study. Findings from this
preliminary information gathering led me to examine the possible sources and
problems faced by teacher candidate as they found differences between themselves
and their students.

The pilot study, comprised of a cohort of 24 third-year prospective teachers,
was conducted from J anuary-April 1993 in conjunction with a teacher education
course, Elementary Curriculum Studies (see Appendix A for course syllabus), that
focused on teaching math, science and social studies methods as well as on increasing
multicultural awareness. The course, which included concurrent field work in
classrooms with culturally diverse students, was taught collaboratively with public
school educators from racial backgrounds which were different from those of the
primary professor, and included reading selected text regarding issues of diversity
along with times of oral and written reflection by the prospective teachers. Questions
addressed in this preliminary study included: (1) How do prospective teachers' prior
attitudes, ideas and experiences combine with coursework and fieldwork in culturally
diverse settings which may offer alternative perspectives on cultural diversity? and (2)
How is it that some students seem more reflective and more able to see connections
across and between their own experiences and those of others?

In the course, two of the texts, White Teacher by Vivian Gussin Paley (1985)
and Savage Inequalities by Jonathan Kozol (1991), as well as several articles on
diversity, dealt with multicultural issues. The teacher candidates used these texts as a

basis for small group discussions and individual written responses to issues that were

l4

emerging for them regarding multicultural education. The fieldwork aspect of the
course took place in an urban setting with a population of children of whom 80% were
Afiican-American. These students came from backgrounds very different from those
of the prospective teachers, who were all Euro-American except for one Latina.
Students also spent several class sessions with public school educators from a variety
of cultural backgrounds.

2.] S I D E ii .

I collected data in several ways during the pilot study. Prospective teachers
responded to the reading they were doing and their fieldwork experiences in writing,
in small groups and in large group discussions which were audio-taped and fully
transcribed. Data were collected via written fieldnotes, audio-taped class discussions,
journals, writing assignments and reflections on students’ own experiences within and
across different cultures. All data were analyzed using the constant comparative
method (Glaser and Strauss, 1967). After multiple readings by two researchers, data
were coded into categories which were refined and confirmed across all of the contexts

of the study.
F] S l E. 1'

To address the questions that were the impetus for this preliminary
investigation, the data were examined in two ways: (a) the conceptual and theoretical
approaches to teacher education that might increase cultural awareness and (b) the
effect of the teacher education curriculum on prospective teachers' intercultural
sensitivity. Four elements emerged out of this pilot study data. First, it appeared that
the infusion approach--one that promoted social and structural equality and cultural

pluralism emphasizing respect for cultural differences throughout the curriculum

15

(Sleeter & Grant, 1994; Goodwin, 1994) was influential as prospective teachers
learned to teach science, math and social studies within diverse classroom settings.
Second, it became clear that the ability of the prospective teachers to adopt some new
perspectives was related to their close engagement in a culturally diverse classroom
setting at the same time that they were studying multicultural issues in their teacher
education program, suggesting that practice and theory combined to produce more
dramatic shifts in thought and teaching. Students reflected in their journals and in
class discussions about their thinking and how they were processing the ideas
presented. One male prospective teacher wrote that

those of use who have the power and educational advantage are not at all
willing to give that up so that until we are ready as a society, and
individually, to allow real change in this equality to happen, nothing will
improve. The gap will continue to increase. (Tom)

A third element which emerged from the data was that the educator from an
Afiican-American background who worked with the cohort a number of times during
the semester was influential in shifting prospective teacher thinking. The broader the
variety of perspectives offered by those who authentically hold those perspectives, the
more options the prospective teachers encounter. Students mentioned Eleanor, an
African-American educator who worked with the cohort, on numerous occasions as a

major influence in their teaching:

Something that has struck me from Eleanor's talk and White Teacher is the
idea of recognizing and celebrating cultural differences. In the 60's and 70's
there seemed to be this push for the races to come together and be “one.”
Now there is this swing away from that theory to recognizing
differences...Eleanor brought this out and I believe we need to learn about
each other's differences. Knowledge will help us combat fear of differences
and make us a richer society. The "melting po " theory is in the past--it is
time to move on. (Nancy)

16

The fourth factor which increased students' multicultural openness and
awareness was writing autobiographies which included reflection on their own
schooling experiences and their own family and cultural backgrounds. Throughout the
term, students were encouraged to make connections with these experiences and these
proved to be moments of insight for many. It also seemed to help students move
beyond their own selves to seeing that others' cultural backgrounds and previous
school circumstances might also affect their learning. Typical of many of these

prospective teachers was Tamara, who was raised in a rural, midwestem setting:

I went to a school in which there were no Blacks but there was a small
Mexican-American population. The children here are very different fi'om
any I've been around. Their dialect constantly amazes me. I find myself
answering the children in the manner they speak to me. Should we try to
correct the way they talk? I think that because my family speaks with a
Southern accent that I am less willing to correct the children because I know
what it felt like when teachers used to correct me.

A fifth factor which influenced the findings involved the cooperating
classroom teacher in whose classroom prospective teachers had their field placements.
These cooperating teachers differed in their cultural awareness and sensitivity which
seemed crucial in shaping how the college students thought about cultures in the
classroom context:

After talking with Mrs. Nickel for awhile I knew why I was nervous. I
thought how in the world am I ever going to be able to handle this. She
informed us that some of the students were going to tell us that they didn't
have to do certain things we told them because we were white. Other
students would basically tell us to get lost when we asked them to do
activities. By this time I was ready to pack up and change majors. (Jennifer)

From this background information, I learned that there were significant
differences in the way this group of prospective teachers approached cultural issues
during this field experience in the classroom. Coursework combined with field

experience provided an opportunity for me to document the ways in which individual

l7

teacher candidates were responding to a culturally diverse classroom and the specific
kinds of issues that were emerging for them. I also learned that some shifted in their
perspectives regarding diversity while others seemed to end the term with many of
their initial ideas intact. It was also clear from this study that much more could be
learned about how these teacher candidates were constructing meaning about diversity
by continuing to gather data as they proceeded through student teaching the following
semester.

The data collected from January - May 1993 during the pilot study focused on
the classroom and practicum work of preservice teachers in diverse classroom settings.
I chose four of these student teachers (Tamara, Jeremy, Nancy and Leah) to follow
during the dissertation study which took place during August - November 1993.
While diversity occurs in every school and classroom, I chose to follow four who
would likely, in the settings available, confront more differences and thus emphasize

the contrasts between their own cultural backgrounds and that of their students.

S"fi [112' .5]

The increasing diversity among students in classrooms across the United States
is a fact that cannot be ignored by teacher educators. Since the majority of teacher
candidates as well as practicing teachers are monolingual, Euro-American, and
middle-class persons who have little experience with cultures other than their own,
they will likely be confronted with the challenge of cultural clashes between
themselves and their students.

This research emphasizes the personal process involved as four teacher
construct meaning about diversity within the context of student teaching in a culturally
diverse classroom setting. The research centered on the discovery each student teacher

brought to the concept of teaching all students by identifying the particular kinds of

l8

differences which emerged between students and teachers in day-to-day interactions.
The study has significant implications for teacher educators as they work to select
teacher education candidates and to develop opportunities and structure experiences
for them which will aid in how they construct and reconstruct their understandings of
what it means to teach alLstudents. It will serve to inform teacher educators about the
process that teacher candidates go through as they experience disequilibrium in the

classroom as a result of differences between themselves and their students.

Q . E 1 11° .
This chapter provided the introduction, background and purpose for the study,
defmined terms used in the study and discussed the limitations. A summary of related
research as well as theoretical perspectives which impacted the study is presented in
chapter two. Chapter three describes the methods and procedures which served as a
framework for the study while the fourth chapter documents individual case studies of
teacher candidates who are working in culturally diverse classroom settings. A
summary of the findings of this study presented within the context of existing
research; conclusions and implications for educators and researchers; and questions for

further study are presented in the last chapter.

CHAPTER 2

REVIEW OF RELATED LITERATURE

The first chapter introduced the various forms of diversity within the current
school-age population. It described the problem that exists when teachers are not
prepared for the diversity present within today’s classrooms. The chapter also defined
the purpose of the study and introduced the guiding research questions. The purpose
of the second chapter is to review the literature related to issues of preparing teacher
candidates for diversity among students in classroom settings.

The literature review is divided into three major sections. The first section
examines the literature pertinent to the range of diversity that exists within classrooms.
The second section discusses research relevant to the process of becoming a
multicultural teacher. The last section focuses on what is already known from the
limited research available about the preparation of teacher candidates for culturally

diverse classroom settings.

B [11' . III'I' CI

The literature is clear about the fact that there will continue to be a growing
amount of diversity in the population of the United States. As noted in the first
chapter, theorists, researchers and educators define diversity in a variety of ways. The
literature does, however, focus on five forms of diversity that directly relate to
educational outcomes for the school population: (1) ethnic and racial differences
resulting from demographic shifts in the United States; (2) a variety of English dialects

or other languages; (3) a wide range of socioeconomic backgrounds; (4) various

l9

20

(physical, intellectual and psychological) exceptionalities resulting in special
education needs; (5) academic outcomes that differ for males and females; and (6)
differences in family patterns. It must be kept in mind that these classifications of
differences are socially constructed in our society and that even though addressed
separately, these areas of diversity do not stand alone but frequently intertwine and
interact with one another in human lives.

The diversity present in today’s school population often results in unequal
educational opportunities for children and youth. The following discussion represents
a segment of the knowledge base available which describes these six areas of diversity

in relationship to school inequities.
B . l 1 E l . D' .

During the past three decades, the demographic composition of the United
States changed more rapidly than it has during any period of time since the European
immigrations in the late 19th and 20th centuries. In 1982 “nearly three of four
American young people (ages 0 - 17) were European Americans, but by the year 2020
only one of two young people will be European-American” (Au, 1993, p. 3). Schools
reflect the steady growth in the non-European proportion of the American population.
In the twenty largest school districts in the United States, over 70 per cent of the total
school enrollment are comprised of children of color (Zeichner, 1992). The degree of
diversity in schools varies according to the geographical location in the United States.

The socially constructed concepts of “ethnicity” and “race” are complex, not
easily defined or understood. For the purposes of this study, “race” describes a group

of persons with a somewhat similar genetic history which includes skin color and

2 1
other physical characteristics. The term “ethnicity” refers to a sense of common
ancestry and/or memories of a historical past; being born in a particular community; or
similar ways of behaving (Labelle & Ward, 1994).

Valli (1995) underscored the ongoing dilemma of race in our society and
described the problem that exists when beginning teachers meet unfamiliar culturally
diverse students. Speaking from her own experiences, she noted that

the civil rights movement, race riots, the assassination of Martin Luther
King, Jr. and Black power movements of the 1960’s shaped the
consciousness of my high school and college generation. The revival of
White supremacy, the videotaped beating of Rodney King, the drugs, guns,
and violence of inner-cities, Willie Horton, questions about affirmative
action, and the plight of young Black males have Shaped the consciousness
of younger generations. Racism and racial animosity may be worse today
than 25 years ago (p. 120).

Research suggests that minority students often receive an education that has
less quality than that of their mainstream peers. As a result of their placement in the
school system, minority students often have access to an unequal curriculum (Arends,
1994). Students from minority backgrounds are disproportionately placed in special
education and vocational programs but they are underenrolled in programs for students
who are gifted and college-bound. Curricular inequalities exist when students are
tracked into these paths of schooling (Goodlad, 1984; Oakes, 1985; and Rosenbaum,
1976). These inequalities come from differences in the content of coursework as well
as in cognitive demands of students. College preparatory classes often emphasize
skills in problem solving and critical thinking and focus on conceptual understanding

while those students in the lower tracks of schooling receive instruction that centers on

memorization of basic facts and skills.

22

Gay’s (1974) research points to another educational consequence for minority
students. Teachers often use different interaction patterns with minority students and
majority students. This research suggests that minority students are asked fewer
questions of all types, are given less wait time to answer questions and are less often
praised or encouraged.

Other conflicts happen in terms of teacher-student interaction when
communication is broken down as a result of cultural differences. Heath (1983)
studied different communicative styles among working-class African-Americans,
middle-class African-Americans and Euro-Americans in the Piedmont region of the
Carolinas. One of her findings centered on the cultural differences among these
groups involving the use of questions. Working class African-American families in
this study rarely asked their children questions at home unless they were authentic
questions where the answers were not known to the adults. In school, this pattern of
cultural communication caused dilemmas when these same students were fi'equently
asked to respond to questions to which the student realized that the teacher already
knew the answer.

Another cultural difference related to questioning was examined by Phillips
(1972) as she studied how Native American children learned in their homes and
communities contrasted to how they were expected to learn at school. Phillips
discovered that these children learned by watching adults instead of interacting with
them and that questions were to be answered by older children rather than adults. At

school, the Native American children’s lack of response to the teacher was often

23

interpreted as a learning deficit or extreme shyness when instead it was a cultural
difference in communicative style.

Teacher candidates who have had little experience with racial and ethnic
diversity face the challenge of learning to teach along with the cultural differences for
which they are not prepared. Valli (1995) directly addressed this dilemma by
suggesting that

within the cultural problematic of race, student teachers in city schools must
negotiate and create their identities as teachers. This problematic intensifies
the difficulties of learning to teach...the process of becoming a teacher
involves entering a strange culture in which neophytes must learn to
function. The strangeness of this culture is compounded when White
teachers find themselves in predominantly Black or culturally diverse
settings--often for the first time in their lives (p. 120).

Teacher candidates who will be entering classrooms where racial and ethnic
differences exist between themselves and their students will need to be prepared to
meet these cultural challenges. They need to understand the importance that race and
ethnicity play in the lives of many students and communities and to provide the kind
of learning environment that values distinct ethnic and racial characteristics.

I . . . D. .
With these racial and ethnic differences within schools and classrooms comes

linguistic diversity. Romero (1994) cited that

according to the National Association of Bilingual Education there are over
7.5 million school-age children in the United States for whom English is a
second language. The US. Department of Education reported in 1992 that
the population of students of Limited English Proficiency in the United
States had increased by 14.3% Since 1991 ...It is predicted that by the year
2000, over 30% of all students in the country will come from families where
the language of the home will not be English (p.85).

Language defines people of many different groups and structures symbol

systems for these groups. Children and youth who speak a different language from the

24

dominant one used in the school find it difficult to find meaning and make connections
in the learning process. While Spanish is the predominant first language of many
children in the United States, an increasing number of students are entering schools
speaking Arabic, Chinese, Hmong, Khmer, Lao, Thai and Vietnamese.

As a result of a 1974 Supreme Court ruling, schools are legally required to
provide assistance to students in learning the English language and in learning school
subjects. Schools cannot legally place students with limited English proficiency into a
regular classroom without language assistance. However, the court ruling did not
specify the form that this assistance should take (Arends, 1994). As a result, the way
students with limited English proficiency are served varies greatly from one school
district to another. Some districts have pull-out programs which serve as a bridge
between their native language and the English language. These language minority
students are often moved out of the program as quickly as possible back into the
regular classroom. Frequently these children have learned to Speak English but are not
yet equipped to conceptualize in ways that are needed to understand content area in
English. They are then labeled as “deficient” or “slow learners.”

Another approach to language instruction in the schools is bilingual education.
There are different interpretations regarding the goals of a bilingual program. A true
bilingual model encourages both Anglo and minority students to learn in English as
well as in the language of the minority group. These types of programs though are
rare due to financial and political facets of our educational system (Romero, 1994).

In many school systems, teachers receive little assistance in providing their
limited English proficiency students with an equitable education. Many teacher
candidates as well as practicing teachers do not have any formal training in teaching
children who have English as their second language. Rigg and Allen (1989) suggest

that teachers must often

25

rely on their own good sense, their sensitivity to the students--whatever
language they speak--and their ability as professionals to alter the
curriculum to suit their students, selecting the materials and techniques
which best fit. Sometimes there are workshops that address some of the
problems these teachers face, either in their district or at conventions, but
for the most part they go it alone (p. vii).

Teachers obviously cannot be expected to learn every language and dialect that
will be represented in their classroom. However, as language diversity continues to
grow in classrooms across the United States, teacher candidates must be ready to value
the language or dialects that students bring to school. At the same time, teachers will
be expected to find ways to provide instruction that will further the education of these
students and to communicate to them the importance that learning English will have
for certain social and vocational opportunities.

5 . . D. .

Many aspects of the lives of students and their families are impacted by
socioeconomic level. The economic achievement of Americans is measured by the
US. Bureau of the Census in terms of socioeconomic status (SES). Interrelated
determinants of this success are occupation, educational attainment, income, wealth
and power (Gollnick & Chinn, 1994).

The United States is one of the richest countries in the world. However, more
than one out of five children in the United States lives in poverty (Campbell, 1996).
Poverty creates a great deal of stress upon families, resulting in a host of physical,
social and emotional needs. These needs often serve as barriers to learning for
children and youth in schools.

In a landmark study, Rist (1970) documented that teachers’ expectations,
instructional decisions and actions were significantly influenced by social-class
characteristics of children. Placement of kindergarten children into low, middle and
high ability groups was based on information received about children from

nonacademic records which included reports of who was on welfare. In addition to

26

this information, the kindergarten teacher also used her own observations of children
including their physical appearance, how they dressed and their verbalizations in the
first weeks of school. As the children in this study were followed into first and second
grade, it became clear that they were locked into the low, middle and high ability
groups into which they had originally been placed in kindergarten. Those children who
fit into a lower-class group fared less well academically and emotionally than their
middle-class peers.

Other researchers have corroborated Rist’s findings on the impact of social
class on instruction and grouping. Anyon (1981) documented the differences in
educational knowledge that was made available to students from different social
classes. While there were some similarities in the curriculum offered across working
class, middle-class, affluent professional and executive elite school settings, there were
major differences in the kind of knowledge made available to these students. What
counts as knowledge in the schools often differs along dimensions of structure and
content depending on what students bring to school in terms of their own background.

Oakes (1985) also addressed the unequal educational opportunities and
outcomes that exist when students are sorted out in schools into hierarchical groups
based on perceived potential for learning. It appears that very often in our schools,
those students, for whom the most nurturant learning would appear to be appropriate,
receive the least. Oakes suggests that tracking does not equalize educational
opportunity for diverse groups of students. Schools should cease to sort and select
students for firture roles in society, but Should concentrate on equalizing the day-to-
day educational experiences of students.

Kozol (1991) vividly portrayed differences that exist in the physical aspects of
schools as well as the social stratification of knowledge between lower and higher
class socioeconomic settings. Haberrnan (1991b) suggested that those students who

come from families with few economic resources often attend schools where a

27

“pedagogy of poverty” exists. Students learn almost exclusively by rote,
memorization and drill rather than by methods that would promote problem solving
and critical thinking skills.

From this research, it is clear that socioeconomic background plays a
significant role in a student’s educational success at school. Teacher candidates need
preparation for the extent to which all facets of socioeconomic status impacts teaching
and learning.

E . l' .

Students with special education needs often struggle for educational and social

equality. Mainstreaming efforts have increased the diversity in classrooms in terms of

special education (physical, mental, psychological) needs:

Twenty-five million or more individuals from every ethnic and
socioeconomic group fall into one or more of the categories of
exceptionality....Exceptional students include both individuals with
disabilities and those who are gifted (Gollnick & Chinn, 1994, p. 152).

Before Public Law 94-142 (The Education of All Handicapped Children Act)
was enacted in 1975, many children with special education needs were frequently
denied access to an appropriate education. As a result of this Public Law (renamed in
1990 to Individuals with Disabilities Act), students with special education needs now
have the right to be educated as much as possible with their peers; many are included
within the regular classroom setting for most or part of the day. This legislation was
designed to provide the most appropriate form of education for the individual with
disabilities in the least restrictive environment for their particular needs (Cushner,
McClelland & Safford, 1994).

Exceptionality issues are directly interconnected with issues of ethnicity, social
class and gender. Dunn (1968) raised questions about the number of minority-group
children who were placed in mentally handicapped classrooms. He found that 60 to 80

percent of students taught in these classes were from low socioeconomic backgrounds.

28

African-Americans continue to be overrepresented in classes for students with
moderate mental retardation and learning disabilities. Kauffman (1993) found that
children of lower-class backgrounds are also overrepresented in classrooms for the
seriously emotionally disturbed while males are placed in these classrooms three and a
half times more than females (Office of Civil Rights, 1992). There are also a higher
percentages of males than females in classes for students with mild and moderate
retardation, speech impairment, serious emotional disturbances and learning
disabilities.

Teacher candidates will be expected to provide an education for all children in
their classrooms. They will be expected to make informed decisions on which
students should be referred for assessment for special education services. Teachers will
need to be able to adapt curriculum, procedures, materials, equipment and methods to
the individual educational needs of students.
deeLDiyersitx

There is a growing body of literature which suggests that gender differences
are salient aspects to consider in regard to teaching and learning in schools and
classrooms. Gender differences are the “most frmdamental of all and have been
overlooked as a matter of inquiry for nearly all of our history...the effects of gender on
the actual education received by children in the school has not been analyzed until
quite recently” (Cushner, McClelland & Safford, 1992, p. 7). Analysis of this research
has provided strong support for the notion that the experiences of female students in
school are often quite different from those of male students.

Research by Sadker and Sadker (1990) suggested that teachers interact less
with girls than boys in classrooms. They also give girls less praise and other forms of
feedback and ask them fewer complex questions. Although girls often start
elementary school ahead of boys in terms of cognitive, social and physical factors, by

secondary school they are behind in achievement on standardized tests:

29

Stereotyping of gender roles is reflected in society as well as in schools.
Even though gender roles seem to be changing, both males and females are
still impacted by gender stereotyping. Stereotyping narrowly defines the
male and female roles and defines them as quite distinct from one another.
It leads children to generalize that all persons within a group behave in the
same way. Men and women become automatically associated with the
characteristics and roles with which they are constantly endowed by the
mass media and by classroom materials. Careers are not the only areas in
which stereotyping occurs. Male and female intellectual abilities,
personality characteristics, physical appearance, social status and domestic
roles have also been stereotyped (Gollnick & Chinn, 1994, pp. 123-124).

Since different treatment of boys and girls often results in different educational
outcomes, it becomes necessary that gender be a fundamental consideration in the
dialogue conceming diversity. Teacher candidates will be expected to create
classrooms that promote educational equity for both boys and girls by (1) identifying
behavior that discriminates between genders; (2) providing content that reflects both
male and female perspectives; and (3) establishing positive and supportive
interactions with both boys and girls in the classroom.

11' . . E .1 E

Differences in family patterns adds to the diversity in schools and classrooms.
F arnilies vary in racial, ethnic, religious, socioeconomic and educational features that
affect family life, structure, status and firnctioning. Conditions of disability and
cultural expectations also impact family life. Children in the United States are brought
up in many different types of households and family groupings. No longer do we have
the typical middle-class, two parents, children and a pet scenario in families as we did
in 1942 when 60 percent of families matched this description (Cushner, McClelland &
Safford, 1992). In today’s schools and classrooms, at least ten different family
configurations are represented. It is estimated that two-thirds of all marriages in the
United States will be disrupted through divorce or separation and there is a growing

number of single teenage mothers as sole parents. Blended, adoptive, inter-ethnic and

30

foster families are also represented in classrooms. The concept of “family” that was
once considered normal, that provided the image of the “proper” kind of family and
guided policies which governed our institutions, is now in a very definite minority.
Some families remain fairly stable over time and others evolve into different
configurations.

Students in classrooms belong to families who have differing value systems.
Children and youth come to classrooms with differences related to socialization
practices that are developed within the context of the family and home environment
(Garcia, 1994). Messages children receive from their homes profoundly impact their
attitudes and values. Often these attitudes and values differ from those of classroom
teachers which results in miscommunication and misunderstandings that have
educational consequences for students.

Teacher candidates must learn to value the many different family patterns that
are represented in their classrooms. It is important that they learn to feel comfortable
with both traditional and nontraditional family structures so that teachers and families
might work together to promote educational success for students.

In summary, the literature cites a wide range of diversity among children and
youth in classrooms across the nation. How these differences are approached by their
teachers will significantly impact educational outcomes for these students. Teacher
candidates must be prepared to accept these challenges so that an equitable education
is available to all students. Since many teacher candidates have had little experience
with those who are different from themselves, the process of changing perspectives
about differences and moving from a monocultural to a multicultural perspective is not
an easy or smooth transition. The next section explores literature related to the process
of how teachers learn about and understand differences between themselves and their

students.

31

II E [E . I l l . l l I l

The literature on becoming a multicultural teacher, although sparse, is
expanding. As I reviewed this research, five themes emerged from the available
literature on the process of becoming a multicultural teacher. These include (1) a clash
of the familiar with the unfamiliar; (2) the construction of new perspectives; (3) the
developmental growth process; (4) core multicultural beliefs and actions and (5) a
teaching practice that reflects an understanding of culturally diverse students.

First, teachers grow up learning approved ways of seeing and understanding
the process of schooling shaped by common experiences, language and culture. They
also tend to be socialized into teaching in ways that tend to emphasize the continuities
with the familiar (Lortie, 1975). Prospective teachers often assume that they will end
up teaching students who are similar to themselves, in settings like the ones in which
they were schooled. As a result, teachers often make cultural assumptions about their
students and want to make their students become like themselves. These assumptions,
and their effect on learning styles, makes school practices unfamiliar to many students
(Sleeter & Grant, 1994). Delpit (1988) referred to the dominant culture of school as
the “culture of power.” Schools and teachers often seem to function as agents set out
to shape and reproduce the values, beliefs and norms of their own culture, usually that
of the Euro-American middle class. Those who differ from the dominant culture learn
that they will have to fit into this culture if they want to be successful in school.

Delpit explained that Afiican American students are often unfamiliar with school
cultural knowledge regarding power relationships. Consequently, they often
experience academic and behavioral problems because of their failure to adhere to the
established norms, rules and expectations. When schools do not pay attention and do

not validate the kind of knowledge that students bring, classrooms become an

32

uncomfortable place for many children and their families and educational practices
become inappropriate and even detrimental to the academic and socio-emotional
development of culturally diverse students (Bumstein & Cabello, 1989).

Second, by actively participating in the process of constructing meaning about
diversity, teachers learn about and understand differences between themselves and
their students. A behavioral approach to learning focuses on responses to physical
stimuli. Educators who use a behavioral paradigm focus on reinforcement, practice
and external motivation as key aspects in learning (F osnot, 1996). Behaviorists often
break down learning into specific parts which move from Simple skills to more
complex activities. In contrast, the constructivist view of learning grows out of a
socio-historical context which views learners as active participants in shaping and
making sense of their world (Brunet, 1982; Vygotsky, 1978).

Piaget’s work in cognitive psychology serves as the psychological base of

constructivism (F osnot, 1996). Piaget’s notion of equilibration suggested that

...new experiences sometimes foster contradictions to our present
understandings, making them insufficient and thus perturbing and
disequilibrating the structure, causing us to accommodate. Accommodation
is comprised of reflective, integrative behavior that serves to change one’s
own self and explicate the object in order for us to function with cognitive
equilibrium in relation to it (p. 13).

Like Piaget, Lev Vygotsky (1986) also focused on the process of constructing
new perspectives. However, while Piaget focused on equilibration as a way to explain
learning, Vygotsky explored the effect of social interaction, language and culture on
learning. He proposed that the knowledge created by an individual within a particular
group takes place in the context of interaction with others and is heavily influenced by
prior knowledge, past and present experiences, interpretations of these experiences,
and human interests, values and positions within the social, economic and political

systems of a society (Banks, 1993a). Vygotsky also suggested that learners first

33

explore concepts on the social level between people (interpsychological) and then
move to an internalization of concepts (intrapsychological). This process of
generating hypotheses and then confirming or disconfirrning is regulated by inner
speech. Through this inner monitoring, meaning is continually being constructed and
reconstructed as past and present experiences, interactions with others and position
with the structures of society are shaped by active involvement in particular contexts.

As teachers work with students who come from very different backgrounds
than their own, they raise questions and struggle to make meaning of these differences
in relationship to themselves and their teaching practice. Writing and talking about
these differences serve as vehicles for reflection, organizing and reorganizing
perspectives. It is here that teacher education programs can play a significant role in
guiding prospective teachers through the process of constructing meaning about
differences by exploring past familiar experiences in their own families and
communities in relationship to their active involvement in the unfamiliar culturally
diverse classroom.

Third, several theorists and educators suggest that becoming a multicultural
teacher is a process that is actively constructed over time but also includes a variety of
developmental levels along the way. Growth towards becoming a multicultural
teacher depends on the meaning that is constructed and reconstructed through
experiences with those who are different from themselves.

Wurzel (1988) proposed that a developmental path leading from
monoculturalism to multiculturalism consists of seven basic stages. The first stage,
monoculturalism, is characterized by an individual who communicates and interprets
experiences based on the perspective that “my way is the best way.” The ways others
perceive and interpret the world are inferior. The second stage, defined as cross-
cultural contact, begins the process of multiculturalism by direct or indirect contact

with other cultural groups. For teachers, it means teaching in a school setting where

34

the cultural backgrounds of children differ fiom their own. It is during this stage that
the process of questioning begins. Cultural conflict is the third step in the process,
according to Wurzel. During this stage in the journey, teachers experience conflict
when their values, behavior and knowledge patterns clash with those of their students.
The fourth step involves educational interventions which include becoming aware of
personal cultural biases, beliefs and attitudes. Disequilibrium as proposed by Piaget is
the next stage of becoming a multicultural teacher. As cultural conflict occurs,
questions intensify and what is already known is challenged or invalidated. An inner
emotional and intellectual struggle occurs, leading to the Sixth stage which is
characterized by a reorganization of thoughts, ideas and knowledge resulting in new
knowledge and a sense of equilibrium. The final step is gaining a multicultural
perspective, incorporating new ways of thinking and behaving which include different
systems of cultural knowledge different from one’s own.

Nieto (1992) also viewed the process of constructing meaning about and
valuing diversity as a process or journey over time. She proposed that individuals
must become multicultural persons before they become multicultural teachers. She
developed a model of multicultural education which identified four levels of
multicultural attitudes and behaviors with regard to the perception of differences.
They include (1) tolerance for differences, some of which may be perceived as
unpleasant, differences endured but not necessarily embraced; (2) acknowledgment of
the importance of differences, recognizing and developing particular ways of
recognizing diversity; (3) respect and esteem out of which differences are seen as
legitimate vehicles for learning, using students’ experiences and cultural backgrounds
as a basis for teaching and learning; and (4) affirmation and solidarity with diversity
by embracing the culture of others, not accepting the status quo but actively working

to bring equity to learning for all students.

35

Fourth, being a teacher who values differences means going beyond
developing appropriate dispositions, attitudes and knowledge and extends to a way of
being that values diversity, heterogeneity, equality of opportunity, collaboration and
consensus (Banks, 1989). The abilities and attitudes of a teacher regarding diversity
cannot be decontextualized from who the teacher is as a person. This personal process
is a journey which takes place over time and is Shaped by individual histories and
experiences.

Fenstermacher (1992) elaborated on the notion that the Skills and techniques
(method) acquired by teachers are in a different category from the kind of human
actions that convey particular dispositions and core beliefs (manner). Manner, or way
of being, has to do with responsible teaching which manifests itself in traits such as
compassion, fairness, tolerance, caring and honesty. Teacher education programs
often work at developing teaching specific skills and methods without fostering the
development of manner which is acquired less directly than a skill and grows over a
longer period of time. F ensterrnacher suggested that manner and method do occur
together in teaching and that manner, as well as method, can be purposefully
developed in teachers through demonstration by others who exhibit qualities of
responsible teaching and through the process of reasoning about actions.

Haberrnan (1994) used the term "decent" to describe the kind of teachers who

are able to take on the challenge of diversity:

The question is what "decent" means. As I interact with star teachers and
try to understand their ideology it is clear to me that they live what they
believe. It is not possible to list their beliefs and commitments apart from
their behaviors. Just as the functions they perform as teachers cannot be
understood apart from their undergirding ideology, the converse is also true

(p. 135).

36

Habennan does list a number of the characteristics of "decent" teachers which
include attributes such as being nonjudgmental rather than moralistic; refusing to see
themselves as saviors; recognizing their feelings of bias and prejudice and working to
overcome them; possessing a clear sense of their own ethnic and cultural identities;
and not seeking to have their power needs met by teaching. Banks, F esterrnacher and
Haberrnan all suggested that a person who truly values diversity has a solid core of
beliefs which are lived out through words and actions.

Finally, teaching practice profoundly impacts the educational outcomes for
students from diverse backgrounds. With the wide range of diversity in classrooms, it
seems unrealistic to expect that teachers will be able to provide instruction that will
take into account all cultural differences present in the classroom. Findings from the
literature on this issue suggest that there are opposing perspectives as to how
instruction for culturally diverse students should be viewed. According to Floden,
Buchmann and Shwille (1987), schools need to be set apart from the everyday lives of
students. Instead of building on the home and community experiences of students,
teachers need to separate out school learning in order to provide equality of
opportunity for all students. These authors question the

educational value of everyday experience for all students. It is not just
directed toward those groups whose home experience is already largely
discontinuous with what is expected in schools. Rather than trying to make
schooling equally familiar to all students, schooling should be made equally
strange (p. 491).

An alternative perspective on this issue focuses on the concept of “cultural

congruence,” which provides a frame for understanding how students of diverse

37

backgrounds might experience school success. Au and Kawakami (1994) suggested
that the overall hypothesis of cultural congruence is

that students of diverse backgrounds often do poorly in school because of a
mismatch between the culture of the school and the culture of the home.
Students have less opportunity to learn when school lessons and other
activities are conducted, or socially organized, in a manner inconsistent with
the values and norms of their home culture...cultural congruence does not
mean an attempt to replicate a home or community environment in the
classroom. Research on cultural congruence recognizes that the home and
school are different settings with different functions in students’ lives.
Culturally congruent educational practices incorporate features of the
students’ home culture but do not result in activities and environments
identical to those of the home (pp. 5-6).

Establishing culturally congruent instruction in a classroom does not change
the educational goals of the school. It does, however, change teaching practice as a
result of understandings about particular barriers to school success for culturally
diverse students. Singer (1988) suggested that
cultural congruence is an inherently moderate pedagogical strategy that
accepts that the goal of educating minority students is to train individuals in
those skills needed to succeed in mainstream society. Its proponents argue
that this goal can best be achieved when students feel comfortable because
their classrooms correspond to the learning environments of the cultural
communities from which they come. The idea is to identify cultural
differences that are obstacles to learning in standardized classrooms, and

then to use this information to change classroom instruction and
management to fit better with students’ cultural standards and expectations

(p. 1).

By providing a culturally congruent classroom learning environment, teachers
validate the diverse backgrounds of their students while preparing them to be
successful in the dominant culture. This view takes into account the significance of
prior knowledge, past and present experiences in families and community as well as

belief systems growing out of a particular cultural heritage. The socio-historical

38

context of a student’s life is necessary for learning to take place in a school setting.
The perspective of cultural congruence focuses on the idea that teachers cannot
understand all cultural differences between themselves and their students but that they
can minimize these differences by providing instruction that is compatible with what is

known and understood about the culture of their students.

BlE'IlfiD"

A limited amount of research has been conducted on preparing teachers for
diversity in the areas of cuniculum and text materials; preservice teacher education;
practice teachers; teacher-student relationships; and recruitment of teachers of color
(Grant & Secada, 1990; Grant & Tate, 1995). Suggestions from theorists on what is
helpful for preservice teachers include helping prospective teachers to understand their
own histories in light of experiences with diversity (Apple, 1985); to have a thorough
understanding of the content they teach (McDiarmid, 1991; Zeichner, 1992); to be
familiar with multiple ways to help students represent what they are learning (Ball,
1988; Wilson, Shulrnan & Richert, 1987); and to find ways of knowing their students
in relationship to community values and practices (Ladson-Billings,l990; Zeichner,
1992). These are crucial elements of teacher education programs which attempt to
establish a philosophical base for preparing teachers who will meet the challenge of
classroom diversity. Limited research has been done, however, on teacher education
programs which are based on the lived realities of teaching candidates as they practice
teaching in diverse classroom settings. Zeichner (1992), reviewing the literature in this
area, found that many of the documents that were reviewed were part of the fugitive
educational literature or less accessible journals that were obtained through personal

contacts rather than literature searches.

39

More recently, Grant & Tate (1995) reviewed the literature and found only 47
studies focusing on preservice programs that focused on multicultural education.
While there seems to be a slowly growing body of literature in this area, much remains
to be studied. As Houston (1990) noted, "There has been notable recent progress, but
the research basis for such important work as educating the nation's teachers is still
extremely thin. Although the importance of research is being espoused, little progress
is being made” (p. ix).

Upon examination of the available research related to multicultural education
and preservice teachers, I found that the research grouped into three categories: (1)
entering beliefs of teacher candidates towards diversity; (2) attempts to shift
perspectives of teacher candidates toward diversity by increasing their cultural
knowledge base; and (3) attempts to shift perspectives of teacher candidates towards
diversity by providing direct interactions between preservice teachers and culturally
diverse school populations.

These categories represent three distinct starting points in the research
involving the preparation of prospective teachers for diverse classroom settings.
Assumptions and goals underlying the studies in each category of research and the
findings from these studies will be discussed in order to document research in the
field. Also discussed will be the place of this dissertation study and its additions to

this existing knowledge base.

[1 ”5.1131112 .21 13"

Research in this area examined the attitudes of prospective teachers towards
diversity and their emerging perspectives about differences among learners in the
classroom. These preservice teachers had little or no previous coursework or

experiences with diverse populations.

40

Research literature in teacher education suggests that teachers and school
administrators often have low expectations for low-income students, language
minority students and students of color (Banks, 1994). The research also suggests the
salient role that attitude toward diversity plays in the academic success of these
students. Assumptions for the research in this category begin with the perception that
teacher self-awareness is a necessary starting point in preparing prospective teachers
for diverse classroom settings. This self-awareness includes prior knowledge,
background experiences, beliefs and conceptions about diversity. Paine (1990) noted,
in her study of approaches to learner diversity held by prospective teachers in five
United States teacher education programs, that since there are educational implications
for the ways in which we think about differences, it is important to understand the
perspectives that teacher candidates bring with them to their teacher education studies.

Paine drew on the baseline date collection of the Teacher Education and
Learning to Teach Study of the National Center for Research on Teacher Education.
The research involved 174 elementary education majors and 59 English and
mathematics secondary education majors. Questionnaires were administered to all
participants and open-ended interviews were conducted with 62 of the preservice
teachers G’aine, 1990).

Paine's study, along with other recent research, Shows that many prospective
teachers enter their teacher education programs with the notion that diversity is a
problem rather than a resource (Zeichner, 1992). The largest category of preservice
teachers in Paine's research held conceptions of diversity which tended to attribute all
problems to differences among individual children with a focus on personality factors
such as motivation. The second largest group of responses associated perceived
differences with categories such as race, class and gender. Few of the responses from

prospective teachers indicated the perspective that differences are socially constructed

41

or the belief that socially constructed differences among children have implications for
teaching and learning (Paine, 1990).

Another study which is grounded in the belief that teacher educators must
acknowledge preservice teachers’ prior knowledge, beliefs and conceptions of

multicultural education was conducted by Goodwin (1994). Goodwin suggested that

from the investigations into teacher beliefs and teacher thinking, we know
that teachers' conceptions of the nature of teaching and learning undergird
and frame the decisions they make in the classroom (Clark & Peterson,
1986), and that incongruence between personal beliefs and actual teacher
education program offerings can contribute to preservice teachers'
dissatisfaction with their teacher preparation program (F eiman-Nemser &
Buchmann, 1985). Consequently, any effort by teacher educators to prepare
multicultural educators should begin with an understanding of how
preservice teachers conceptualize multicultural education (p. 119).

Goodwin found that the responses of these prospective teachers fell on a
"continuum ranging from the most cursory to the most in-depth, from the most
superficial to the most meaningfirl" (Goodwin, 1994, p. 127). She used Sleeter and
Grant’s (1987) five-approach typology of multicultural education as an analytical tool
for conceptualizing the responses of 120 preservice teachers who completed an open-
ended questionnaire which was designed to solicit their conceptions of multicultural
education.

Goodwin's findings reiterate many of those suggested by Paine's research.
Most of the respondents thought of multicultural education as (a) the education of the
exceptionally and culturally different; (b) a human relations approach; or (c) single
group studies emphasizing one particular aspect of diversity. All three conceptions
perpetuate the status quo rather than address any structural reform in achieving equity.
In addition, responses showed that preservice teachers thought of multicultural
education as a way to meet individual student needs rather than as a systemic approach

to altering inequitable educational practices.

42

Another significant finding in Goodwin's research is that the preservice
teachers in the study seemed to conceive of multicultural education as a concept that is
externally driven, a reactive education that depends on one’s circumstances. As
Goodwin noted, "What they were prepared to do seemed dependent on how much
control they would have, the kinds of students or communities they would work with,
the models or materials available” (Goodwin, 1990, p. 127). In reducing multicultural
education to the procedural or technical, these prospective teachers defined
multicultural education solely for those who are different from themselves.

In a related study, Nel’s (1993) research on preservice teachers' perceptions of
the goal of multicultural education was based on the premise that the perceptions and
beliefs of a teacher could be the contributing factor to either the empowerment or the
disabling of minority students. This study focused on 280 white, middle-class,
predominantly rural preservice teachers who had no coursework in multicultural
education. A reworking of Grant and Sleeter's five approaches to race, class and
gender was used as the organizing format from which to elicit the response of
preservice teachers regarding their perception of the main goal of multicultural
education. Responses indicated that these preservice teachers understood the goal of
multicultural education to be the assimilation of minority students into the present
school system through tolerance and cooperation, which corresponds to the first two
approaches in Sleeter and Grant’s (1994) typology. As in the research of Paine and
Goodwin, Nell's findings indicated that it is difficult for preservice teachers who have
had little experience with cultural diversity to think beyond the existing structure of
the school system. While multicultural education seems to be generally regarded in a
positive light, it is viewed by preservice teachers as a concept which gathers all
students into the mainstream Eurocentric culture and establishes a cooperative and
harmonious spirit among them. It also seems clear from these particular studies as

well as from other related research (Hadaway & F lorez, 1987/ 1988; Zeichner, 1992;

43

Grant & Tate, 1995) that preservice teachers come to teacher education programs with
different personal, developmental and intellectual levels of readiness to conceptualize
the goals of multicultural education. As Goodwin (1994) noted, "Preservice teachers
are not empty vessels and may not be uniformly prepared to receive the same
message” (p. 129).

W

The assumption underlying the purpose for multicultural education courses,
workshops or seminars for preservice teachers is that perspectives, sensitivities and
attitudes about differences among learners in the classroom might be shifted by
increasing the cultural knowledge base (Larke, 1990). The cultural knowledge base
includes such goals as the development of historical perspectives of racism, prejudice
and discrimination; development of cultural consciousness; and successful teaching of
multicultural students (Bennett, Niggle & Stage, 1990). Through autobiographical
cultural essays, information on the history and culture of selected ethnic groups and
lesson planning that develops multicultural perspectives, teacher educators set out to
increase the cultural knowledge, skills and sensitivities of preservice teachers.

Several researchers have documented the impact that a workshop, seminar or
course on multicultural education has had on preservice teachers' attitudes and views
about teaching culturally diverse students. In the Teacher Training Program of the Los
Angeles Unified School District, preservice teachers attended a series of presentations
involving multicultural issues. McDiarmid (1990) analyzed the content of these
presentations and the preservice teachers' views of stereotypes and teaching culturally
diverse children both before and after the multicultural presentations. He concluded
that the presentations appeared to have little effect on how teachers think about these
issues and raised questions about the content and pedagogy of multicultural programs.

Similar results were docrunented by McDiarmid & Price (1990) as they used data from

44

pre- and post-program questionnaires and interviews given during a three-day
workshop intended to influence student teachers' views about teaching culturally
diverse learners. Results showed that the multicultural presentations had little effect
on preservice teachers' beliefs about the capabilities of learners labeled "high" and
"low" ability, on the use of stereotypes in making decisions or about providing
genuinely equal opportunities for all students to learn challenging and empowering
subject matter.

Similar results were found by Larke (1990) as she set out to assess the cultural
sensitivity levels of a group of preservice teachers before and after completing a
required multicultural education course. Results from a self-administered
questionnaire suggested that preservice teachers were aware that they will need to
teach students from diverse cultural backgrounds but only one-fifth of them indicated
a preference for teaching students from different cultures. In summarizing the results
of her study, Larke (1990) noted that after taking a multicultural education course,
“preservice teachers continue to reflect much discomfort in working with children of
different cultures and accepting differences such as language and relating to the
parents of those children (p. 28).

A study by Bennett, Niggle & Stage (1990) found somewhat more positive
results as they examined possible relationships between teacher education students'
cognitive development, feeling of social distance and multicultural knowledge at the
beginning and the end of a pre-service multicultural education course. Findings
indicated that this course was most effective with the preservice teachers who were
already open to cultural diversity issues. For those who were not as receptive, the
course had significantly less impact.

It appears from this research that while some increase in cultural knowledge
and shifts in attitudes can happen, taking one isolated course on multicultural

education is not sufficient for educating preservice teachers to work effectively with

45

students from culturally diverse backgrounds. Larke (1990) suggested that future
teachers need more positive personal contact with these students and their parents in
order to develop the attitudes of acceptance and respect for the diversity of students

who will be in their classrooms.

11.1 'lll'lCl 1111' 5121'

Research in this area focuses on preservice teachers' direct experience in
culturally diverse settings as a laboratory for learning. The assumption is that the
combination of cross-cultural experiential encounters, together with instruction which
increases the cultural knowledge base, will make a difference in the actions of future
teachers. Several researchers have documented various approaches taken by teacher
education programs to offer preservice teachers the opportunity to become directly
involved with those from a culture different fiom their own.

Ross and Smith (1992) found that field experiences which emphasize diverse
classroom placements do have an impact on preservice teachers' knowledge of and
attitudes towards cultural diversity. Before taking the course combined with the field .
experience, the six preservice teachers who participated in the study believed that
individuals are responsible for their own success or failure. After the course and work
in classrooms, all of these preservice teachers began to consider other factors such as
cultural background, teacher practices and school curriculum as having significant
impact on learning. However, the knowledge and perspectives about teaching diverse
learners differed considerably among the six participants, which again points to the
different levels of readiness and ability on the part of preservice teachers for teaching
diverse learners.

A study involving student teachers who worked in South Texas school settings
with a culturally diverse student population and those who student taught in Minnesota

was the focus for Cooper, Beare and Thonnan (1990) as they examined the

46

connections between a student teacher's cross-cultural experiences and his/her attitude
towards multicultural teaching. Findings indicated that those who worked in the
Texas setting, where cultures difierent significantly from their own, nurtured their
attitudes and skills. Those who student taught in Minnesota, where cultures were
similar to their own, tended to think more in theoretical terms about cross-cultural
issues.

Yet another approach in an attempt to directly engage preservice teachers with
diverse populations was initiated at Texas A & M University with the establishment of
the Minority Mentorship Project. Each preservice teacher served as a mentor to either
an African-American or a Mexican-American student. This interaction involved
weekly individualized tutoring at the mentee's school, cultural events, social events,
interaction with mentee's parents or guardians and weekly letter or telephone
correspondence during the semester, summer vacation and holidays (Larke, Wiseman
& Bradley, 1990). The pre-assessment and post-assessment results indicated that the
preservice teachers involved in this project experienced a change in attitude and
perceptions towards African American or Mexican American children through the
personal interaction established during the year.

Cochran-Smith & Lytle (1992) emphasized that there are no prescriptive
solutions to understanding and responding to cultural diversity in classrooms. These
researchers suggested that preservice and inservice teachers need to develop avenues
of inquiry concerning issues of diversity and to develop plans of action that are valid
for particular communities. Through exploring questions, teachers are able to analyze
specific classroom and school events which help them understand and respond to
cultural differences. Cochran-Smith and Lytle's (1992) research on teacher-research-
based teacher education projects in urban Philadelphia showed how teacher inquiry
provides opportunities for preservice teachers to examine dimensions of diversity as

they relate to teaching, leaming and schooling.

47

Culturally diverse classrooms are one context that provide teacher candidates
with experiences with students who are different from themselves. Other
opportunities exist in community settings outside of the classroom where preservice
teachers have the chance to interact with persons from diverse cultural backgrounds
while examining their own beliefs in the context of these actions (Gallego, 1995). One
program, La Clase Magica (LCM), served as a community based alternative learning
environment located in a working class neighborhood in the midwest. It is one of eight
such community-based environments located across the United States. Community
members were from diverse ethnic and cultural backgrounds (Afiican-American,
Caucasian, Latino and Asian). Children from the neighborhood came to La Close
Magica twice a week after school to play computer adventure games and board games.
Pre-service teachers fiom a state university participated at La Close Magica once a
week as part of a literacy course. Gallego explains that the preservice teachers were
referred to as amigos who

interacted with children during computer or board game play, talked with
kids and shared an afternoon snack. Amigos were urged not to play the
traditional role of teacher, ie. asking convergent questions, directing
activities but to play the role of collaborator involved in genuine interaction,
ie. requesting information, testing out strategies (Gallego, p. 19).

After each LCM session, these prospective teachers met with a university
instructor to discuss their experiences with the children. They also documented these
interactions through fieldnotes. Teacher education students reflected on their role as
teacher and on the physical and psychological constraints of many conventional
classrooms. There is evidence from this research that the alternative learning setting

of La Close Magica provided a unique opportunity for prospective teachers to explore

issues related to diversity and teaching.

48

Summary

Teachers and students come to school from a wide diversity of backgrounds.
Both teachers and students come into classrooms with their own understandings about
the world which have been shaped by their experiences in family and community.
Many teacher candidates coming into teacher education programs have had little
contact with cultures other than their own. Research suggests that few preservice
students hold the view that societal and cultural factors have an impact on teaching
and learning. They often view their role of teacher as one which helps assimilate all
children into mainstream culture through tolerance and cooperation.

Increasing the cultural knowledge base is a common approach taken by teacher
educators in an attempt to sensitize preservice teachers to cultural and societal factors
involved in the teaching and learning process. Preservice teachers are often asked to
examine their own cultural histories and are encouraged to develop ways of looking at
the world from the perspectives of those who are culturally different from themselves.
While increasing the knowledge base does seem to have some impact on attitudes
towards diversity, it is clear from the research that taking an isolated multicultural
education course is a weak approach to preparing teachers to work effectively in
culturally diverse classrooms. There are no prescriptions for successfully teaching
students who come from culturally different backgrounds than those of their teacher.
It is also unrealistic for teachers to have Specific knowledge about every cultural group
represented in the classroom.

AS preservice teachers become engaged in face-to-face interactions with
students from diverse cultural backgrounds and begin to recognize issues of diversity
which grow out of the context of these particular relationships, they may be able to
reflect more thoughtfully and develop appropriate plans of actions in their teaching

practice. Theory and practice begin to merge.

49

We now have some knowledge about the attitudes of many preservice teachers
and their conceptions of multicultural education as they come into teacher education
programs. There is also a small body of research which documents the lack of impact
that courses, workshops or seminars have on preservice teachers in terms of increasing
their cultural knowledge base about differences in meaningful ways. We have some
sense of how some teacher educators are attempting to combine coursework with
experiential components which encourage preservice teachers and students from
diverse cultural backgrounds to form relationships with one another.

The pilot study for this dissertation project used the approach of combining
coursework with field experience in a culturally diverse setting for a group of third-
year elementary teacher education students as an attempt to explore issues of
curriculum and diversity. It is clear, however, that we need research which provides a
more in-depth examination of what actually occurs daily in classrooms with diverse
learners as well as how preservice teachers think and respond to these particular
circumstances. We need to know about the day-to-day interactions which make up the
personal journeys involved in the construction of meaning about diversity.

This dissertation study examines the student teaching experiences of four
teacher candidates as they complete their teacher education program in culturally
diverse classroom settings. The next chapter describes the design of the study and the

methodology used for gathering and analyzing data.

CHAPTER 3

DESIGN AND METHODOLOGY

In the previous chapter, I reviewed the literature relevant to issues involving
the preparation of teacher candidates for culturally diverse classroom settings.
Literature on (a) the range of diversity within classrooms; (b) the process of
becoming a multicultural teacher; and (c) teacher education efforts to prepare teacher
candidates for diversity was examined. This chapter looks closely at the design of the
study; the setting and population of the study; the participants and their classrooms;
the methodology for data collection; and the data analysis procedures used to address
the following research questions: Within the context of teaching in culturally diverse
classrooms, (1) What differences did teacher candidates confront between themselves
and their students as they engaged in the personal process of constructing meaning
about diversity? and (2) What development took place regarding the multicultural
attitudes and behaviors of teacher candidates as they confronted differences between

themselves and their students?

W
In order to gain a better of understanding of how teacher candidates make
sense of differences among students in classrooms, I chose a close-to-the-classroom
research design that allowed for systematic inquiry within a natural setting. This
design was chosen for the study because it most closely matched my questions about
the particular beliefs, attitudes and behaviors or practices of individual student

teachers towards differences among the children in their classroom. Inquiry focused

50

51

on the meaning that is made from observing and documenting what the participants
did and said in the classroom. The design of the study provided opportunities to
gather detailed, descriptive accounts of customary school and classroom events that
shed light on their meaning for the participants involved (Cochran-Smith & Lytle,
1992). It was assumed in developing this study that teaching is a highly complex,
context-specific, interactive activity.

Two major goals guided me as I designed the study. First, my review of the
literature revealed that the majority of research studies which investigated the attitudes
towards and conceptions of multicultural education took place outside the context of
culturally diverse classrooms. In my study, it was important that the natural setting
become the direct source of data so that meaning could be constructed in the context in
which the action occurred (Bogdan & Biklen, 1982). During the pilot study,
prospective teachers worked in culturally diverse classrooms; however, the time spent
with the children amounted to only four to six hours a week for five weeks. It was
possible during this short time to get a glimpse into the kind of beliefs, attitudes and
behaviors which were emerging for each of the practicum preservice teachers. My
goal, however, was to build on this information by taking a daily, in-depth, ongoing,
close-to-the-classroom approach during the entire student teaching semester which
would provide an opportunity for me to document the thoughts, feelings and actions of
the teacher candidates. Not only would these teacher candidates become directly
engaged in day-to-day classroom routines but they also would encounter very
particular situations related to differences among students.

A second goal was to document and analyze the multicultural attitudes and
behaviors towards diversity in terms of any shifts which might take place in the
context of specific classroom situations which arose during student teaching. While
recent research has given clues which indicate that experiences for prospective

teachers in culturally diverse settings does tend to raise awareness about the kinds of

52

differences among children, the analysis of data from this study allows for
examination of specific instances which tend to support or challenge the beliefs held
by the student teacher. This study documents the personal meanings and values placed
on the concept of diversity as four student teachers reflected on specific instances they

experienced in their classrooms.

S . l E l . E l S l

Gaining access to school sites involved consulting with the principal at each of
the two schools selected as appropriate sites for this study. I chose these two schools
because of their diverse student populations. During the month of April, 1993, I
explained the research proposal to each principal and asked for permission to conduct
the study at their school. Both expressed enthusiasm for the study and readily granted
access to the sites for Fall 1993.

The student teachers and their cooperating teachers were contacted by phone in
June 1993 concerning their interest in joining the study. All agreed to participate; the
call was followed up with a letter which thanked them for their interest and outlined
the details of the study. Written consent was then obtained from both the classroom
teacher and the student teacher. The study focused on student teachers and only
pertained to students in the classroom as they were involved in general educational
activity; therefore it was not necessary to obtain consent forms from the parents of
children in the classroom.

The academic year for both schools began during the third week in August
1993. Student teachers worked with their cooperating teachers in setting up the
classroom environment and accompanied them to opening workshops and school
meetings. The school day began at 8:15 with dismissal at 2:30. Descriptions of the

two schools follow:

53

Hathawfilementamichml

Hathaway Elementary School was the school site for the practicum work in the
pilot study. This large two story brick building is located five blocks west of Main
Street in an urban midwestem city of approximately 44,000. The school displays
children's art work in the corridors and docrunents daily pupil attendance by classroom
on a large chart near the entrance to the building. Children who attend Hathaway
school come from the surrounding community which includes houses, apartments and
low-income housing projects. This public school serves 525 children from
kindergarten through grade six who ride the bus or walk to school. The principal, Mr.
Kendall, described the school population as "73 percent free or reduced lunch with 75
percent minority-~mostly African American children." The school population is
gender balanced with close to 10 percent of the children identified for receiving
special education needs. The school is growing in the enrollment of students who
speak another language than English, which currently is about 10 percent of the school
population. Mr. Kendall stated that at least 60 percent of the children come from
Single-parent families. While noting that parents do Show interest in their children’s
education, Mr. Kendall expressed his perspective that "as far as helping kids is
concerned, parents view that as the school's responsibility." Both Tamara and Jeremy

requested that they be placed in this school setting for student teaching.

ChambersElemmamSchQQl
The second school site for the study was Chambers Elementary, which is

located in a midwestem town with a population of approximately 24,000. The town
has an abundance of small factories, attracting a Hispanic population which has settled
in the northern part of the town in the vicinity of this school. Chambers has 360
children in kindergarten through grade five; 55 percent of the children qualify for free
or reduced lunches. Hispanics comprise around 25 percent of the school population.

Nearly all of these students come into the classroom using English as their second

54

language. Another sizable group of children in the school are from families who
moved in from Appalachia to find work, bringing with them a distinctive culture.
Gender of the student population is relatively balanced between males and females.
The school's population also includes 10 percent special education students who are
mainstreamed into the regular classroom setting. The principal, Mr. Johns, noted that
approximately 60 percent of the families are not made up of the original family unit.
Many of the children live within walking distance of the school, but some ride the bus
on a daily basis.

The large brick building is the oldest of the six elementary schools in town.
However, the inside of the school is newly painted with student work displayed

throughout the halls and classrooms, creating a hospitable atmosphere.

TIE" 111.2]

The participants in this study were four teacher candidates who were
completing their student teaching assignment as part of their teacher education
program at a small liberal arts college in the midwest. Of the four, three were female
and all were Anglo. Their ages ranged from twenty-two to thirty-five A required
component of the program at this college is a study-service-term (SST) which is
designed to immerse students in a culture significantly different fi'om that of the
United States. Most of these sites are in Central American in Spanish speaking
countries or in Germany, Africa and Asia. The first seven weeks of the semester are
spent studying the language and culture of the host country. During the last six weeks
of the semester, students work in a field/service-leaming assignment, usually in a rural
area. Throughout the term, students live in homes of the host country and cat at least

two meals daily with their “families.” Those students who cannot participate in the

55

program in another country are required to spend a semester on-campus pursuing
intercultural studies.

Three of the four student teachers in this study participated in the SST program
in another country. Nancy went to China for a semester and Leah and Jeremy studied

and served in Costa Rica. Tamara opted for the on-campus intercultural semester.

Tamara

Tamara was placed in a first-grade classroom at Hathaway Elementary with
Mrs. Birdley, an experienced teacher of fifteen years who had previously worked with
student teachers. From previous contacts, it was documented by college supervisors
that Mrs. Birdley was working on teaching with themes across the curriculum, used a
literature based approach to teaching reading, emphasized concrete hands-on
experiences for children and incorporated cooperative learning groups in the
classroom. Mrs. Birdley's classroom was located on the first floor of the building and
twenty-two students were on her roster. Class composition included eleven males and
eleven females; ethnic groups represented included sixteen African-American, two
Mexican-American, and four Anglo students. While none of the children had limited
English proficiency, many of the Afiican-American children had Black dialect as part

of their linguistic culture. Four of the twenty-two children had hearing impairments.

.Leremx
Jeremy requested that he be placed for student teaching with the second-grade

teacher with whom he had worked during his practicum work at this school. After
working in her classroom, it was his perception that Ms. Richard, who was in her sixth
year of teaching, was the kind of teacher who would be a support to him during
student teaching and would be someone upon whom he could model his own teaching
practice. He especially liked the way she used literature in the classroom and her

rapport with the children. Ms. Richard's room was several rooms away from Mrs.

56

Birdley's with tvventy-three students in the class. Three students were identified as
having special education needs. All fourteen boys and nine girls in the class spoke
English but Black dialect was a regular part of the African-American children’s
linguistic style. Ethnic groups were represented by fifteen African-American, five
Anglo and three Hispanic children.

Nanci:
Nancy chose to be placed for student teaching at Chambers Elementary

because of her interest in working with students who have English as their second
language. Mrs. Butler was chosen for the cooperating teacher because of her past
experience in working collaboratively with student teachers. She was working at
integrating subjects across the cuniculum and at finding ways to incorporate her
diverse group of students into the classroom. Her classroom was located at the top of a
long flight of steps to the second floor. In her ninth year of teaching, Mrs. Butler had
twenty-three second-graders in her classroom with seventeen Anglo and six Hispanic
students. There were ten girls and thirteen boys in the classroom which included four
children who were identified as having learning disabilities. Two students spoke

English as a second language.

Leah

Leah had experienced a reading methods practicum in Mrs. Long's classroom
during the first semester of her third year in the teacher education program. Her
rationale for placement during student teaching in this classroom included Mrs. Long's
organization of the curriculum around themes, her emphasis on reading as the core of
the curriculum, and her style of relating to fifth graders. This classroom was also on
the second floor of the building and had twenty six students, twelve boys and fourteen
girls. Ethnic group representation included nineteen Anglo, five Hispanic and two

Cambodian students. Seven of the children in the room had been identified as having

57

special needs--three mildly mentally handicapped children, three with learning
disabilities, and one student with emotional disorders. Four children in the class spoke

limited English.

DataLellecticn
Multiple data sources were used during this study. Included were initial and
final interviews with student teachers; journal entries from the four student teachers;
and researcher classroom observations and field notes as well as interviews with the

student teacher after each classroom observation.

1..” . 'lElSl I]

An initial interview was conducted with each student teacher at the beginning
of the study for the purpose of gaining background information on each teacher
candidate which would provide a starting point for documenting entering beliefs and
attitudes. Since an underlying assumption of this study is that the personal experiences
of an individual in families, schools and communities serve as the basis for beliefs,
attitudes and understandings, it was necessary to find out the kind of experiences each
student teacher brought to the study. These individual audiotaped interviews took
place during the first two weeks of student teaching in late August 1993. The student
teachers were asked to talk about their own backgrounds in relationship to family and
schooling, their experiences with persons who have histories different from
themselves, their experiences to date in classrooms and their understanding of what it
means to teach all students. Each audio-taped interview, which lasted from 60-90
minutes, was then fully transcribed. Questions asked of each student teacher are

outlined in Appendix B.

58
We:

During the course of student teaching, student teachers wrote five journal
entries (one every two weeks) which were due at five intervals during the semester.
These written journals provided another way for the teacher candidates to reflect on
what they were thinking about and acting upon while they were practicing teaching.
College supervisors read and responded in writing to these journal entries; copies were
made for me to add to the data collected. Student teachers were asked to reflect on (a)
general areas related to student teaching (planning, content of curriculum, classroom
environment, interactions with students...); (b) specific questions regarding planning
for diversity in the classroom; and (c) questions and issues which were emerging as
salient for them at the particular time. Specific guidelines were given for the journal
responses; opportunities were provided for student teachers to address their own
agenda. Guidelines for each journal entry are listed in Appendix B.

E l :1 U] . I. l l

I observed five lessons in each classroom during the period of time when the
student teacher was teaching during her/his thematic unit. Throughout the observation
sessions, I took handwritten field notes on what the student teacher chose to teach, the
methods chosen, what was said, and in what ways students responded. While taking
these field notes, I also designated a space on the right hand side of the paper for the
purpose of recording personal and/or theoretical reflections, questions to ask during
the follow-up interview with the student teacher, reactions to look at more closely, and
data from previous observations which came to mind while writing the notes. These

field notes were then expanded after each of the observations.

01' . .1. .-,| rc‘o ‘. I‘ si‘ {‘ ‘-. 1". ‘Ur..l.
After each classroom observation, I met with the student teacher for an audio-
taped interview which was later fully transcribed for analysis. These interviews gave

me a chance to ask questions about what I saw; provided the student teachers with an

59

opportunity to talk about what issues of importance were emerging for them; and
added to the richness of the data collected during the observations. During the
interview, I talked with the student teacher about the lesson that was just taught, asked
questions which grew out of the classroom observation, and gave student teachers an
opportunity to initiate issues which were emerging for them. In addition to specific
questions about individual thematic unit lessons, more general questions were asked.

These are listed in Appendix B.

E' l I . . l E l S l I 1
These 60-90 audiotaped interviews took place during the final days of student

teaching and were then transcribed for analysis. The interviews gave me data to
compare with those collected in the initial interview. I asked them to talk about the
high and low points that occurred during student teaching as well as questions
regarding the diversity in their classrooms. The questions asked of each student

teacher are included in Appendix B.

W

Data analysis took place both during the course of the study and after the
formal process of collecting data. Ongoing analysis took place during the study as I
read each student teacher's journal, transcribed the interviews from audio tapes and
observed in the classroom. This type of analysis did not adhere to a specific method at
this point, but instead moved back and forth from one source to the other as I
identified particular situations related to diversity which were interesting and
informative to me. This process gave me the opportunity to (a) examine the emerging
data; (b) begin to identify patterns or themes; and (c) develop working hypotheses
which helped focus my inquiry.

60

I began the formal analysis by searching for and identifying patterns or themes
from the journals written by each teacher candidate. As I read and reread the journals,
1 developed codes for the kind of patterns or themes related to diversity that emerged.
I then identified patterns related to diversity that appeared in the transcribed data from
each student teacher interview as well as from data collected from classroom
observations. These three data sources (written journals, interviews and classroom
observations) were then triangulated to provide a cross-check to ensure that the
findings from one data source corroborated the findings from the other two sources
(Goetz & LeCompte, 1984). After identifying the themes related to diversity that
grew out of the data collection for each teacher candidate, I then identified particular
situations from the data that supported each theme.

A constant comparative analysis approach (Glaser & Strauss, 1967) was then
used to describe, analyze and compare data across the four case studies. Similar
themes that had been identified in the individual case studies were grouped together
and categorized across case studies.

At this point in the analysis it became clear that I needed a framework for
addressing my major research questions in a way that would make sense of the data.
My first research question focused on the differences that teacher candidates were
confronting between themselves and their students in the context of their student
teaching experience. After struggling with several ways in which I might organize the
information I had collected, I decided to use six broad forms of diversity that impact
teaching and learning in today’s classroom as a frame. These six forms were derived
from the review of the literature and also emerged from the collected data. They
include: (1) ethnic and racial differences; (2) a variety of English dialects or other
languages; (3) a wide range of socioeconomic backgrounds; (4) various
exceptionalities resulting in special education needs; (5) academic outcomes that differ

for males and females; and (6) family patterns. Defining these forms of diversity more

61

explicitly became necessary, and I worked from the identified themes to distinguish
one area of diversity from another. However, since the concept of “culture” embraces
all forms of diversity, it must be noted that often the categories overlap and
interconnect in multiple ways. Thus, there were not always tidy, clear ways to
distinguish between them. In this study, the distinguishing characteristics of each
form are described in Figure 1.

My second research question focused on shifts in attitudes, beliefs and
behaviors of the teacher candidates in the process of confronting differences. As with
the first question, I realized the need to develop a framework that would portray the
progress of individual teacher candidates in their understanding of diversity as well as
to look across case studies for this development. After a number of attempts to
develop my own framework from the collected data, it seemed helpful to adapt an
already existing We developed by Nieto (1992) for categorizing the development of
multicultural attitudes and behaviors. Using Nieto’s descriptions as a base and then
adding information from my research data, these levels are distinguished from one

another by the characteristics listed in Figure 2.

Summary
This chapter described the design of the study which included data collection

and data analysis procedures. The settings of Hathaway and Chambers schools were
described as were the four teacher candidates. The design of the study involved the
collection of data from multiple sources including initial interviews with the four
student teachers, journal entries from the student teachers, the researcher’s classroom
observations/field notes, interviews with student teachers after researcher observations
and final interviews with the four student teachers.

This research study focused on the personal experiences of these particular

teacher candidates within the context of a culturally diverse classroom setting. The

62

constant comparative analysis of data was used throughout the study to identify
emerging patterns and to develop working hypotheses across case studies. The frame
for analysis of the data was described. Nieto's (1992) model for categorizing the levels
of multicultural attitudes and behaviors was adapted and used as a frame to identify
any shifts which may have taken place over the student teaching period in relationship
to attitudes, beliefs and actions concerning diversity.

Chapter four consists of four case studies which document the differences that
teacher candidates Tamara, Jeremy, Nancy and Leah confronted as they worked in
culturally diverse classrooms and describes developments in their multicultural

perspectives.

63

 

(l) Racial and Ethnic

Ethnic - sense of common ancestry, being born in a particular
community or culture following a particular social pattern: includes
socialization (patterns of and expectations for behavior);
communicative style; and prior knowledge

Racial - describes a group of persons with a somewhat similar genetic
history: includes Skin color and other physical characteristics

(2) Language
Includes dialects of the English language or other than English
languages

(3) Socioeconomic
References to financial resources, particularly lunch status (full pay,
reduced or free) at school.

(4) Exceptionalities
Includes physical, intellectual, social and emotional conditions that
require special education placement and adaptations

(5) Gender
Includes issues related to differences between males and females which
includes stereotyping of roles and specific concerns for gender groups

(6) Family Patterns
Includes differences in how a family is defined, ways families interact
and what is valued in the family

 

 

 

EigmeJ. Distinguishing characteristics of differences in six areas of diversity

 

 

Level Zero - Lack of Tolerance for Differences

extremely uncomfortable with differences

may express desire to become tolerant

prior knowledge of students not taken into consideration
low expectations for culturally diverse students

Level One - Tolerance for Differences

lifestyle differences and values of students and families endured by
not necessarily embraced

may include uncomfortable or unpleasant feelings

some attempt to acknowledge prior knowledge of students

some amount of lower expectations for culturally diverse students
does not question status quo

Level Two - Acceptance of Differences

lifestyle differences and values of students and families
acknowledged as important

does not have lower expectations for culturally diverse students
prior knowledge of students considered irnportant--attempts to
connect to the curriculum

begins to question status quo

Level Three - Respect & Esteem

lifestyle differences and values of students and families highly
valued

all students expected to be successful

prior knowledge of students highly valued-connects to the
curriculum

expresses desire to change the status quo

Level Four — Affirmation, Solidarity and Critique

differences embraced as valid vehicles for learning

lifestyle differences and values of students and families welcomed
and supported

high expectations for all students--wide variety of instructional
strategies used

cuniculum connected to students’ interests and prior knowledge
does not accept status quo--takes action

 

Figure; Levels of multicultural attitudes and behaviors

 

CHAPTER 4

FOUR CASE STUDIES

Chapter three focused on the design of the study and methods of data
collection. Settings for the study were described, participants were introduced and
data analysis procedures were summarized. This chapter tells the stories of four
student teachers as they worked in culturally diverse classrooms. Pseudonyms are
used for all participants in the study. Each case study is divided into three sections.
The first section introduces the teacher candidate by providing background
information gathered from the pilot study. The second section, focusing on the teacher
candidate as student teacher, describes the differences which emerged between each
student teacher and his/her students in the areas of (1) race and ethnicity; (2) language;
(3) socioeconomic background; (4) exceptionalities; (5) gender; and (6) family
patterns. The final section addresses the development that took place in each teacher
candidate’s multicultural attitudes and behaviors over the semester of student teaching

in a culturally diverse classroom.

65

66

TAMARA

Baskgmunflnfunnation

I have a very close fiiend who is a member of the African-American
culture. I have been introduced to the deaf culture through
acquaintances. I really enjoy learning about these difiierent cultures. 1
find their experiences entertaining and I am glad for them because it
makes me more aware of other cultures.

This statement came from Tamara during the pilot study at the beginning of the
Elementary Curriculum Studies course after she was asked to respond to the question,
"What has been your experience with cultures other than your own?"

Tamara, a twenty-year old Euro-American female, grew up on a small farm in
the Midwest. Her parents, raised in Kentucky before moving north for employment,
still have close relatives in the Appalachian region. She has two older sisters who are
twice her age. Tamara believes that what is most important to people in her home
community, including herself, is "family and neighbors helping each other out." As an
example, Tamara told about a recent event when a barn on their farm burned down one
evening and how community members gathered together to help rebuild.

Schooling for Tamara took place in a rural area where teachers "were always
on top of us and knew what we were doing." In middle school she felt as if she
achieved but when she entered high school she “got lost and didn't talk very much.”
When Tamara began college it was "hard to start talking and hard to believe that
something I say is important to someone else."

Tamara remembered that she had wanted to become a teacher ever since
kindergarten. As she thought back to her image of a teacher when she was young, she

said that teachers "knew it all--were there to help you like in breaking up fights--they

67

smiled all the time and had it all together." Her image of a teacher started to change in
high school when she realized that "teachers had to be on top of everything and there
was so much work involved."

Before entering fieldwork (during the pilot study) in the Elementary
Curriculum Studies course in the classroom where the majority of the students were
African-American, Tamara read the book White Teacher by Virginia Paley (1989).
Comments from her response to this text suggest that while she was willing to enter
into the conversation on diversity, she clearly had some questions and concerns
regarding the issues discussed by Paley. In addition, Tamara wonied about others’
possible misinterpretation of her attitudes and intentions. She acknowledged that the
book did "add to my fear of this predominantly Black classroom," and she made the
following additional comments:

As I went into field placement, I began to wonder if the children would not
respect me because I was white...I would feel very uncomfortable
discussing racial issues in the classroom and I am not sure why...I believe
that all of us have fears or apprehensions about possible confrontations over
attitudes which we do not hold...I have fears of conveying the message that
I do not care about racial differences...

As Tamara observed and participated in a second grade classroom for two
mornings a week for six weeks, She worked at sorting out the attitudes and feelings
about her experiences in this setting. Patterns that emerged from her fieldnotes during
this time suggest that Tamara (I) "felt" different fi'om the children in the classroom;
(2) was unclear how to respond to situations where issues relating to diversity arose in
the classroom; and (3) gained understandings about cultural issues from the African-
American educator which significantly influenced her thinking about diversity.

Throughout her field experience, Tamara referred frequently to differences in

language that seemed to make her feel out of touch with the children in this classroom:

68

These children here are very different from any that I have been around.
Their dialect constantly amazes me...It amazes me how "out of it" I feel in
the classroom at times when the children are talking.

Each morning the black children in the classroom came in dancing, singing
a rap or talking some "jive". Sometimes I just sat at the back of the
classroom in wonder at these children; I just watched the ways they
interacted through body movement and their language.

I decided that as a teacher it is critical to keep up on sayings and expressions
in the classroom. During the first couple of weeks the children were all
talking about each other's mothers. I have a very limited resource of
knowledge about blacks but I knew that this was a negative expression.

Tamara's found herself answering children in the same language patterns and
dialect as they spoke to her. She questioned whether she should try to “correct the
way they talk...I think that because my family speaks with a Southern accent that I am
less willing to correct the children because I know what it felt like when teachers used
to correct me."

Tamara also indicated a number of times throughout this course/field
experience that she "felt different" from her students in terms of the kinds of
knowledge the students had about the world in comparison to her own. During the last

day of field experience she wrote that

sometimes I think these children are cooler than I am. I think that the
children know more about what is going on in the world than I do...It came
out in a discussion with the children on March 10 that all the children know
this homeless lady in the community. I could not believe it! I have only
seen one homeless person in my lifetime and they know a homeless person.

Several situations arose during Tamara's fieldwork that presented some anxiety
for her as she tried to figure out how to respond. One instance centered around leading
a discussion on the difference between "needs and wan ". Tamara introduced the

lesson by asking students, "How do we get what we need and want?"

69

The first answer I received came from Kanisha who said, “We get what we
need from the government.” That is a harsh reality when you as a teacher
had planned to talk about having a job and putting money in the bank to
earn interest. Basically I accepted this answer and just went on because I
really did not know how to address this subject. Kanisha’s situation is like
so many of the other children's situations in this classroom.

Another example of a specific instance which caused Tamara anxiety came
during the last week of her field experience:

Manuel came into the classroom and told Adrian that he was “just a stupid
white boy." Obviously Manuel meant "white boy" as a derogatory term and
honestly I could not believe I was hearing this. For a moment I just sat there
until I realized that they were not teasing anymore. I really had no idea
what to say or how to deal with this problem. I still don't know what I
should have said.

Eleanor, the African-American educator who met with students for a number
of sessions on culture and diversity during the semester, seemed to influence Tamara's
thinking in a number of ways. Tamara appreciated the fact that Eleanor "just answered
questions which may have seemed silly to her." Eleanor helped her to understand that
there are many "subcultures" within a school and helped her "realize that although I
did not think I had stereotypes, I do. When she said to think of a stereotype about
different cultural groups of people, I usually had one."

Tamara also indicated that Eleanor gave her some insight on how students
from various cultural backgrounds may have different learning and/or interaction
styles. This seemed to connect with Tamara's thinking about what she was
experiencing in the classroom with predominantly African-American children: "I have

found that the black children in my class respond immediately, while most think about

raising their hand after the fact."

70

Some of the questions Tamara had about language use were also addressed by
Eleanor:

When Eleanor talked about “playin’ the dozens,” that hit home because

most kids in my class say things about each other 8 "mammas." Eleanor also
said sometimes just allowing children to use their own language was
appropriate. I believe it is necessary so that children can come to believe
that their culture is accepted by the teacher.

At the beginning of the semester, Tamara described getting to know the
experiences of those from another culture as "entertaining,” implying that she was
thinking about diversity from a "we" and "them" perspective. She felt like the outsider
in this setting where the students' language and world views were quite different from
her own. At the end of this course, she noted that she had become much more aware
of various cultures and terminology used to discuss diversity but that she still found it
"difficult to know the correct terms to use when talking to people from other cultures."
She also expressed regret that "people from other cultures think you are trying to learn
about their culture just for a class but I am interested." Tamara's interest in learning to
teach in culturally diverse settings resulted in a request that she be placed back in this
school for student teaching the following semester. She made this decision in spite of
her family's resistance to the idea of her teaching in an urban school with children
from predominantly African-American backgrounds. The following data were

collected as Tamara student taught at Hathaway school in a first grade classroom.

11 . EB I 1 'fi 1
" T he way I grew up couldn't have been more di/jferent"
Tamara's experience with persons from a culture different from her own had
been quite limited. Before coming to college, she had little contact with people outside

of her own culture other than the Amish folks in the farming community in which she

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was raised. Her roots in the Appalachian region of Kentucky, however, did give her a
sense of what it is to feel "different" in a community when language and customs do
not fit in with local customs. When Tamara went to college she met Gina, an African-
American student, with whom she developed a close friendship. This friendship had

Significance not only to Tamara, but also to Tamara's family:

My dad and his family are really, I would say prejudiced. Just exposing
him to my black friend at school and to my whole family--some of my
uncles still, they don't want to talk about black people--and being around
those people who say things still. I think it is really slow in my community
because nobody is there you know, and I have to keep that in mind. So I
don't let it get me upset because my parents and my family I can say things
to but other people, I'm one and you're many. They know nothing about
other people. They haven't been fiiends with anyone who is different so
right now I'm dealing with those things.

In the pilot study during practicum work in the Elementary Curriculum Studies
course, data suggested that Tamara "felt" different from the children in the classroom.
She stated frequently that she was unclear about how to respond to situations relating
to diversity in the classroom. Now, during the first weeks of student teaching, she
continued to feel differences between herself and her students. After being in the
classroom daily for two weeks, she stated in the initial interview that "I believe that
the way I grew up and my culture could not have been more different from the way my
students are being raised and their culture." Throughout student teaching, frequent
references to her own family and cultural background supported the fact that indeed,
life for her had been and continues to be quite different from students in her
classroom. Six particular types of diversity that impact teaching and learning frame
the story of Tamara as She confronted differences between herself and her students

during student teaching.

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(A) Raeialnndfithnig

In the area of ethnic and racial diversity, Tamara confronted differences
between herself and her students related to (1) communicative style; (2) prior
knowledge; and (3) various racial issues.

First, Tamara’s experiences in her home, school and community gave her a
particular perspective on what persons are to value and how they are to behave in these
settings in order to be a part of the community. It became clear very early in student
teaching that Tamara’s way of thinking about interactions between teachers and
students did not necessarily match the communicative style that her students brought
to the classroom. During the initial interview with Tamara, after she had been in her
student teaching placement for two weeks, she responded to the question, "What do
you find yourself thinking about most as you are in the classroom, as you plan and

teach--what are some things that keep coming to your mind?" by saying:
Keeping them together. Management, I guess. Keeping things going--how
to keep things going without letting them get out of control--letting
discipline problems arise that I could possibly prevent. (8-31)

The one most perplexing management issue for Tamara pertained to the
differences in communicative style between herself and her students which centered
on the question, "Why are my students always talking?" Students interacted verbally
with her while she read books to them and while she gave them directions for their
work; they continually talked with one another during work time. This kind of

interaction at school was not within her realm of experience:

I went to an all white, rural elementary, middle and high school. We were
just expected to conform to classroom expectations like sitting in our seats
and raising our hands before talking out. At Hathaway, it is an unusual day
when the children sit in their seats and only talk when called upon. (8-31)

At first, Tamara tried to confront the situation by trying to talk louder than the
students. She soon realized that this approach was not effective. The heart of the

matter seemed to be that she felt powerless in her effort to be the one in charge of the

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classroom. It seemed to be her perception that a role of the teacher is to talk while the
role of the student is to listen. When students verbally interacted with her while She

was talking, her beliefs about these roles were challenged:

And even when I get really, really loud they tune me out. When I
constantly talk loud they tune me out. I have a sore throat all the time-- they
tune me out. I know they do. I have to stop and think, Tamara, you're
talking really loud and you need to stop that. When I start out in the
morning and they keep talking, the more frustrated I get, the louder I get
and I know that. I’m not used to that. I'm still searching for my power and
my place within the classroom. (8-31)

Verbal interaction with her students was a constant source of tension for
Tamara as evidenced in my observations of specific lessons on September 28 and
again on October 7. During the first observation, Tamara’s interdisciplinary thematic
unit on the topic of farms gave her plenty of opportunities for interaction with her
students. First, she introduced the children to sunflower seeds by reading a book about
sunflowers and then she used the seeds from a real sunflower as a counting lesson.
She had students put ten sunflower seeds in paper cups she had distributed. During the
entire lesson, there was a steady hum of discussion going on between teacher/student
and student/student conceming the activity. In the interview after the observation,
Tamara spoke about the ongoing verbal interaction throughout the lesson. When
asked what she thought about this kind of interaction, Tamara said she felt
uncomfortable with it and attributed all the talking to the familial links between

students:

They all run around with each other. It doesn’t bother me when they talk all
the time to each other but I know there has to be some kind of control on
that too because they get out of control--at times it does bother me...It just
seems like they talk the whole time--they're too loud for me lately...it's just
getting on my nerves because yesterday evening (sighs)--they're interested
in what they are doing but yet... (9—28)

During the October 7 observation, Tamara led the group in writing a story

about the field trip they had taken the day before to a farm. She then moved into

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reading two different versions of "the three little pigs" story. While Tamara read the
books, the children continually kept up a verbal interchange with her, talking about
what was happening in the story, what would happen next, and what the animals
looked like. The following interview with Tamara, which took place after the lesson,
centered on the subject that was bothering her the most--children talking while she was

teaching: (R: Researcher; T: Tamara)

R: So, what were you thinking this afternoon when you were reading The
Three Little Pigs?

T: Oh, weren't they funny. Sometimes I just--I can't take it when they
were talking back to me. They talk back and get going.

R: Do they always talk when you're reading a book?
T: Yes. Either I just have to tell them--absolutely mean it--"Shut up!"
R: What do they talk about?

T: The story-~yeah--they talk about the story--but sometimes--please just
be quiet and listen. Sometimes I want to--but no, they talk about the story
and things I really have to watch them, you know, but they talk about the
story.

R: And they kind of talk about what's going to happen or--

T: Oh yeah, I bet he's gonna do this. The way I’ve learned to listen to a
story and read a story is that the children will just sit there and listen to me.
And sometimes I wish I could stop and talk to them more about it--but that's
not me to stop and talk. I'm learning to do that but, still--because I hear
their comments, especially the ones that are really loud--I wish I could hear
everything they say but I can't when they're all yelling at me like that--not
yelling, talking back to me.

R. It's like kind of a continual dialogue? Do you attribute this kind of
interaction to this particular group of children?

T: Mostly it's my Black kids. Some of them just talk out to me--talk out
to the book--but some of them turn and talk to each other about the book.
And I'm not--I think they're thinking aloud and want to share their opinions
about what's going on. (10-7)

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In addition to communicative style differences related to verbal interactions,
Tamara confronted differences between herself and the students in relationship to the

way the African-American children responded to questions:

T: ...It's like when you get them in a classroom setting, getting them up
into that circle. When they are sitting at their desks gabbing about
everything and then you get ‘em up and you just want them to share ideas
and talk, they're quiet. When it's just about their own personal ideas like
"What's your favorite color?"--they can't even tell you that. It doesn't matter
what they're favorite color is--I'm not sure if that is just their culture or not.

R: So they are really observant and into what is going on with each other
but when you ask them a direct question, they have trouble responding.

T: Yeah, it's like, she's talking to me, what should I say?
R: And you don't know why this is?

T: Yeah. Even today, Mrs. Birdley was asking one of the little boys if he
could put together a puzzle -- "Can you put together a puzzle?" He just
went right on, went over and picked up the puzzle and started putting it
together, never answered her. She asked him three or four times if he liked
to put together puzzles. He didn't say, he just went over and did it. So, I'm
not sure why they do that. Why when us whites ask them something, why
they can't just say yes or no. I'm just not sure. (IO-l4)

Tamara was beginning to realize that children were engaged in the learning
process while verbal interchanges were happening between student and teacher . They
were relating their conversation to the book Tamara was reading and asking questions
that would further their understanding of the story. Tamara also puzzled over
situations where the children didn’t respond directly to questions. She was starting to
link this difference to the possibility that ethnic and racial diversity might be related to
communicative style.

During the final interview with Tamara in November, after she completed
student teaching, she reflected on changes that took place during the thirteen weeks in

terms of how she viewed her interactions with children during instruction:

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T: Some of the relationships I was having problems with
specifically-- with Daniel in the beginning and the way that kind of
changed-J didn't feel like I was always fighting him in the end. I don't
know what happened but I felt like in the beginning I was always trying
to fight him-- shut up and be quiet all the time or taking away things or
privileges.

R: And you're not sure why or how that changed?

T: I don't know why--I think I didn't even realize it was
happening, but now I look back in the beginning, it was a gradual
change. I still have problems with him but generally it got better and I
don't know why. When I look back, I was constantly telling children to
sit down and I didn't have to do that at the end, so I guess our
relationship changed. I guess my attitude with them changed too
because in the beginning I was always saying "no" to them--"you can't
do this, you can't do this." I don't know why it changed but it did and
I'm happy about that. It made me feel better working with the kids and
I'm sure it made the kids feel better about working with me.

R: Do you think that learning more about the culture of the
children in the classroom had anything to do with the change?

T: I had to get used to the way they act in general--they get so
excited about things-J don't know--maybe that's not how to describe it.

R: More animated, maybe?

T: Yeah, that's good. More talkative and the way they respond to
things-- you can't ask them to be quiet because that's not how they are--
and really when there's no need to be quiet, why ask them to, they're
always thinking about things--and questions--oh--questioning things, I
just couldn't believe. It seems like it was more the black kids. In the
beginning especially and then after awhile you get used to it. They're
going to ask those questions and you might as well get used to it, you
know. (1 1-18)

Secondly, Tamara confronted differences related to what and how she knew
about the world in relationship to what and how her students knew. From Tamara's
field experience at Hathaway school, she discovered that children from this urban
school community often had a different kind of knowledge about the world than she

had learned in her own rural community. Early in student teaching, this notion was

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confirmed as she noted that that her students knew a lot about what was going on in
the world around them and "as first graders, they have to take care of themselves."
Throughout student teaching, Tamara identified several kinds of diversity in the
classroom in terms of prior knowledge, especially when compared to her own.

Tamara had worked on initial planning of her thematic unit on "farms" the
previous spring. She had talked with her cooperating teacher about possible directions
to take the unit but didn't have a sense at that point of how the group of children in the
classroom would enter into her planning. During my first interview with her, I asked
her to reflect on the process she went through in developing the unit and her thoughts
at this point after she had been with the children for two weeks:

R: Last spring when you planned your thematic unit, you went through a
process. Can you talk a bit about that process, how you decided what you
wanted to do?

T: Well, my cooperating teacher wanted me to do the unit on farms that
we're doing now. It's a huge topic and trying to break that down into things
that I felt were manageable was difficult. I wanted to do more with plants
so I tried to build the plant side up and the crops, I guess, and do some
different things.

R: Now, since you are beginning to know the children, are there things
that have changed for you in how you've thought about the unit?

T: They want to talk about animals more than plants. They're very active
and very talkative and doing more active things.

R: What did they already know about animals?

T: They knew a lot less than I thought they would. I don't know if they
don't know or if they don't answer. Like today, I asked them what a dairy
was and nobody knew what a dairy was. So I think they know less than
what I thought they would know. And then again, they know some things
that you wouldn't expect.

R: What has been their experiences with animals?

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T: Pets--cats and dogs and they know like songs about them and noises
they make and things like that. They know that cows give milk. We
haven't really been into what animals are used for--I don't know how much
they have an understanding of that. Right now, it's very slow. (8-31)

Tamara was starting to think about how she might make adaptations to the
curriculum based on the prior knowledge of her students. She also realized that she
needed to plan experiences that would give her students an opportunity to go beyond
what they knew. A field trip to a nearby Amish community which held farm auctions
was a highlight during her farm unit. Tamara, who had grown up on a farm, learned
that there were many of her students who had previously had no connections with the
farm and could not even recognize particular animals. After the field trip, She
described how the children responded to the animals:

They just wanted to hold them. They wanted to touch them and everything.
Daniel got to feed the baby calves a bottle. And so that was good and we
got to see rabbits and horses. It was just funny, some of the things they
talked about--"it stinks"--and there was dew on the grass. Now the children
have all seen goats, cows, pigs, dogs and chickens and can even recognize
these animals. If I would have done a jungle or dinosaur theme, I couldn't
have made these kinds of connections. (10-14)

Tamara began to figure out that she could not assume that her students knew
what she knew. Four weeks later after another classroom observation, Tamara said to

me in the interview after the classroom observation:

You have to be so specific with them and you have to Show them
everything. You have to show them what you mean. And once you do it -
the first time we do an activity, it's like new water to them but then after you
Show them, they'll understand. (10-28)

Tamara was learning that if there is something that she wanted her students to know,
she needed to be very explicit in introducing the concept.

Throughout student teaching, Tamara identified other kinds of diversity in the
classroom in terms of prior knowledge. For example, she described Kenton as a child

who is very different from herself:

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He has a sexual knowledge about the world that first graders should not
have He is familiar with sexual terms that shocked me. He has knowledge
of current news and weather but he is most different from me in terms of his
expression of sexual knowledge. (10-14)

Finally, in this area of racial and ethnic differences, Tamara experienced a
number of situations where issues regarding race emerged. Tamara’s field experience
at Hathaway school gave her some glimpses into the kind of ethnic and racial diversity
issues she might encounter during student teaching but she still felt quite unsure of
herself and uncomfortable when situations relating to race came up in the class.

During the second week of student teaching, Tamara said to me in an interview:

I feel like when we talk about racial things I have to watch Tyler because
he's gonna say something. I notice myself watching him whenever we get
into a discussion which could lead to racial things. I try to prevent him
from saying something because once he gets going--I'm not comfortable

dealing with him yet. (10-14)
Of major concern to Tamara all throughout student teaching was how to handle
Specific situations related to race that arose in the classroom. In the first interview
with Tamara, she talked about her own biases and her lack of experience with others

who are racially different from her:

We had a lot of Mexicans in high school--Mexican-Americans I guess. I’m
not sure but I had a bad stereotype of them. They were rough and were
bullies and I never became friends with anybody from that culture. I think
all my bad Black stereotypes are still there. I mean I still think about it--like
when I’m at the school at night and go out to my car. I haven’t really had
much experience. (8-31)

During the student teaching semester, Tamara made several references to
instances in the classroom where racial issues became important. One day Nathan,
one of the four white children in the classroom, was working on his self-portrait and

colored his skin black:

I went up to him and asked him why he was coloring his picture black. He
said, "Because she (a black girl) is" .I said, "Well, that is because she is
black and you are white." He just looked for a minute. Then T.V., who is a

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mulatto, stuck his arm over and said, "Hey, I'm darker than you Nathan, but
not as black as Becky." Then T.V. flipped his hand over and said, "Hey,
Nathan, my hand is almost as white as your arm." Nathan still wanted to
color himself black. I said, "Go ahead,” you know. And then Kendall tells
me all white people are prejudiced. I asked him where he got that idea and
he said, "my mama told me." Glenn asked me the other day, "Do you know
you a white girl?" I said, "I think I know that Glenn." It's interesting to me,
you know. (10-14)

Even though Tamara felt unsure of herself when it came to responding to racial
issues, she made attempts to connect curriculum topics to the heritage of African-
Americans. Since the majority of students in her class were African-American, Tamara
thought that her students needed to know more about their history. On October 28,
Tamara's lesson plan stated that her objective was to "expose the kids to black

successful persons." Tamara began the lesson by telling her students:

T: Today we're going to talk about George Washington Carver.
Givonti, who do you think he was?

G: President.

T: Any other ideas? (Silence) Do you think he was a white man
or a black man? (Most students say he was a white man.) Well, he was
a black man. (Many students clench fists and raise in air saying,
"Yes!") You'll have to put on your thinking cap for this one. George
Washington Carver found 300 uses for this one plant. What do you
think it is? (Shows picture of a plant)

J: Tomato

K: A flower

T: It does look like a flower.
D: Peanuts!

T: Stand up and say that, Daniel! George Washington Carver
discovered peanut butter, peanut oil, shampoo with peanut oil, face
cream, 300 uses. I'm going to read you a book called Pocketful of
Goobers. Do you know what goobers are?

D: Like grapes?

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T: Well, they are peanuts. (reads book) (IO-28)

In the interview after the lesson, I asked Tamara if she had ever talked about
other Afiican-Americans with the children. Her response was that they did talk about
African-Americans in sports because that's what the children bring up.

In summary, it’s clear that Tamara was experiencing some disequalibirum in
the area of ethnic and racial diversity as she student taught in a classroom where many
of the children came from very different backgrounds than her own. Differences that
emerged for her in this area of racial and ethnic diversity related to communicative

style, prior knowledge and racial issues.

(B) Language
Tamara found that her Afiican-American students often seemed to speak a

language that was different from her own. She told about terms they used which she
had never heard of before and about unfamiliar patterns of language interactions.

Early on in student teaching, a child told Tamara about the term “whipping cor ”:

I never knew what a whipping cord was and all the kids seemed to know.
She was talking about getting beatings, whippings with a whipping cord. I
just sort of sat there and looked at her. I had never heard of a whipping cord.
(9-28)

Another example of an unfamiliar term to Tamara came in talk about hair
styles:

They were talking about something the other day--oh--the thingies in their
hair. I forget what you call them now--the things they braid into their hair
that are fake and that make them look like they have a big thick thing of
hair. (10-7)

Not only unfamiliar terms, but grammar usage was a difference confronted by

Tamara:

T: They don't use verbs correctly and language like that--it's hard to get
used to.

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R: What do you do, then, about language in the classroom when you don't
consider it to be standard English?

T: Nothing. Right now just getting them to talk about things we want
them to talk about and stuff is the issue. One of the African-American
teachers at this school, Mrs. Bates, was willing to share her beliefs about
dialect with me. She told me that she allows her children to use their dialect
during most of the day but at times they had to use “book language.” (10-
28)

In her last journal reflection, Tamara noted that the dialect of the African-
American children had not been a problem for her. While she did not reflect a great
deal on children using non-standard English at school, it seemed that she did recognize

that this was an issue to consider.

(C) Socioeconomic
Tamara never had to wonder whether her own parents would provide her either

a lunch or lunch money for school. At Hathaway school, she found her students’ not

having lunch or lunch money a perplexing situation:

We had two kids who, like the first week of school, we would let them
charge until their free lunch went through. Two parents wouldn't send their
children lunch money and so the school got tired of giving them their lunch
and told them that they had to ask for peanut butter and crackers. That's just
ridiculous, the things they have to go through here. It's like, are you
serious? (8-31)

During student teaching, Tamara made a number of references to the economic
status of her children and their families, particularly in terms of lunch status--who paid

full lunch prices and who qualified for free or reduced lunch prices:

Brittany's mom and dad are really good about coming into everything and
being supportive. They are parents who are willing to admit that their child
isn't the top--the greatest, you know. They know she has some problems.
They are the only ones who pay full lunch. All the other parents I've met,
two are on reduced lunches and the rest are free... Those who pay the full or
reduced priced lunches are among the first to send in money for field trips.
Some of the parents whose children get free meals--it is more difficult to get
the money from them. (10-18)

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During the last weeks of student teaching, Tamara again reflected on economic status:

I think many of the issues that I face in the classroom are around money
more than race. Such as one child will get a new book bag when others do
not even have a book bag. It is a sad issue to deal and I feel more
comfortable dealing with race issues rather than economic issues. (10-28)

Tamara thought about the financial resources of her students’ families most
frequently in terms of lunch status at school. While Tamara limited her reflections to
financial resources in the area of socioeconomic diversity, it is clear that she did
recognize economic status as an issue that has a significant impact on the lives of
children in her classroom. She suggested that it was more comfortable to talk and

think about racial issues than about socioeconomic factors.

(D)E . 1..

Tamara went into student teaching with the positive attitude that children with
special needs would be an integral part of her classroom community. She was
concerned, though, about this aspect of diversity among her students in terms of how
to include them socially and academically into the classroom. Several incidents took
place which challenged her belief that students with special needs could be part of the
regular classroom. Early in October, Tamara attended a before school meeting with all
of the elementary teachers in Hathaway school which was intended to focus on
inclusion of all students in the classroom. In an interview with Tamara on the day of

the meeting, she expressed her concerns:
T: We had a meeting on inclusion this morning.
R: Oh, you did?

T: Yeah, with the primary education and special education people.

They were talking about getting the special ed kids in the regular classroom
more. It's fine for our Mth (moderately mentally handicapped) girl to be
in our room. She only comes for specials and she went on a field trip with
us...she isn't a behavior problem. But the MiMh (mildly mentally
handicapped), he is such a behavior problem. My teacher told Billy he
couldn't go on the next field trip because he went on the last one--did I tell

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you about that? He went with us and he got into the pens. We were in with
the baby cows and we looked over and there's like a small waiting-stall
type-thing where the two month old calves go and they're getting pretty big
when they're two months old. The next thing we know he's doing
cartwheels out there in the two-month old pen and I'm like, "Oh, my
goodness". What are you supposed to do, you know. They want him to go
with us but he's not in our room all the time so...

R: He is in a special education classroom?

T: Yeah--we don't know how to deal with his problems...Yesterday he was
laying [Sic] on the table--they're doing all this cutting and gluing. I go in
there and he's on the table leaning over and talking to Scott. We can't handle
him. We can't do it...Actually, for Billy, you have to have just one person to
be zoning in on him--it's just amazing what they expect from us. (10-7)

Tamara also brought up the struggles they were having with the children in the

classroom who had hearing problems:
R: What kind of hearing problems?

T: Physically can't hear. So those children we really have to watch and
sometimes I ask them, "did you hear what I said?" So those children, all of
those who are supposed to have hearing difficulties, are problems in the
class.

R: In what way?

T: They talk when we are talking. Some of them make noises. They start
making noises and basically talking when they aren't supposed to. And they
don't look at us. (IO-18)

Tamara began thinking about the children with special needs as “problems” in
terms of behavior and in planning for instruction. When I asked her how she went

about planning for teaching when she had students with so many different needs, she
responded by saying:

T: It's very difficult to plan for these children and their specialized
teachers are not quick to help in that planning. Unless there are smaller
classes of full-time paraprofessionals I could not imagine those children
getting the help they need. Also, I can see the other students being cheated
because of the teachers needing to individualize instruction for those mildly
and moderately mentally handicapped children and our hearing impaired

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students. Next year when inclusion goes full scale at Hathaway, I'm glad I
won’t be there to see it. (10-18)

Tamara’s experiences at Hathaway challenged her initial beliefs that children
with special needs should be included in a regular classroom setting. She found it
difficult to think about planning and implementing instruction for such a wide
diversity of educational needs. Children with special needs tended to be viewed as

“problems in the classroom.

(E) Slender

There were several references to gender from the data collected on Tamara’s
experiences in the classroom. Unfortunately, these references were brief, resulting in
many questions about the particular instances on which she reflected.

During the first interview with Tamara, I asked her to describe the way the
children in her classroom related to one another. While the following incident is also
directly related to area of race, the fact that she particularly talked about the girls in her
class convinced me to use the gender category instead of the ethnic and racial

category:

I think the strong personalities are protective of the weaker
personalities in the classroom which is most of the time the black
girls protecting the two white girls. I didn’t expect that. We’ve got
a lot of--most of the girls--I think we have one black girl with a
personality that isn’t like outgoing and bold. (8-31)

This conversation took another turn so specific examples of her thinking were
never established. In another area, Tamara spoke about her concerns with classroom
management and reflected on the way She responded differently to the behavior of
boys and girls. She commented that she finds herself “yelling at boys--I can see a girl

doing the same thing and I don’t jump on them.”

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A final reference to gender emerged from Tamara’s journal on October 27 as
she reflected on the ways in which the children were making connections to her farm
unit:

Some of the children in the classroom were very excited about the plant

experiments that we did in the class like the celery in colored water and the
bean swell. Generally, the boys were the most verbal and excited. (IO-27)

In summary, while gender issues were not dominant throughout student
teaching, the above instances provides enough data to suggest that Tamara was

noticing and reflecting on gender diversity.

(F) EamihLEattsuns

It was very clear to Tamara that her mother, father and siblings were her
immediate family unit. When she was growing up, someone from this unit was
present when She came home from school each day. In contrast, she talked about how
many of her students went home to "nobody" and she became confused when trying to
sort out who "family" was for each student. Tamara's experiences in her rural farm
community gave her the strong sense that family and neighbors take care of each
other. A number of instances in the classroom caused her to face the idea that there
may be different ways to think about "who is family?" and the kinds of roles played by

family members:

I don't understand a lot of their home situations from the kids talking. They
talk about their aunties all the time, grandmas too, but then suddenly they're
talking about mom--it's like, is mom there? And then dad-~it's like mom
and dad together and you're not with mom and dad--you know. That's what
I'm thinking. It's very confusing. They have the most confusing homes...I
feel like I don't want to leave anybody out--like when I say, take this home
to mom and dad--mom and dad, auntie, grandpa, grandma, whoever. (8-31)

In late September, Tamara ate lunch with several of the children which
included one with whom she seemed to be having the most trouble in terms of

management and discipline, Daniel. In spite of her frustrations with him, Tamara

87

made efforts to get to know him better and started thinking about possible differences
between her socialization and Daniel’s which might explain his behavior patterns
which didn't match her own. In her journal entry after her lunch with Daniel, Tamara

wrote that

Daniel is the child I have the most problems with. He lives with his mom
and two siblings. His father lives in a near by apartment and comes to visit
often... Daniel's favorite thing about school is " Student of the Week"
although he has not received this award. Daniel's friends are people who
come to his house to play. I would like to say that I understand my problem
with Daniel better; however, I do not. One aspect of Daniel's personality
that I did gain [knowledge of] was that he talked all during lunch and stood
up to eat; something I am clearly not accustomed to within my society. I
still hope to gain insights into my relationship with Daniel. (9-27)

Unfamiliar family situations relayed to Tamara by the children in the class left
her in a quandary. During an interview in late September, Tamara elaborated on one

conversation with J avonte:

Like they tell you things about their family and I don't know how to
respond. I mean, I don't know how to respond to things they do and say.
One day Javonte asked me if I had kids. I'm like, "No, I don't have any
children." Then he asked, "Why aren't you married?” "Well, I haven't
found anyone, Javonte." "You should be trying to find someone." Then he
told me everything about his family, the bad stuff and the good stuff, who
died, who got shot. (9-28)

When I asked her how she found herself responding to things like "my brother
got shot last night,” she answered that she usually asked them what happened and if
the person who got shot is okay. She then will tell them she hopes they get better. "I
don't write them off,” Tamara said, "but yet, I don't want them to get upset."

During this same interview in late September, Tamara admitted that she had
gone into student teaching with a negative attitude about parents of children in this
school: "they're not going to be very helpful and they're just going to be kind of--
they're going to fight us all the way." Throughout the thirteen weeks of student

teaching, several instances arose concerning parents which supported this initial

88

attitude. In an interview in early October, Tamara noted an incident conceming a note

from a parent that made her angry and frustrated;

We got this letter from one of the parents this morning. We send home tons
of notes from the office--killing trees--and the child's mother said that she
didn't want her child out in the cold today and it was too short of a notice to
have him wear red today. And she didn't want his red shirt showing because
she wanted his coat zipped and buttoned. We weren't going to let his coat
open just to see the red--we're having this neighborhood walk against drugs
today at 1:15 and I'm like, get serious, it was so negative, like we were just
idiots...

A lot of the kids don't even have red on today. I didn't even know we were
supposed to wear red today. But, just things that you aren't expecting and
they're thinking totally different things--it's like that with anybody you work
with but parents are like--gotta protect my child. I'm not saying they
shouldn't but it just seems like they're not concerned enough to come in
about grades and when they're having a problem in school but Lord, when
they think we're not going to button and zip their coats, they're gonna have a
fit on us. (10-7)

Tamara went on to add that “it would just seem like parents would at least
acknowledge a note that was sent home-just to get some kind of a response.” She felt
like the effort was all in one direction--fi'om teacher to parent and without reciprocity.
Tamara wondered what parents did think about the school and the classroom: "I have
no clue what they think about us, what they think we're doing here. I don't know what
they think, they won't even respond."

Tamara also began to see differing norms between school and home, especially
in ways of responding to conflict. She related the story of one mother who came in for
conferences who explained to the teachers that she told her daughter not to take
anything from other kids, to hit them back. Tamara recognized the conflicting
message for the child but clearly felt that the message the school was giving was the

COITCCI one:

89

Yeah, she’s getting two totally different messages ‘cause we’re telling
her “you're going to get in trouble for fighting and it's not going to
solve the problem” and her mother is telling her to hit back. I
thought, no wonder we can't do anything, you know. (IO-18)

Tamara’s supervising teacher, Mrs. Birdley, seemed to enjoy working at
making the classroom a hospitable place for parents. However, Tamara picked up

from other faculty and staff members a negative attitude about teaching at Hathaway:

They say it's hard to get parents involved and that the kids get “attitudes” by
second grade. And some of them even come into the kindergarten with
attitudes. I'm not sure they would say that about white kids, that they come
in with an attitude. (10-18)

In spite of Tamara’s criticism of parents, She generally seemed to feel positive
about her interaction with parents during student teaching. In her last journal entry,
she noted that

I had to become comfortable dealing with parents during this term or be
uncomfortable many times. I saw parents at: back-to-school night; first-
grade parent night; Parent’s Day; Indian Awards Day; class and school
parties; the school play; and during parent-teacher conferences. 1 was able
to send notes home to parents concerning many of these activities and was
then able to talk with parents during these times. Most all of this
communication was very positive. (11-8)

Di Elll'l “.1 lEl'

As Tamara student taught in a culturally diverse classroom, she confronted a
number of differences between herself and her students. These include differences in
ethnicity and race; language; socioeconomic background; gender; special education
needs; and family patterns. Nieto’s (1992) model characterizing levels of multicultural
attitudes and behaviors was adapted as a frame for analyzing the development of
Tamara’s multicultural attitudes and behaviors in these areas of differences. See

Figure 3 at the end of this case study for a summary of this development.

90

(A) RaoialnniEthnio

Tamara spent a significant amount of time during student teaching trying to
resolve the dilemma of determining appropriate classroom interaction between
students and teacher. At the beginning of student teaching, she was quite concerned
about the active role that her students took in responding to her teaching, particularly
in the ways that related to the amount of verbal interaction. From her own schooling
experiences, she was used to the teacher talking and the children listening. In this
classroom, students seemed to be involved in much more verbal interchange with her
while she was teaching. She tolerated this difference but found it frustrating and
actually physically exhausting as she tried to shout over the students. At the beginning
of student teaching in August, Tamara seemed to be at Level One in her development
of multicultural attitudes and behaviors in terms of differences in communicative style.

While managing the classroom, the issue of student/teacher interaction was
initially a concern for Tamara but towards the end of student teaching she was
beginning to think that perhaps her own schooling experience was not necessarily the
only way for education to take place: it may not be necessary for children to sit in
silence while a book is being read to the class. In late October, after talking with
another student teacher (whose classroom was in a suburban setting with mostly Anglo
children) about her struggles with her expectations of students in terms of verbal

interactions, Tamara wrote:

I was thinking about my conversation with Leanne when she said that it
is not a question in her classroom of whether the children will get quiet
when she is talking, they just do. Maybe our expectations for
Hathaway should be the same as for her children. I do not know, should
we have the same expectations socially as other schools? Personally, I
think not, as long as it does not interfere with the learning environment.
I still have the same academic expectations as I would have with other
children but not the same social expectations. For me, this was a very
interesting discovery about my own teaching. (10-28)

91

By the end of student teaching, Tamara thinking had developed from a Level
One (Tolerance for Differences) to the beginning of Level Two (Acceptance of
Differences) in regards to differences in communicative style. She felt more
comfortable with differences in communicative style between herself and her students
and realized that her way of communicating was not necessarily the only way. Her
students were learning in ways that had not been a part of her background but she
acknowledged that these ways were of value.

In addition to different communicative styles, Tamara readily acknowledged
that many of the children at this school had a different kind of prior knowledge than
her own. What the children knew about and how they knew were different. While
some of Tamara’s assumptions regarding what students knew about content seemed to
stem from a lack of teaching experience with first graders, other assumptions were
more culture-based. Tamara's rural background and the children's urban experiences
often did not connect. Tamara attempted to resolve some of these differences through
content of the curriculum and the ways in which she planned for children to engage in
learning. In August, Tamara seemed to enter student teaching at Level One (Tolerance
for Differences) and moved to a Level Two (Acceptance) category by the end of
student teaching in December as she began to accept the prior knowledge of her
students as important and made attempts to connect this knowledge to the curriculum.

The pilot study documentation shows that Tamara was concerned at the outset
of her student teaching about issues related to race. While her attitude was one of
tolerance (Level One) and openness to learning about cultural differences, she felt
uncomfortable with how to handle issues related to race, especially that of color. As
she developed relationships with the children and became involved in several incidents
with them which involved talking about racial issues, the focus of her written
reflections as well as the oral interviews portrayed an attitude of acceptance of

diversity and an acknowledgment of the importance of talking about these differences.

92

Tamara found that as student teaching continued she did not have to ignore comments
about differences such as skin color because she did not know what to say. She began
to feel more comfortable addressing differences in a small group setting with the
students who were involved at the moment with a particular concern. She found that
when children brought up issues of color on their own, she could then keep them
thinking by asking questions and could keep them talking. Tamara’s entering beliefs
and attitudes about racial diversity was characterized by tolerance accompanied by
some anxiety and uncertainty. Throughout the student teaching semester, she became
more accepting and able to acknowledge the importance of racial differences. She
developed from a Level One (Tolerance) stage of multicultural attitudes and behaviors
to at least the beginning of Level Two (Acceptance of Differences).
(B) Language

Tamara entered student teaching with the knowledge that African-American
students talked about things that she did not understand. However, she acknowledged
these differences and was interested in discovering the meaning of these unfamiliar
terms. She also became aware that many of the African-American students used non-
standard English as they communicated in the classroom but this did not seem to be an
area that concerned her. It seems that Tamara entered student teaching with an attitude
of tolerance (Level One) of these differences in language and remained at that level
throughout the semester.
(C) Socioeconomic

Tamara made several direct references to differences between herself and her
students in terms of socioeconomic status. She was quite aware that economic and
class factors play a salient role in issues of diversity. While she was uncomfortable
talking about economic differences, she realized the impact that financial resources
have on opportunities for her students. Tamara continued to characterize children and

their families in relationship to the lunch status of students at school (full pay, free or

93

reduced lunch). Tamara seemed to enter and remain at Level One (Tolerance for
Differences) throughout student teaching in her thinking about socioeconomic

diversity.

(D)E . 1..

Tamara's attitude at the beginning of student teaching towards children with
special needs in her classroom was one of acceptance (Level Two) She knew that she
would have students with a variety of special needs and although she had some
concerns about how to accommodate these needs, her attitude was one of acceptance
of this form of diversity. During her weeks of student teaching, however, she grew
more disillusioned with the idea that children with special needs can be accommodated
academically and socially into the regular classroom. Experiences in including
children with special needs, coupled with the attitude of a number of classroom
teachers in the building, seemed to have challenged her earlier beliefs.

Tamara's level of attitude seemed to shift from the belief that children with
special needs should be accepted and included in the regular classroom community
(Level Two) back to a beginning level of tolerance (Level One) in the area of

exceptionalities.

(E) Gender

Tamara reflected on several instances throughout student teaching that
involved gender diversity. In one instance She separated out the girls in the class by
suggesting that the Black girls protected the White girls. In another area related to
gender, she reflected on how she seemed to react in more negative ways to the
behavior of the boys in her classroom in comparison to the behavior of the girls. In a
final reference to gender, she reflected on her observation that the boys in the
classroom seemed to be more excited about the plant experiments they were doing in

the classroom in comparison to the responses of the girls. These instances relating to

94

gender groups do not fit neatly into a particular category, but do indicate that Tamara
is acknowledging differences in the area of gender and is thinking about these
differences in relationship to her teaching. She seems to have begun student teaching
in August at a tolerance level (Level One) and remained at this level throughout the
semester.

(F) W

Tamara entered student teaching with a conception of family based on her own
family background--a father, mother, brothers and sisters--living in the same house.
She thought of a family as a traditional family unit--mother, father and children.
Tamara became much more aware of different family configurations during her time at
Hathaway school and seemed to become more accepting of the fact that children do
have family even though who is in a family may not match her own conception of
family. She seemed to begin student teaching at a low level of tolerance for family
configurations different from her own and developed into the level of acceptance
(Level Two).

Tamara's attitude toward parents at the beginning of student teaching could be
classified as a "us against them" kind of attitude. She found that her view of how
parents should respond to their children and to the school did not correspond to what
she was experiencing in interactions with parents of the children in her classroom. She
found these differences to be a source of frustration throughout student teaching.
However, she did find personal contacts with parents to be congenial as indicated
when she reflected in her last journal reflection about Specific events at school where
these contacts took place. In the area of family patterns related to differences in social
patterns and values, Tamara seemed to enter and remain tolerant (Level One)

throughout her student teaching experience.

95

Simmer:
The data suggests that Tamara confronted differences during student teaching

between herself and her first grade students in all six categories of diversity identified
in this study: racial and ethnic; language; socioeconomic; exceptionalities; gender; and
family patterns.

At the beginning of student teaching, Tamara tolerated differences in the area
of racial and ethnic diversity. She realized that her students exhibited a different
communicative style than her own. Tamara also learned that there were differences
between the prior knowledge brought to school by her students in comparison to her
own. In addition, although she tolerated the situations that arose in the classroom
regarding race, she also felt uncomfortable dealing with specific racial issues. As she
interacted with her students over the student teaching semester and reflected on these
interactions, she began to value and accept these differences.

In the areas of language, socioeconomic and gender diversity, Tamara found
unfamiliar terms and patterns of speech; unfamiliarity with economic situations; and
various gender issues. In these areas, while she did encounter particular situations that
caused her to reflect and react, she seemed to remain at a tolerance level throughout
student teaching.

Entering this first grade classroom, Tamara seemed to acknowledge and value
the special needs of children. She supported the concept of including all children as
much as possible into the regular classroom setting and seemed to be ready to make
accommodations for their needs. However, as student teaching proceeded, Tamara
experienced frustration with this arrangement and became less willing to explore
alternative ways to include these children. She developed lower expectations for
children with special needs.

Finally, Tamara identified differences between herself and her students in

relationship to family patterns. Tamara went into student teaching defining family in a

96

way that reflected her own experiences in a two-parent family from a rural community.
As student teaching progressed, she began to acknowledge and value the various
family configurations represented in the classroom. However, throughout student
teaching, Tamara continued to be puzzled and somewhat uncomfortable with the
differences she perceived between her own sense of social patterns and values and

those of her students and their families.

97

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98

JEREMY
Barkeroundlnformation

I had never seen whites, A fiican-A mericans and Hispanics work
together in a contained area except for in the movies.

Twenty-three year old Jeremy has bright red hair and very fair skin. He
described his midwestem hometown as “fairly small with one stoplight, one grocery
store and one restaurant.” When asked to share something about his family, Jeremy
quickly responded that a “major factor in my family is that we are Christians.” Until
Jeremy was eight, his family traveled from church to church on weekends with a group
called the Full Gospel Singers in which his parents were participants.

Jeremy attended a small rural elementary school and then went to a larger
middle school. However, for high school, his parents moved to a community with a
smaller high school so that "my brother and I had a better chance at sports." The year
after high school, Jeremy was involved in "sort of like missionary work with Youth for
a Mission. We went to Mexico and Minneapolis and did some inner city stuff. "

Jeremy decided to become a teacher when he walked by the laboratory
kindergarten on a visit to the college campus after he had completed his Youth for a
Mission term. He had been entertaining the thought of teaching but "going by and
seeing the kids playing--we stopped there for a little bit--I thought, this is what I want
to do. I really like kids."

As a child, Jeremy thought that teachers were "really cool" and he liked
teachers who went out to recess and played with students. Now, he has concluded that
"there is more to teaching than I thought. You could have a major impact on a kid's
life or you could ruin it. "

At the beginning of the Elementary Curriculum Studies course (during the pilot

99

study), Jeremy stated that

I have never really talked to a black person before being in this school and I
value the experience. I had never seen whites, African-Americans and
Hispanics work together in a contained area except for in the movies.

Themes that emerged from Jeremy's reflections on his experiences in the
Elementary Curriculum Studies course include (1) a continual struggle in dealing with
his own feelings of prejudice; (2) a feeling that this classroom site was truly unfamiliar
territory; and (3) uncertainty about how to respond to specific instances in the
classroom which focused on cultural differences.

After reading White Teacher (Paley, 1989) and participating in this second-
grade classroom, Jeremy began to reflect on the notions presented by Paley that (1)
differences among persons need to be valued rather than ignored, and (2) our
expectations of certain individuals or groups of students may be reduced because of

our own prejudices and the stereotypes we hold:

...looking within myself I see myself thinking and trying to justify treating
all people on the same level with a pair of color-blind glasses on. I always
thought this was the correct approach to take but now I realize this isn't
handling a situation but avoiding it all together.

I once again find myself falling into this same category of not expecting as
much from the black children simply because they are black. I seem to
think of things in terms of my own way which for myself is the
stereotypical white man's way.

While only being in the classroom for two weeks now and after reading
White Teacher, I've begun to see that I have many prejudices that I didn't
even realize that I had. My prejudiced feelings began on my Study Service
Term in Lirnone, Costa Rica after constantly being yelled at by blacks on
the street for being a white North American with long red hair. I did
nothing to receive these Obscenities and now hold a resentment of all blacks
in general until they prove themselves to me. The feelings that I hold for
black people in general aren't directed towards kids in my classroom
because I don't blame them but blame the older black generations who have
chips on their shoulders and rightfully so.

Jeremy’s written field notes during the pilot study reflected the way he was

feeling about being a minority in the classroom. He recognized that his own

100

background had not been one which allowed him to feel comfortable with others who

did not share his culture.

From the beginning of my kindergarten year until the end of my senior year
in high school, I can count on one hand the number of kids I've had in my
classes that were of a different cultural background. Five. And out of these
five students there was only one who was African-American. So now I'm
placed in a situation where I'm surrounded by ten Afiican-Americans, two
Hispanic and nine white students. Help!

A number of specific situations arose during field work which Jeremy felt
unequipped to handle. One moming he helped students with a worksheet that
involved working with scissors, glue and pencils. Students were working individually
when Jeremy heard Winona yell, "Quit it nigger" to Chester. Jeremy commented, "I
was dumbfounded. What was I supposed to do?" Another day Chester started to cry
and when Jeremy asked him what was wrong, Chester told him that "they be makin'
fun of my mama." In this situation, Jeremy attempted to work at some understandings
between the children involved but still felt uncomfortable with the situation and unsure
about how he handled the interaction.

Eleanor, the African-American educator who conducted several class sessions
on diversity, seemed to influence Jeremy’s perspectives, particularly in the area of
thinking about parents and their children. After one session with Eleanor, Jeremy
noted that

there was one statement that Eleanor made that really made me stop and
think about what she had said. Her statement was "every parent wants the
best for their child but a lot of parents don't know how to achieve this." In
my classroom at Hathaway I just assumed that Joshua's parents didn't care
about his schooling. I thought that his actions were a direct reflection of his
parents’ lack of concem...then last week I saw a book order form with
Joshua's name on it for over fifteen dollars worth of book and it was signed
by his mother. Go figure! This just shows me that parents do care about
their children but sometimes the child's actions aren't directly reflective of
the love and attention that they get at home.

After the practicum was completed, Jeremy commented that "this field work

was hard." However, he decided that he wanted to go back to Hathaway school and

101

requested to student teach with the teacher he had for this practicum. He thought it
"would be much easier to go to some of the other schools in the area and do my
student teaching there but I feel that with teaching students here, and the whole
atmosphere in general being harder, it will foster a greater learning environment for

me to sharpen my teaching skills and abilities."

Hill II '61

It seems like a black person has to prove himself to me but I 'm trying to
work on that.

Jeremy's entry into student teaching was accompanied by a set of beliefs or
constructs that grew out of his background of experiences in his home, school and
community. During his practicum work, Jeremy had struggled with his own feelings
of prejudice, noting that his term in Costa Rica had been a time when feelings of
prejudice surfaced. In my first interview with him during student teaching, two weeks
after school had started, he again brought up his intercultural semester in Costa Rica

which had taken place during his second year of college.

I had spent some time in Mexico after high school, a month and a half. We
did some Bible distribution and they were really wonderful people. It
seemed that all the people down in Mexico were really nice. Then I went to
Costa Rica--my host families were really dynamite. My first one was really
understanding. I wanted to go home so bad but they were really
understanding and helped me out a lot. I am really thankful for that. And
my second family, whenever I asked them to say something slower they
would just laugh (laughs) at me and keep going you know. It seemed like I
had a really excellent experience expect for this one part.

When I was in Limone when I walked to work, sometimes I'd go over to
this girl's house and for some reason these black guys-~they'd always yell at
me. Sometimes in English and sometimes in Spanish, they'd yell profanity
or just anything you know. It would never stop. A couple of times I said
some stuff but I don't know it just seems like since they were black-—okay,
before Costa Rica I'd say that I might have been a little prejudiced but I
mean, nothing really. I wouldn't have considered myself prejudiced at all. I
mean, since then, it seems almost like--and I'm not saying that all of my
experience was bad cause I went to this black Baptist church and they were

102

all excellent there but it seems like just those incidences from those guys
saying that it seems like now I'm prejudiced. It seems like a black person
has to prove himself to me but I'm trying to work on that. That's one of the
reasons I picked Hathaway, because I don't want to think that way. And
with some people I don't but sometimes I just prejudge them.

Jeremy's acknowledgment of this reason for choosing Hathaway school led me
to ask him if he thought these feelings had affected or will affect his work at Hathaway
during student teaching. He responded by saying that “working with children isn’t the
problem but it might affect my relationships with some of the older black persons, like
parents or high school age students.”

Throughout student teaching, Jeremy continued to confront his feelings of
prejudice. His story is told within the framework of six particular types of diversity
that impact teaching and learning which include: (A) ethnic and racial; (B) language;
(C) socioeconomic background; (D) exceptionalities; (E) gender and (F) family
patterns.

( i I B . l l E l .

Jeremy confronted differences between himself and his students in three areas
of racial and ethnic diversity: (1) racial issues particularly related to physical
characteristics; (2) prior knowledge of students; and (3) expectations for behavior.
First, in his practicum work earlier that year, Jeremy did not hesitate to talk about his
feelings of being in unfamiliar cultural tenitory in a classroom where the majority of
children were African-American. During my first interview with Jeremy, two weeks

after student teaching began, he continued to express similar feelings:

I had this one kid that was in the bathroom, there were two of them, the one
kid comes out and tells me that there is a kid in there cussing. So, I go in
there and I said, ”I was told that two of you guys are cussing.” The one kid
says, “I wasn't cussing. The only thing I said was nigger, you honkey.” He
says this to me! I was shocked! I mean I was totally shocked! I didn’t
know what to do. I said, “your name is in the book for that one.” (9-1)

During this same interview, Jeremy described three of the boys in his class.

Color of skin seemed to be of significance to him in these descriptions:

103

Dustin is white. I really like Dustin. I think he comes from a really caring
family. He's very, very polite. He, when he has a question, raises his
hand....Then, Brandon, he's black. And then Mario is, I don't know, he
might be black or mixed. His mother is white. (9-1)

Toward the end of the interview, I asked him what stood out in his mind as he
thought about the differences among the children in his classroom. Our conversation

follows:

J: I think maybe, I think, the biggest difference is the color of skin. That's
just on the outside though. But as far as doing anything out of the ordinary,
behavior problems or things like that, it doesn't matter about the color of
skin. I mean, I don't know, there's really not that much difference that I can
see except maybe how they carry their body and react to different situations.

R: What do you mean, how they carry their body?

J: Um--I mean, okay, there's just a difference in the way a white person and
a black person walks. I don't know, I don't know how to describe it.
There's just a difference. And sometimes the way they wear their clothes--
I'm not saying all--but some of them like to wear the baggy clothes. I like
to wear the baggy clothes myself. Yeah, basically what I'm saying is
outward appearance but inward I would say that there's not anything
drastically different. (9-1)

In a journal entry three weeks later, Jeremy continued to view the major
diversity in his classroom as one of different racial backgrounds. He seemed to want
to be able to discuss color differences with the children in his classroom and talked

about some initial planning that might lead him in that direction.

All of my students fall under the category of black, white or a mixture of
both, so I can see a major diversity in their racial backgrounds alone. When
planning I try not to only pick out the white trade books but also try to pick
out books that include blacks in the story. I also feel as though it is
important for these children to see the differences, ask questions, and not be
ashamed of who they are or where they come from. Next week I'm going to
read the book People (Spier, 1980) to the children and hopefully they'll see
the differences and ask questions. (9-24)

In this same journal entry, Jeremy wrote about one of the lessons that stood out
to him as being the best so far in his student teaching. He showed slides from Mexico

and talked about Mexico and Costa Rica in an attempt to establish a more global view

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of the concept of community. He wrote about a discussion that occurred during this

presentation:

A question posed by Gena was “Why are all of the people in the slides a
different color that we are (she's black)?” As I tried to explain this, Gena
asked if the children's parents were either black or white or one of each
color. Then while I was explaining this, Rebeca said, “Oh, I know why! It's
because it's hotter there and the sun is brighter.” I told her that being closer
to the equator did have a little effect on their skin coloring because of sun
tanning. But I also tried to stress that even though it was hotter there and
they had more sun, it still didn't make the difference in skin coloring as she
thought. Then I told her that even though Gena and Darin are black, it's not
because they're closer to the sun than she is. It's just a difference in the way
they were made. Then I told them that it depended on what their parents
looked like to determine what they would look like. (9-24)

About a month later, in mid-October, Jeremy again wrote about the differences
he was perceiving among students in his classroom. He described these differences in
terms of race, economics, upbringing and educational level but once again he came

back to differences in race:

One of the biggest differences between my students and myself is the fact
that I'm white and they're black. I've even had one student tell me, “there
are too many white people in this school. Why are there so many white
people here? I hate white people.” Then I stated the fact that I was white
and asked him if that meant that he didn't like me either. He said, “Well, I
like you and one other white person but that's all.” How can a seven year
old second grader hate a person just because of their skin color at such a
young age? Is it home life, school, friends, society?

A second theme that emerged in Jeremy’s story focused on what his students
knew about the world from their home, school and community in comparison to what
Jeremy had come to know from his home, school and community. The progression of
Jeremy's thematic unit on the topic of “community” provided many examples of the
differences between Jeremy’s life and the lives of his students. The following

conversation took place between Jeremy and me two weeks into student teaching:

R: Think back a little bit to when you planned your thematic unit last
spring. Can you talk a little bit about how you went about planning the unit
and about how now that you know the kids you might be thinking
differently about the unit than you did before?

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J: Okay. With the unit I found out--I got some stuff from my teacher. I
went to the library and started looking through different books to find

information. I was looking at some trade books there. I really can't say how
I was thinking differently.

R: How did you decide what was most worth knowing for your students--

how did you decide originally when you started working on the unit what
your concepts should be?

J: I'm not really sure if I--yeah--well, I did--okay--whenever I thought of
the communities idea I just pulled a whole bunch of stuff together and got a
basic general idea and then I tried to do what I thought would be the best for
the kids as far as--different sections like transportation-J thought what kind
of transportation would they likely be using-~or with different people--
community helpers--who is going to be in their community who is going to
be positive, that they are going to see. I tried to think of the different living
conditions like apartment houses and homes as opposed to farms.

R: So, now that you've met the children, has that changed any?
J: Um, yeah, I think it has some.

R: Any particular ways?

J: I'm not really sure. (9-1)

My first observation of Jeremy teaching a lesson from his thematic unit took
place on September 7 when the children discussed differences between the “city” and
the “country.” After the discussion. Jeremy passed out a worksheet with a map of a
neighborhood. The following conversation took place between Jeremy and myself
immediately after this observation:

R: When you gave out the map, what was your goal, what did you have in
mind for them?

J: The neighborhood thing. I wanted them to become more acquainted
with a map and how to read a map. I guess I didn't really explain myself,
why I wanted them to do it.

R: Do you think they had any idea what the term "vacant lot" meant on the
map?"

J: I didn't even think about that. They were probably thinking--vacant lot-
-what's that?

106
R: Or what is city hall? What do people do there?

J: That's something I have to work at. When I do it, it's like I take for
granted that they already know this stuff and it's just like well, here it is and
I hand it out and expect them to do all of these and do it real quick. But a
lot of times they don't--a lot of them are at different levels too. (9-7)

Jeremy seemed to be struggling with defining what he thought students should
be learning from this map and why they needed to learn it. He also seemed to be
understanding that his students didn’t necessarily have the same background
knowledge about the concept of “communities” as he did. I wanted to find out what
he knew about the community around Hathaway school where his students lived so I
began by asking him:

R: When you planned for the lesson, how did you think about where the
kids lived and what they know about community?

J: It's hard for me to think that because I don't really know where they
live. I grew up in a small town and I don't know if I should go out maybe
and see where some of them live or what because--

R: Maybe just driving around someday or after school to familiarize
yourself with this neighborhood, their community. As you think about it
now, what is the image in your mind of where they live and how they live?

J: See, I don't know. I don't know. I have no idea how a lot of them live.
They say this is sort of like an inner city area-- it is--but it doesn't seem like
that to me at least--

R: Because?

J: I mean, the only thing I see are houses around. I don't see projects or
anything from here that I associate with the inner city. So I really don't
know how and where they live.

R: Do you think it would make a difference if you did know more about
their community -- as you teach this unit on community?

J: Yeah, I would because that's what it is. Community. I guess I'm
thinking of my community instead of theirs. But how else am I supposed to
do it if I don't know their community, you know.

R: How do you find out about their community? We already talked about
one way, driving around. Are there other ways?

107

J: Maybe talking to some teachers and stuff who live in the community or

even the kids, I guess, talking about how their community is. I wish I

ggould have done this before but I don't know--I just never thought of it. (9-

During my third visit to Jeremy's classroom, he opened the lesson by talking

about rules in a community. He then gave the children a worksheet that listed five
words: suburb, community, city, services and rural. The children looked in their text
and wrote the definition for each word. After the observation, I asked Jeremy what
connections he thought the children were making between themselves and a word like
“suburb.” I asked him why he decided it was important for them to know what that
word meant. He responded by saying that it was important for the “children to know
that everything is not just like the city where they live, that there are different places

that look differently than what they are used to.” He then added:

I hate worksheets, I really do. I learn better when I don't--I even think the
kids would learn better if they don't do the worksheets. But it seems like
my ideas are like--I don't know what to do--I don't have all these resources,
you know. Where am I going to get this, what am I going to teach for
tomorrow, I have no idea. The easiest thing to do it to get a worksheet. I
know it could be going better. I'm hoping that tomorrow will go better and
the kids will seem to learn more. (9-24).

Even though Jeremy seemed to realize that he was not planning experiences for
the children that would build on their prior knowledge, he struggled in his thinking
about how to make changes in the curriculum. He had some awareness that he needed
to find out more about the local community but he couldn’t seem to act on what he
knew he needed to do.

A third pattern in this area of racial and ethnic diversity is perhaps the strongest
theme running throughout all of the collected data on Jeremy. This theme focuses on
the concept of “respect” in the context of classroom management and discipline. The
knowledge Jeremy acquired from his home, school and community laid the foundation

for his perception of what it means to have control of the classroom and for how

108

students and the teacher relate to one another. During the first interview, he was

already noting that discipline and classroom management were areas of concern:

One thing I have to work on is discipline. I don't know if it's because I'm
not the head teacher. I'm not sure if that will change when I start teaching
more or if its just the way that I'm doing things. So I guess I'll find out with
time. One basic thing that a lot of them can't get into their heads is that
when they have a question to raise their hand. They always want to blurt
out the answer, they don't want to raise their hand, and they talk a lot. (9-1)

When asked to name the children in his class who he thought learned the most
while he was teaching, he indicated that it was “the quiet children, the ones who had
their eyes on him” who would have learned the most. Jeremy felt that these children
did well because they were quiet and paying attention. He named several children
who he assumed were “clueless” and “could care less” about what he was teaching,
indicated by their problems with talking, short attention spans and emotional
problems.

At the beginning of September, Jeremy wrote in his journal about the “lack of

respect” he was getting from students:

My relationship with the students is good but it lacks a certain respect from
some of the students and in turn the discipline is a little shaky because I
tried to be a nice guy and let them talk a little bit. Impossible with this
group! One key to teaching that I have seen is having control of the
classroom and keeping it. One problem that I've dealt with since I began
teaching by myself is the lack of respect showed from one particular
student, Mitchell. It has been a constant uphill battle that I think has been
resolved until the next out break occurs. I have tried to deal with the
situation by talking to his mother, using a firm tone of voice, separating him
from other students and constantly staying on top of his every wrong action
to let him know I mean business. Will the day ever come when I feel totally
in control and on top of things? (9-10)

Two weeks later, Jeremy was becoming even more fi'ustrated with classroom
management and discipline. Again, one particular student, Mario, seemed to be the
main focus of his concern:

The biggest problem that stands out in my mind is discipline. The student
whose name stands out in my mind is Mitchell Thomas. How can I teach if
he constantly interrupts? I've tried yelling at him, standing him in the . .
comer, talking to his mother and father, affirming him when his behavror rs
good, taking away his recess, what else can I do? Should I get even tougher

109
or be more lenient? Should I continue to ride him throughout the storm
until he finally sees that I mean business? Sometimes I wish teachers could
still use belts to whip kids. That's what he needs, a good whipping from his
mom and dad. Could it be the medicine he takes for ADD? Or is this just

his excuse? For the teacher, he's fine, but when She's gone it's like the child
in the movie Problem Child. What should I do? (9-24)

At the end of September, discipline again was the focus of Jeremy's journal
entry. He wrote that "discipline is the cause for so much of my heartache and
concern." When I interviewed him after observing in the classroom for the fourth time,

the following conversation took place:

J: I don't know what to do. I do not know what to do. I have no idea
what would work. No idea. Should I bribe him? I wouldn't even care. I'd
give him a candy bar every single day for the next three weeks just so he'd
leave me alone--get him out of my hair.

R: Have you talked with anyone about your frustration?

J: Yeah--with Tamara. It's good. I'm so glad there's someone else at this
school that I can talk to. Discipline is the hard part. It's like I went to school
three and a half years for what, you know. And also too like at the
beginning I guess I took it personal, and now it's just like

R: Took what personal?

J: I don't know. I guess it bothered me more that it wasn't working out,
that the discipline was so bad. Like now I'm getting used to it.

R: Are you getting used to it or are you saying, I just have to get through
this?

J: Yeah. I know one thing. I'll never teach in an inner city school-- never!
R: What do you think is making it so difficult?

J: I don't know, I really don't know.

R: Any clues?

J: No. I guess because I don't have a loud deep voice.

R: Do you think that's what it takes to gain respect?

J: I don't know. I wish I knew. No, I really don't know. Maybe I'm too
nice to the kids. I think one thing I let them get away with some stuff at the
beginning. I don't know. I really don't know. I don't know they act so
different when I'm there. I really don't know. (9- -30)

110

The expectations Jeremy had for the behavior of his students at school did not
match with the actions of a number of his students. Throughout October he continued
to experience frustration. By the end of October it became quite clear to the classroom
teacher and to the college supervisor that Jeremy’s time in this particular classroom
was not helpful to him or the students. It was arranged for him to discontinue this
placement and he began to work in another classroom setting, this time in a fourth
grade. It was agreed that he would student teach in this new classroom for six weeks
to see if he could be more successfirl in a different setting. Specific issues related to
teaching and learning were explicitly discussed between Jeremy and his college
supervisor.

This second placement, at Minterville, was in a rural school setting where at
least a third of the children were from Amish homes. It was clear in Jeremy's journal
entry at the beginning of November that this placement seemed to give him a different

perspective about teaching:

At Minterville, I am renewed and the winds were once again placed in my
sails. Like a wounded sparrow that could only hope, I was nurtured back to
health and now have the strength to soar like an eagle. I have now seen the
light.

Spending time at two totally different schools has been a real eye opener. I
now see where I stood in each school system due to the culture alone. At
Hathaway I felt like part of the group, but it wasn't comfortable. Sort of like
a puzzle piece that looks like it should fit, and kind of fits, but not to the
point where you know it's a match. On the other hand, at Minterville, it felt
like home from day one. I'm not sure if it was because of my cooperating
teachers, the students, the cultural background of the students, my standing
in the classroom, or because I grew up in a school system very similar to
Minterville. I can't quite put my finger on it but one thing I know for sure is
that I was much more well received by the students at Minterville as
opposed to Hathaway. The teachers were even friendlier and more helpful
and I can't think of one bad thing to say about their school system. If I had
children, they would go to Minterville. (1 1-9)

lll

Jeremy felt more comfortable in this rural school setting. It seems that he was
experiencing so much disequalibrium at Hathaway that he was basically paralyzed in
his thinking and actions. While the Amish children were from a different ethnic
background than his own, he found it easier to identify with this culture than that of
the African—American culture. He felt welcomed into a community that seemed
familiar to him.

(B) Language

No specific data were collected on language differences.
(C) Socioeconomic

One of the ways that Jeremy characterized children in his classroom was by
describing their lunch status at Hathaway Elementary. Examples include “Alena eats
free lunch which tells you that she comes from a poor family;” (9-10) and “Mario lives
with his aunt, eats free lunch...” (9-27).

Jeremy also referred to the financial resources of children and their families as
he wrote about Brian and Tony:

After school Brian goes to day care and then his mother picks him up before
it gets dark. Brian always looks good and wears really nice clothes and
shoes...he decided to be my best buddy from day one and hasn’t let
up...Tony comes from a very poor family that just moved to the Hathaway
area a week ago...Tony has worn the same shirt for the past three days in a
row and it hasn’t been washed so finances are definitely a problem for his

family. The one thing I really like about Tony is that he always has a smile
on his face no matter what. (9-24)

Jeremy’s description of the community his students were from revealed that he

had formed some perceptions about socioeconomic factors of their community:

112
Their values seem to lie in clothes, shoes...the kids come from a rough
neighborhood...What type of role models do they have when all you ever
hear is bad things from the inner city. Guns, drugs, fights, money? When
will it end and why do people try to find their security in it? (1 1-8)

Minterville students and their families, Jeremy believed, had value and
lifestyles that more resembled his own while Hathaway’s children and parents used
their limited financial resources in inappropriate ways. He perceived that the city life
of his students was filled with crime and violence. Jeremy found the differences
between himself and his students at Hathaway in terms of socioeconomic background
to be unfamiliar and unsettling.

(D) Exceptionalities

In his third journal entry, Jeremy spent time writing about his understanding of
the concept of “inclusion.” Jeremy defined his “inclusion” students as

two LD students, another new student that I know is LD, 8 chapter kids,

and another student that falls under the title of inclusion for half of the

day. It seems so hard to plan for the “regular” students and keep them

on task and at the same time plan for the “inclusion” students too....it

seems like a losing uphill battle. (10-22)

Jeremy had mixed feelings about trying to provide instruction for all of these
students in the classroom. On one hand he liked the idea of including all students in
the classroom because he believed that students with special needs would gain in self-
confidence and self-worth. On the other hand, however, he found it very difficult,
almost impossible, to plan and teach in ways that would include everyone:

To keep all of these students on task and help them with their work is
almost impossible. After I’ve explained the lesson and what I want the
kids to do, I have three kids staring blankly at their papers and telling me
that they don’t know how to read. I also have an inclusion student for half

the day, Mary, who does the best job she can and never is a behavior
problem but I wonder how much she is really learning. (10-22)

113

Jeremy gave Mary the same work as everyone else but he had to give her extra
help. He worried that this special help to her was being perceived by the other
children as preferential treatment:

Mary is given the same work as our other students. The children are very
supportive of Mary and give her a lot of help and special attention. The
only draw back is when I seem to give Mary all of these special treatments
according to some of the kids in the classroom; “Why does Mary always
get to go to the bathroom?” (she has a bladder problem); “Why doesn’t
Mary do the work we do?”; and “Mary didn’t color good, why does she get

to...?” (10-22)

Jeremy didn’t make any references to adaptations he was making for the
students with special needs in his classroom. No reasons were given as to why Mary
had the same work as everyone else or what the goals were for Mary. Jeremy did ask
himself questions concerning the issue of including children with special needs in the
regular classroom:

I wonder how much these “inclusion” kids are really learning. Are they
really learning or are they just being pushed aside? Sometimes I think
smaller classroom instruction would be better, but then I’m not sure. I’m
not even sure where I stand with inclusion. One day I’m for it and the next
day I’m against it. If I was forced to take a side, I would say, for the most
part, that inclusion isn’t as great as everyone says it is. The children
actually may lose out on it academically but then again flourish socially.
Which is better, brains or social relations? I DON’T KNOW WHERE I
STAND. (IO-22)

For some reason, Jeremy felt like he needed to take a position on whether or
not to include students with special needs in the regular classroom. He realized that
there were priorities to weigh when thinking about what is best both educationally and
socially for students with exceptionalities but it seemed difficult for him to think about

individual children with special needs and adaptations for them in the classroom.

114

(E) ficndcr

While gender issues were not dominant throughout Jeremy's student teaching
experiences, he did note several specific instances involving differences between
males and females. The first mention of gender came about during the initial
interview after I asked him what behavioral expectations were difficult for some
students to meet. His main concern at this point was that the children didn't raise their
hands to talk:

There are some, but most of them are girls, who are like angels. They never
talk. They always raise their hand. Everything they do is what you want in
a student, the ideal student. It just seems that the boys are a lot louder.
Maybe that's their nature though. (9-1)

At the end of September, Jeremy talked about an incident that took place on a

field trip his class took to the downtown public library:

They were like walking over there all holding hands and stuff. I thought
that was kind cool! It's kind of weird because the girls didn't hold hands but
the guys did. And going there, Brandon and Dwayne were holding my hand
on the way back, Alex did. And it just seems kind of weird because the
guys were holding hands and the girls didn't. It was just really weird. (9-24)

During the final interview in December, Jeremy identified gender as a
“culture” because it was his perception that there were a many differences between
males and females. Jeremy seemed to stereotype males and females by certain
characteristics and found it difficult to understand when certain behaviors or
characteristics didn’t match with the stereotypes he held.

(F) EamibLBattcms

Jeremy brought to student teaching his own experiences with family structures
and his perceptions of how these structures contribute to the behavior and success of a
child. His expectations of students seemed to be based on assumptions about the
values and behaviors of children and their families. In his first journal entry, just a

few weeks into student teaching, Jeremy wrote about Alena:

115

Alena is just a young student full of hurt and hate that doesn't know how to
express itself unless she's being bad or hurting someone. If I had to guess at
why she acts this way I would say that Alena lacks encouragement and love
from her separated mother. Alena comes from a single parent home. She
lives with her mother and said that her dad lives in Indianapolis. She sees
her father on occasion, but I don't think it's as often as she lets on (9-10)

In addition to making assumptions about students based on what he knew

Alena’s family situation, Jeremy also had difficulty understanding that “family” may

mean different things to different people. His own family structure of a mother, father

and two children did not match up to the way in which Alena seemed to find her

family.”

Approximately 3 week and a half ago, our Chapter One teacher came in,
read a book, and then had the children do a writing exercise about someone
special in their lives or someone they spend a lot of time with. Most people
were writing about their grandmothers or grandfathers but Alena wrote
about her neighbor. I couldn't figure this one out. Why would she possibly
write about her neighbor? When I questioned her about it She said that she
spends every Friday night with her neighbor and that they watch TV and
play games together. She wasn't sure what her mom did those nights but
she did say that her mom had a boyfriend and that he was a really nice guy.
(9-24)

Jeremy also made predictions about the future of his students. In this instance,

his image of Alena in a few years is based on school behavior and his knowledge of

her family situation:

Alena spends a lot of her time after school by herself. She had already had
three pink slips this year for bad behavior and the two last ones are for being
with students who were stealing and pulling the fire alarm and for urinating
on a first grader. Alena can be helped by a very patient and special person
in her life but if she continues at this rate I wouldn't be surprised to see her
in jail or pregnant by the time she is 16. I know it sounds harsh and cruel to
say these judgmental calls but I think they're safe to say. (9-24)

Towards the end of October, Jeremy wrote about another student, Mario. He

described Mario as living with his aunt, getting free lunch, not knowing where his

mom and dad are, going to Chapter One program, repeating the second grade and

116

often coming to school in a mood where he cries and tries to lie on the floor all day

long. Again, Jeremy predicts a pessimistic future for one of his students:

What could possible be going through this little boy's head? He constantly
has to be affinned and told that he is doing an excellent job on his work
because his self-esteem is so low. I know Mario is going through more now
that I will ever have to go through at all at such a young age, but still that
doesn't excuse his behavior sometimes....It's hard for me to see him doing
anything productive with his life--not to say he has to go to college and get
a degree--but I'm saying that he will have to deal with the problem. ( 10-22)

At the end of student teaching, Jeremy wrote about his perception of the values

and behaviors of the children both inside and outside of school.

At Hathaway, the values and behaviors inside and outside of school seemed
to be very different. Their language is much rougher when not in school.
Their behavior seemed to be “I can do whatever I can do whenever I want
and think about the consequences later.” Their values seemed to lie in
clothes, shoes and what is valued by their parents at home. The kids come
from a rough neighborhood and home life situation. It's almost like one
thing is being taught at school and another thing is being taught at home.
Plus the things that are taught at either place aren't the same. The kids are
receiving mixed messages and don't know which ones to follow. (1 1-8)

Jeremy continued his written reflection by asking the following questions:
Why is there such a drastic difference between the kids at Minterville and
Hathaway if it is not the values and beliefs taught at home? Is it just a
cultural thing? Is that what we should blame every problem on? Partly
maybe, but come on, let’s get real. It’s because of their home life and what

the parents are saying and modeling in their lives while at home. How are
children supposed to succeed if they are getting the wrong message? (1 1-8)

It seems clear that Jeremy was in a more familiar territory at Minterville in
relationship to family pattems--the ways families interact and what is valued in
families. It was difficult for Jeremy to visualize any kind of a successful life for some
of his students who came from families and neighborhoods where lifestyles and values

were so different from his own.

117

D1 [111'] “.1 ”3'.

Jeremy found differences between himself and his students at Hathaway
school. Adapting Nieto’s (1992) flame, the development of Jeremy’s multicultural
attitudes and behaviors in these areas of differences were analyzed. See Figure 4 at the
end of this case study for a summary of the development of Jeremy’s multicultural

attitudes and behaviors.

(A) Racialhndfithnic

Jeremy had very few experiences with persons who were of a race different
flom his own. However, the intercultural term he took in Costa Rica had a significant
impact on him in terms of his feelings about persons of color. He acknowledged that
he was angry about being treated with disrespect while he was there because of his
white skin color. He noted that now a “black person has to prove himself to me.” He
even chose Hathaway school as the place to teach because he wanted to try to shift
those feelings. During the final interview, Jeremy talked further about the way be
perceived that coming flom a different culture than his students at Hathaway
contributed to his lack of teaching success. The following conversation took place
with him:

R: What was similar about Hathaway and Minterville?

J: Similar in terms of lunch count and attendance, that’s about the only
similarities that they had. In Minterville, my similarities seemed to be
almost all I had. There were eight Amish children in my classroom, but I fit
in with them really well. I got to spend a lot of time with them and know
them on a personal level that I found to be very helpful and rewarding. I
would love to spend some time with an Amish family and live like they do
in their culture. I also came flom a similar school, home and atmosphere as
these children came flom. Because of this, the children seemed to respect
me, see me as a role model and take me in as one of their own.

118

R: What were some of the differences between the schools?

J: Because of my differences at Hathaway, I didn’t have the respect that I
thought I deserved. The discipline problems were out of control and the
kids wouldn’t listen to what I had to say. At Hathaway most of the children
were different flom me because they came flom black, lower class, one
parent families. Because of this I had trouble relating to them and getting
through to them. I wanted to teach them so bad that it hurts to think that my
student teaching experience there was kind of a flop. Nothing I could do
would change their minds. I feel as though it was a combination of culture,
my supervising teacher, the kids, me being Mr. Nice Guy and my greenness
that caused the problem. I wish it could have been better and I wish it
would have worked out but-- (12-19)

Jeremy felt unsuccessful at Hathaway but it was difficult for him to sort out
what happened to make his student teaching there so difficult. He described some of
the factors that entered into this experience. I asked him to further define the role that
culture played in his student teaching at Hathaway:

J: Let me see. Looking back at that one time, whenever, at the very
beginning when it was getting out of control--the kids didn't--they wouldn't
respect me. I was really, really, really upset and my classroom teacher
asked me if I wanted to take some time out and I said no and I got up in
flont of the kids and I started crying. And I'm not sure if that was good--but
then again--I mean--just because of that culture.

R: How did the children respond?

J: Well, some of them, it was different. Some of the kids, especially like
the girls, started crying themselves, they felt really bad. There's one kid in
particular, he just laughed the whole time. I mean not out loud, but
snickered and stuff. Dwayne. I'm not sure why that was. At the end I had
problems with Dwayne but it wasn't immediate. I don't know if that had
something to do with it or what. I'm not sure.

R: How did Mitchell act during that time?

J: He was listening and stuff. I'm not sure if it's not something they see,
for a male.

R: Was that the impression you got flom your teacher-«that it was a
problem?

119

J: Oh yeah! She said, you never should have done that. Never cry in
flont of the class. Especially the Aflican-American culture. I did and I feel
comfortable with it. (12- -19)

It’s interesting to note that Jeremy had not referred to this incident in previous
interviews or in his journal entries. It wasn’t until the final interview that he described
how he cried in the classroom one day when he became totally flustrated with
managing behavior. Jeremy’s teacher reprimanded him for this incident by informing
him that it particularly inappropriate to cry in flout of Afiican-American children.
Another incident that reinforced the idea to Jeremy that he was not behaving as a
teacher in ways that fit the Aflican-American culture of his students took place when a

substitute came to his classroom at Hathaway.

J: I had a sub come in. The sub told me that in an Aflican-American or
black family that the father is always loud--you have to raise your voice to
the kids. You have to be rough and stem with them.

R: Was she Aflican-American herself?

J: Yes. And it's like--I tried and it's not me. She told me to practice on my
voice, making it louder I guess and more kick to it I guess.

R: Because that was what they were used to?
J: Right.
R: So, what do you think about that now?

, J: I don't know. I don't think it is necessary, it can work for some people
but I don't think it's necessary to run a classroom like that cause a lot of
people aren't like that and I know I'll never have the rough voice. (12-19)
Jeremy was confused by the information he was receiving about the African-
American culture. In addition, Jeremy’s study of “community” within this classroom

where the majority of children were Aflican-American was a continual struggle for

him. He did acknowledge along the way that he really did not know what to do, how

120

to teach and that everything he planned was based on what he had known and
experienced flom his own perception of “community.” At the end of student teaching,
Jeremy wrote in a journal that he would have done some things differently in his unit

on community and some things he would have kept the same.

I would have kept the same categories because getting too many categories
would have been both difficult and confusing. But I would have added
more to each category, added more trade books and started my thematic unit
off on a different foot. To begin with I would have had the children begin
by building their very own community with detail, and then add on a suburb
and countryside as well. This would have made more concrete the
definitions of community, suburb, city and country in their minds without
ever needing to memorize their written definitions. One more thing I will
do the next time before and during planning for a unit is to see the children's
community before writing anything down at all. (1 1-8)

Jeremy’s entering beliefs about expectations seem to fit into Level Zero (Lack
of Tolerance) for multicultural attitudes and behaviors. While he clearly recognized
that differences existed, he found it difficult to move beyond into tolerating and
accepting these differences. His experiences throughout student teaching tended to be
ones that did not result in growth or expansion of his multicultural attitudes and
beliefs. In the area of racial issues, particularly related to physical characteristics,
Jeremy seemed to be at a beginning level of Tolerance (Level One). He had
uncomfortable feelings when he had to deal with issues of race related to skin color
but he did not talk in negative terms about color. In the areas of prior knowledge of
students and expectations for behavior, Jeremy seemed to enter and remain at a Zero
Level (Lack of Tolerance). He found it very difficult to think about and plan his
lessons so that they connected with his student’s knowledge about the world.

(B) LW

No specific data were gathered on language differences.

121
(C) Socioeconomic

Jeremy seemed very uncomfortable with the differences he perceived between
himself and his students at Hathaway in terms of socioeconomic status. He believed
that the financial resources of his students and their families were used
inappropriately. In addition, his image of the “inner-city” suggests that his
information about the neighborhoods and communities of his students and their
families was limited. In the area of socioeconomic diversity, Jeremy entered and
remained at a Zero Level (Lack of Tolerance).

(D) Exccnuonalitics

Jeremy struggled throughout student teaching with the notion of “inclusion.”
He seemed to think that he had to take a stance either for or against the idea of
including all students in a regular classroom as much as possible. Jeremy was fully
aware that some of his students had special needs but he questioned whether or not
these students were learning in a regular classroom. The social value of these
placements seemed positive to him but he also thought about these classroom
placements in terms of what was better for their educational needs. In terms of
Jeremy’s attitudes towards classroom placement of children with special needs in the
regular classroom, Jeremy seemed to enter and remain at a Level of Tolerance (Level
One). However, since he did not appear to think about or make attempts to adapt their
classroom work so that they could be successful, in the area of curriculum adaptations

he seemed to enter and remain at a Level Zero (Lack of Tolerance).

122

(E) ficndcr

At the beginning of student teaching, Jeremy noted differences between male
and female students. He associated boys with terms like “noisiness” and girls with
“angel-like behaviors.” He also expressed real surprise that the boys in his class
would hold hands on a field trip while the girls didn’t. Jeremy described this whole
event as “weird.” Jeremy seemed to begin and end his student teaching in the same

category (Level Zero (Lack of Tolerance).

(F) Warm

Jeremy’s expectations of children often seemed to stem flom the assumptions
he made about the values, beliefs and behaviors of children and their families. It often
seemed as if Jeremy wanted to make shifts but the kinds of interactions he was
experiencing day after day in his classroom seemed to only strengthen the feeling of
differences between himself and his students and families. A statement made by
Jeremy in an interview with him in late October sums up his feelings of

disequalibrirun as he tries to find his place in an unfamiliar cultural setting:

How am 1, Jeremy D. Hemingway, a white middle-class sheltered
American supposed to teach 21 vastly different students when I have
hardly anything in common with them at all? I have never been with or
seen an Aflican-American family home life. I don't know what their
family relations are like, what they value, what is important to them, or
what they respond to the best. I guess I'm learning by trial and error
and try to base my planning on things that I myself would enjoy, things
that they've enjoyed in the past, and things I've learned in the past 39
days with my kids. I feel that I've come a long way, but yet I have so
much further to go. (IO-22)

In the family patterns area of diversity, Jeremy felt extremely uncomfortable

with the differences between himself and his students. He had low expectations for

123

some of his students based on the value system of the family. In fact, he predicted
somber futures for several children based on what he knew about their family
situation. In this area, it seems that Jeremy still lacks tolerance for differences (Level

Zero).

Summon:

During student teaching, Jeremy conflonted differences between himself and
his students in the following areas of diversity: racial and ethnic; socioeconomic;
exceptionalities; gender; and family patterns. During this student teaching experience
he did not identify or confront language diversity.

It was during the analysis of data on Jeremy that it became necessary to adapt
Nieto’s (1992) flame for categorizing levels of multicultural attitudes and behaviors.
Nieto’s model begins with a category that is identified as tolerance for differences. At
this point in Jeremy’s life, he expressed the desire to become tolerant. However, the
data suggests that in most areas regarding diversity, Jeremy is less than tolerant. He
was extremely uncomfortable throughout student teaching with issues related to ethnic
and racial differences, particularly in the areas related to expectations for students and
the prior knowledge that they brought to the classroom. However, he was more
tolerant in dealing with situations related to physical characteristics, particularly skin
color.

In addition, Jeremy was less than tolerant in the areas of socioeconomic

differences, gender and family patterns. He was in the same less than tolerant category

124

in relationship to adapting curriculum so that children with special needs could be
successfirl in the classroom. He did, however, tolerate the placement of children with
special needs in his classroom and seemed positive about the social benefits that
inclusion brought to students. Jeremy’s past experiences and student teaching in this
culturally diverse classroom combined to serve as a block to growth in many areas of

multicultural attitudes and behaviors.

125

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126

NANCY

Backgroundlnfonnation

Personally, and as afitture teacher, I find myself responding to these

issues in a myriad of ways. [find myself struggling with attitudes and

assumptions in myself that need to change. I find helplessness,

hopelessness, and of course anger and a demand for j ustice in my

heart. Isn't this America?! I am again startled by the fact that

selfishness, greed and egocentrism know no cultural, national or

political boundaries.

Thirty-seven-year-old Nancy grew up on a farm in the Midwest. She described
her family as "keeping to ourselves with church being an important part of our lives."
Her upbringing was "strict--we weren't allowed to go to movies, had no television and
couldn't go to ball games." Nancy played in the woods and spent many hours reading.
Her family emphasized that "you must do a good job in whatever you do, follow God
and follow your heart--whatever you understand that to be."

Nancy described elementary school as a good place for her because she was an
academically successful student who was always at the top of her class. Her friends
were few and she did not fit in with the popular crowd. She described herself as a
"loner" throughout high school.

Deciding to become a teacher came about a year ago when Nancy was thirty-
six. She had been to college after high school but "never knew what I wanted to do."

Nancy believes that she was influenced to become a teacher because "we are a family

of teachers." Also influential in her thinking about teaching as a profession was the

127
positive experience she had teaching English in China when she participated in the
college study/service semester. She described this experience as "highly reinforcing--
you get admired and children listen." She also had positive experiences teaching
English as a Second Language in a local school system. Nancy used to think that
teachers weren't "quite regular people" but now she thinks of herself as "normal--
having everyday struggles-J don't see myself in the same light as I saw my teachers."
At the beginning of the Elementary Curriculum Studies course, Nancy
responded in writing to the question, "What do you enjoy about people flom cultures
other than your own and what do you find difficult in relating to those flom another
culture?" by writing that
I enjoy those I meet flom third-world cultures. Many times I have found a
freshness and simplicity (not in a negative, downgrading way) in the way
they approach life. There is a perspective on life flom many of these
cultures that helps to round out and enlarge my own. What I find the most
difficult, especially in non-Westem cultures, is the way that women appear
to be treated. I do not consider myself a '“feminist” by any stretch of the
imagination but I really have a hard time when I see the place most women
are given in those cultures. One of the other things I find difficult is
knowing the appropriate way to communicate-sometimes you speak
directly to the other person about what you're thinking. Other times you
need to go “around the bar” and get to something indirectly and
diplomatically. Sometimes it feels like a big game and I don't enjoy that.
Patterns which emerged flom the pilot study data suggest that throughout this
course, Nancy focused mostly on drinking about (1) valuing differences; (2) self as
teacher; (3) the lives of the children in the classroom; and (4) the inequality between
those with power and those without in our society.

After reading White Teacher (Paley, 1989) Nancy discussed the insights she

gained on the importance of recognizing, talking about and valuing differences:

128

Speaking of and recognizing differences is a sign of equality, of being at the
same place. Being aflaid to speak of such things does not put two people in
the same place together, but in two, disjointed, uncomfortable places.

I need to spend some time thinking about the fact that differences are great,
really. If I am more comfortable with that fact then perhaps I won't be so
afraid to bring those differences up. I hay: been aflaid to say anything to
people about their “special qualities,” aflaid of stepping on their toes or
bringing something up they didn't want to talk about.

Until I read this book, I never thought in such a blatant way about the fact
that differences are often considered to be negative. Consciously, I would
always say that differences are great and necessary. But as I read this
passage I realize that subconsciously I have been uncomfortable with a lot
of differences and have responded as if “they” were second best.

Nancy commented flequently in the field notes written during the pilot study
that she needed to stop focusing so much on herself and concentrate more on the
children. She felt that she was being too tough on them and wanted to "loosen up and
not take myself so seriously as a teacher. " At the end of her practicum work with third
graders, Nancy noted that she "realized that I have often cared about whether the
lesson went well and whether I was successful than I've cared about the kids."
However, throughout her field notes, She highlighted specific situations during this
practicum which indicate that she did care about the children in the classroom.

Perhaps the incident which seemed to impact her the most was with Alicia, an Aflican-
American child in the classroom:

It was in the literature center that Alicia was looking through Rehema's
Journey (Margolies, 1990), a book of photographs of a girl in Tanzania.
Pointing to the girl in the book she said, “Oh, she's UGLY! Why is she so
black? She's ugly.” She totally caught me off guard. It was a startling,
blaring comment about her self image as a black person, and it smacked me
right across the face.

Nancy seemed to value highly Eleanor's input into the course. Eleanor helped

to expand Nancy's view of different cultures “to include various groups such as gifted

129

children, deaf children and the visually impaired.” Nancy wrote that Eleanor is
“perhaps stretching the concept just a bit but I do see what she is trying to say: that any
student other than the 'Ken and Barbie' white set is subject to feeling excluded or less
valued.”

Nancy reflected flequently on the complexity of multicultural issues--that she
needed to always consider the history of culturally groups in our society in thinking
about present day circumstances. She valued highly the fact that Eleanor helped her to
revisit the history of Aflican-Americans and to relate this history to how teachers
might tell these stories to their students:

The main thing that totally, absolutely bowled me over was the perspective
she brought to the question that was asked about how to handle slavery in a
positive way. She listed four things on the board that slavery brought to her
people; enslavement and continuing to live in the land of their oppressors,
families torn apart, education forbidden, and not being able to vote and have
a voice in their own land...I had thought about the fact that they are still
having to live in the land of their oppressors; to “prove” themselves to be
equal, but I had never considered the other things she mentioned. It all
makes so much sense...

I'm not kidding when I say that this puts this race of people in a totally
different perspective for me. I'm living a very mediocre life in a lot of ways
and I've had all kinds of things going for me. To go against that kind of
odds and bondage and produce that much forward motion and tenacity is
something incredible about this culture of people. My respect just went up
one-hundred-fold.

Throughout the course and particularly after reading Savage Inequalities
(Kozol, 1991) Nancy thought about multicultural issues in terms of injustice and
power. She saw herself as an active participant in a society which is stratified in terms
of power and acknowledged her struggle in finding ways to address this inequality:

Those of us who have the power and the educational advantage are not at all
willing to give that up so that the powerless can also have equal access to

those things. Kozol cites several instances where there have been successful
legal challenges to this inequality. In virtually every case there has not been

130

any actual change following the court rulings because those in power have
found ways to dilute the effect to keep it flom happening. Evidence like
this points to the fact that until we are ready as a society, and individually,
to allow real change in this inequality to happen, nothing will improve. The
gap will continue to increase.
Nancy's interest and experience in teaching students who have limited English
proficiency led to her request that she be placed in a student teaching situation which

had a diverse student population, particular desiring a setting where there were a

number of Hispanic children.

[1'88 11 'fi 1

A question that bothers me a lot is how to reach the kids that are
already struggling; not staying on task, not getting work done,
seemingly not caring too much about learning and schoolwork

They ’re still young and soft and could be more easily “reached ” at this
age but I don ’t know how to reach them, to bring out the gifiings [sic]
in them that I see.

During Elementary Curriculum Studies, the semester before student teaching,
Nancy reflected on issues of diversity in terms of injustice and power. She also
brought with her the beliefs and values she acquired flom her own family and
schooling experiences as she reflected on herself as teacher.

The story of Nancy’s personal process of constructing meaning about
differences between herself and her students during student teaching takes place within
the context of six particular forms of diversity which impact teaching and learning.
These types of diversity include: (A) racial and ethnic; (B) language; (C)

socioeconomic background; (D) exceptionalities; (E) gender; and (F) farme patterns.

131
0A)l&acnujunilh&uuc

In this category of racial and ethnic relations, Nancy conflonted diversity in the
areas of (1) expectations for behavior; and (2) prior knowledge. Nancy fully
acknowledged that the children in her classroom grew up in different situations and
communities flom her own. During her early years, she was playing in the woods and
reading books. Nancy wrote that her students at the same young age

are dealing with much more complexity of life than I think I ever did. A
couple of them, for example, had to decide whether they wanted to live with
their mom or their dad. I was well prepared for the school scene because I
had so much support flom home. I was also taught to obey whoever was in
authority. Some of these kids are too, but a fair number are not. (9-13)

This notion that students need to “obey” their teacher came with Nancy to her
student teaching classroom. This struggle with being in charge of classroom behavior
seemed to weigh her down flom the very beginning. During my first interview with

Nancy, two weeks after student teaching was underway, she told me that she had

become

really tired. I am already quite tired. I feel like the wicked witch of the
west, telling them all the time to be quiet and taking their money away. I
am constantly feeling like a referee and an umpire. That I think about a lot.
(9-1)

I asked Nancy how norms for behavior were established in this classroom and
what was valued in terms of behavior. She responded by saying that

paying attention to the teacher is most important. That means looking at the
teacher. That means being quiet. That means not playing with things like
in your hands. That means knowing when to talk and when not to talk.

(9-1)
Two weeks later, in her journal, Nancy wrote that the two biggest problems

that children were having in her classroom are

132

talking when they are supposed to be paying attention and not staying “on
task.” There are several students who have trouble complying. One
desperately wants attention so will do anything for it, even negative
attention. Another can't concentrate on what he's doing for more than three-
to-five minutes and is constantly distracted (if he isn't ADD I don't know
who is). Others are just too social. They have trouble not talking to their
neighbors....l feel like a constant nagging person. (9-13)

At the end of September, Nancy still struggled with how to structure discipline,
how to achieve a balance between being too quiet and the state of chaos. She
struggled with the way she responded to students when they didn’t meet her
expectations for behavior. After my second observation on September 29, Nancy and
I had the following conversation:

R: So, what could you have done in the lesson, knowing what you know
about your students, in terms of management during the lesson? Would it
have made a difference, for example, if they had been closer so you could
have reached out --

N: That's probably true. I also shouldn't have put Alex by Tim. Those are
the two who ended up in detention, they are good buddies. And I always,
you know, punish them by splitting them up and I know they like to be
together. And I know I probably shouldn't have done that because they
aren't able to control themselves enough but they got into trouble with each
other and maybe I could have used a bit of a light touch you know. My
teacher said to me that I come down too heavy sometimes. I need to lighten
it up a little bit. I could have just said something like, I don't know, I could
have just joked with Alex or used some kind of light, I don't even know
what I could have said to him. I have these tapes inside of me that tell me
the things that automatically come out.

R: It is hard to retape.

N: It is. It's like I have to go against my natural responses and I guess I
have to realize too that that's not going to change (snaps fingers) boom, like
that. (9-21)

Nancy realized that her past experiences at home and school had a significant
impact on the way she responded to her students. She wanted to make changes but

found it very difficult to change the patterns that had build up over the years. As we

133

continued the conversation, I noted that it does take some time to figure out
alternatives for what to say and what to do. She responded by suggesting a few
strategies she might try:

N: One think I could do is when a kid is--toward the start of the day or

whatever and a child is turning around and talking and they're not supposed

to be--instead of immediately coming down on them hard I could Signal to

tklfizm. hThey're not always doing it deliberately. They just forget and I don't
ow ow--

R: Does it feel awkward to you to do something like that?

N: Well, I feel like I'm finding my way in this area so much. I mean you
could tell during this lesson that I was working really hard at trying to keep
things flom getting out of control but I was also at the same time trying to
let them enjoy it so it was kind of--it felt kind of--it wasn't natural and
relaxed. Maybe that will come with time.

R: Several times you gave positive feedback that seemed natural and
relaxed.

N: Really? I have a concern about how I'm coming across to the kids. I
want to get past this point so that I can-~and it feels that in some ways I'm
getting there-better how to handle classroom management and discipline. I
want to be able to focus more on picking up on them and where they're at
rather than always having my mind on, okay, I've got to keep these kids
under control you know. I just want to be more natural and be more myself
and enjoy the children...1 don't sometimes know when to handle the problem
at hand with a light touch or with some severity. I come across as severe
and flowning more than I want to. (9-29)

In the middle of October, Nancy again brought up discipline and classroom
management in her journal, noting that it was at the top of her list again as an issue she
was dealing with in student teaching. She continued to feel like she was nagging the
children and felt that the class was really testing the boundaries:

The areas where the tension would come for me was expecting that they
“should know how to behave” in school and with peers; that they would
OBEY the teacher and not physically hit each other. I often get impatient
and frustrated with Mark for simply not obeying. I'd tell him to put his stuff
away or not to do something and he wouldn't listen. That was hard.

I also got tired of trying to help them learn to get along with each other,
especially whacking each other in the hall and at recess. Physrcal v1olence
was never allowed in our house and I have never had to (so far) learn to

134

cope with it personally so I don't know how to teach them how to deal with
it in a healthy way. That was flustrating. (10-16)

Nancy felt that students “should know how to behave” in terms of how she was
taught to behave at home and school. Her sense that children should “obey” their
teachers also served to increase her flustration level. She seemed at a loss to know
how to help her students solve conflicts in cooperative ways.

In another area of differences related to ethnicity, Nancy’s prior knowledge
was different flom that of her students. Her home, school and community experiences
gave her information, perspectives and beliefs which did not correspond to the cultural
experiences of many of her students. In my initial interview with Nancy early in
student teaching, she expressed concern about getting her students interested and
helping them make connections between their previous experiences and current
classroom cuniculum. In addition, she worried about defining her own role in helping
students make these connections and wondered how to structure their learning
experiences so that prior knowledge could be built upon in constructing curriculum:

What is wearing me down right now and that I think about a lot is how to
keep the kids, make the kids interested in what is being taught. What I
think about overall is what--how I can make this interesting for these kids
and I think about how I am doing as a teacher. (9-1)

In her first journal entry, dated September 13, Nancy noted that the most
salient question for her at this point in student teaching related to the concept of letting
children figure out things for themselves. She wanted her students to use their prior
knowledge to explore and further their knowledge.

In most of my education classes we have been taught to provide some

guidance for kids as they explore and learn but that the best thing is
basically to let them figure things out for themselves. We are simply to set

135

the situation up for them to be able to do that. I have been finding that with
second graders that is not often possible. In science, a couple of art
projects, class presentations, and in general it seems that kids this age need
modeling. They need to see things clearly modeled first and be told exactly
how to do many things or they are lost. This makes sense to me. If kids
aren’t given the tools to how to explore, how can they do it? Yet, this
seems to directly counter many of the things I learned in my classes. I don’t
understand. (9-13)

During my first observation in her classroom, on September 15, Nancy was at
the beginning stages of her thematic unit on plants. During this morning she helped
students plant seeds and make predictions about their growth. She asked the students
many questions during the lessons and listened carefully to their responses. She also
gave them opportunities to ask questions and to talk about what was interesting to
them. In the interview after this observation I asked Nancy which children she thought
learned more than others during this lesson and why she thought they might have
learned more. She indicated that the children who made their own observations and
made connections to previous learning most likely learned the most:

I can’t remember which kids came up with their own observations because I

know I pointed out--I suggested a couple of things to them. I don’t know if
I should have just let them describe what they saw than kind of coach them
on or not but probably the kids that were able to connect with the things
they learned the day before learned the most. You know some of them were
able to say that the food came flom the inside--the rest of them--they were
thinking about it, you know. They had different answers but they were
thinking about it. So I don’t know whether they learned just as much
because they were simply thinking about it or not. I don’t know. (9-15)

I asked Nancy if she had noted any differences between the first group of
children who planted the seeds and the second group. She responded by saying that the

groups seemed quite similar to her:

136

I think it was pretty similar--yeah--I think it was similar. They seemed to
make the connections-J mean they seemed to be connecting knowledge
flom before. I mean, they knew what the seed cover was. It was wrinkled,
they knew that. When I asked them where the food was coming flom, a
bunch of them said inside the seed. I was really pleased they were making
those connections. I don’t know about my role. I don’t know if I’m doing
too much, dominating too much. I just don’t know. (9-15)

Later in the conversation, Nancy and I discussed the third group who planted
seeds:

R: You did some things differently at the beginning. When you asked
them questions about why they shouldn’t touch the bean...

N: Oh, I did do that in the last group. That was better.
R: What was better?

N: They were more involved. That was better. I didn’t even think about it
at the beginning. Vanessa was coming up with so much stuff. Yeah, you
can’t always plan everything in teaching. I tried to think through everything
but you just kind of learn by trial and error, don’t you? I just have to realize
that.

R: They came up with some good reasons why they shouldn’t touch that
seed.

N: Yeah, they did. It has been a real struggle for me. I put this in my field
notes. I’ve done a couple of other science experiments with them and one
of the first ones that I did--I wanted to see--it was one where I had them
plant the flower seeds. I decided that I was going to see, you know, I put
the cups out and the soil and basically told them that they needed to put
three seeds in and I wanted to see if they could kind of organize themselves
and do it WHICH DID NOT WORK. It was chaos. And so I really
struggled with how much structure to give this group and I’ve gone to
giving them a lot of structure. So its been a lot teacher directed. At this age
and with doing some of these things, some of them for the first time, I’ve
pretty much come to the conclusion I need to tell them exactly what to do.

R: Are you there as teacher to model at points where you see that in order
to have learning move ahead, there needs to be some intervention?

N: Okay, I see. I don’t think it really sunk into me. Maybe because I was
so heavily influenced by the Art for Children course. I took flom that class

137

that I shouldn’t Show them anything. It all comes flom them. So I guess I

drug [sic] that into--I carried it over to the Math and Science. I was still

under the impression that a lot of it was supposed to come flom the

students. When you want something to look a certain way, you model it. If

you have an experiment and it doesn’t matter how it looks, then that’s when

the child, when it is more open ended. That makes sense to me. (9-15)

During student teaching, Nancy spent a significant amount of time thinking

about how to help her students use their prior knowledge to make connections to the
curriculum. This issue of working from the knowledge of children in the learning
process surfaced again about a month later in mid-October after I observed a third
lesson in Nancy’s classroom. Small groups of students were planning a presentation
to the rest of the class on what they had learned about plants. The group I observed
was in the process of planning their presentation on stems: Nancy was involved with
the children in the following conversation:

N: Yesterday we talked about stems, remember? What do the stems do?

Cl: They help the plants eat.

C2: Help the stems stand straight.

N: How does food go into the plant?

C3: Sucks it up!

N: If there was no stem, just leaves, what would that stem do?

Cl: If we didn’t have stem, we’d have to be in a wheelchair.

N: What’s our stem?

C4: Our legs.

R: In about 20 minutes, you’re going to teach the rest of the class about
stems. What could you do as a group to tell what you learned about stems?

C3: If you put it in food coloring, it sucks it up.

138

N: What does that explain? What helps the celery plant grow?
C: The dirt.

N: How does it come up through the veins? How can we tell that to the
class? What would you think about the idea of telling them what you did in
your experiment? Would you be willing to Show the class that? To explain
to them why that happened.

C4: We could be a garden.

N: How about if you are flopped on the ground? (continues to offer ideas
which children accept and modify). (10-16)

As I interviewed Nancy after this lesson, the topic again emerged concerning
the role of the teacher/student in the learning process, of helping students make
connections to their own prior knowledge and experiences. I asked her to talk about
the presentations given by the students. She responded by talking about her
perceptions of how the presentations would be accomplished:

I guess I kind of had an image in my mind of what the presentation would
be like. It’s been hard for me to know--with all the things of teacher
directedness vs. it coming flom the students where the line is. (10-16)

In her last journal entry in early November, Nancy wrote about her struggles
with figuring out the roles of teacher and students in the learning process:

I was aware of the fact that teachers are not information givers, but guides
in learning, before, but it has become even more clear to me that this is
indeed the case. During the lessons that involved me doing most of the
work (talking) the kids were paying attention but out of threats of
punishment, not out of a lot of interest. My most successful lessons were
those where the kids had a lot of say in what happened and were somewhat
open-ended. It’s hard to learn to teach in a different way than I learned. I
came to the conclusion that my job as a teacher is like that of someone
trying to catch fish--my job is to find the right kind of bait to offer so that
the kids take it and run with it. (1 1-8)

139

During the final interview, I asked Nancy what had become clear to her about
what teachers need to know to teach? She responded by saying that she

really didn’t know how first graders thought. I feel like teachers need to
know how the children perceive the world and consequently have to connect
with that, to make learning real. I think teachers need to know how to give
structure to provide security in the classroom. I don’t know how you learn
to give them that. I need to find out about their values, their lingo, and how
I’m to meet their culture. (12-13)

Nancy believed that it was her role as teacher to take seriously the job of
helping students use their prior knowledge to connect to the curriculum. She took
seriously the task of trying to plan lessons that would build on this knowledge as well
as to expand their knowledge.

(B) Lanmiasc

No specific data were collected on language differences.
(C) Scciocccnomic

There were few instances when Nancy referred directly to socioeconomic
background. Frequently her references to this area of diversity were also linked to
family social patterns and values. Nancy described her father as a contractor/carpenter
and her mother as an entrepreneur. Many of her relatives are school teachers. During
student teaching, Nancy learned that many of the families of her students did not have
the same financial resources that she had while growing up. At the beginning of
November, Nancy wrote about Ethan’s parents in relationship to their socioeconomic
position:

Ethan’s parents-J called them several times after school to tell them about
Ethan’s behavior for the day. They were supportive and I enjoyed talking to

them for that reason. It was good for me, too, because my expectation of
low-income white families with a just-out-of—jail father was not that they

140

would care about working with the school, but, they really did. I was upset
when they moved. (1 1-8)

The personal contact Nancy had with this family was significant in helping her
reexamine her perceptions of persons whose lifestyle and socioeconomic status was
quite different than her own.

(D) Exceptionalities

When asked about her early schooling experiences, Nancy remembered school
as a good place for her. Her family supported her in academic work and she felt she
had been motivated to learn. She thought of herself as basically an achieving type of
person and remarked that she got “a lot of good encouragement flom my teachers. I
was not ever the top person in my class or anything but I was always towards the top.”
(9-1)

It wasn't long into student teaching before Nancy began to worry about the
challenges of meeting the learning needs of those children who think of school
differently than She did and whose abilities were quite different flom her own. Two
weeks into student teaching, Nancy and I had the following conversation:

R: What do you seem to be thinking about the most in relationship to your
teaching? .

N: I think about how to reach especially the kids who have problems.
There are several kids in my class who are having problems and I just think
about those kids and watch them and write down notes about them.

R: Especially the kids who have problems--what kind of problems are you
talking about?

N: Mostly kids that aren't following the teacher, whose brain is off in left
center for whatever reason. With a couple of the kids, I think it's ADD but I
don't know. There is such energy there--and not just energy--but how can I
get these children--what can I do to get these children to focus and to be
interested in something and to feel good about themselves instead of me all
the time having to correct them. Another kid that bothers me clearly has

141

emotional baggage flom home and you can see it weighing on him and it
bothers me to think of his life at home as a small second grader and he can't-
it's very hard for him to pay attention and sit still. There are several kids
like that who have emotional baggage. It’s real hard to get them to find
something to make them feel good about themselves in the classroom and
about learning. (9-1)

During this same conversation, Nancy also brought up the need to know about
how to reach children in different ways. She felt that the background she received in
her teacher education program on multiple intelligences was going to be helpful to her
during student teaching:

I think we need to talk about that stuff more-~how to reach kids that learn in
different ways because I'm having that experience now in the classroom.
Some of those kids who cause problems, those are some of the same kids
who when we do active things--activities, movement, they're (snaps fingers)
there. They're engaged--at least some of the time. And I want to learn how
to use more of that kind of thing. And I think we need to do a little bit more
with kids that learn in different ways. (9-1)

I asked Nancy to think of any specific incidents in the last two weeks which
stood out in her mind related to trying to meet individual learning needs. She again
mentioned the two children who she thought were diagnosed with attention deficit
disorder and related an incident which involved an activity extension flom a book she

had read to the class:

Some of the kids are clearly academic--they can read and write well you
know. The girl that’s the highest in the class, who reads fluently and writes
fluently and is very verbal, was cruisin' and these other boys were having
trouble engaging and paying attention. Then we did something where we
did Curious George folds a boat--makes a boat. Before we started it, I asked
my teacher, “why are we doing this, instructionally speaking?” She thought
a minute and said she wanted to see the perceptual abilities. Well,
interesting things came out and I tell you it was interesting! The girl that
was very verbal, she had an awful time and one of the boys that causes the
main trouble, he has some emotional problems and has trouble focusing on
stuff, he was helping her do some of the folding. Those guys got it,
BOOM! The ones who had the most trouble So that's the question I keep
asking myself, “what kinds of things can we do in school to keep tapping

142

into that in those boys?” I don't really notice a problem with English as a
second language kids. (9-1)

Nancy already introduced activities that led up to her thematic unit on plants. I

asked her if she was planning differently now that she had met the children and knew

about some of their interests and learning needs. She told about one activity where she

planned a variety of ways for the children to get into the topic of seeds:

With a poem we read, we split them up into three groups. One group did
movement and drama to music to the poem. Another group did art and
copied the poem down and then another group planted seeds and started a
science log. Then they switched. It was real interesting. Consistently we
are seeing that with a couple of kids, when we do movement with hands--
folding, actions, putting together, taking apart, movement with the body--
that they do better. I don't know how we can find more of those things that
would help their reading and writing, how to tap into that. That's a question
I have, you know, how to get at what we call those more academic areas.

(9-1)

I observed Nancy teaching a lesson where a small group of eight students were

observing the growth of the flower seed they had planted. They were also doing some

graphing of the growth and making predictions about future growth. Two other

groups of eight each were doing other work with seeds and plants. I asked Nancy if

and how she planned for the different learning needs of the students for this particular

lesson:

N: No, I didn't. I did not. I knew that drawing pictures would help. They
are all having trouble with writing. I mean, I knew it would be good. Now
when I planned for the other two groups, I did keep these differences in
mind.

R: What did you plan?

N: There were two other groups going on at the same time. Lori Larnpkin,
the special education teacher had one and my teacher had one. I wanted
Lori to be able to have more time. Her group was using the book The .
Carrot Seed (Krauss, 1945) which is very--vocabulary wise--read1ng wrse
it's about like as low as you can get for something like that. She used that
book and said that things went real well, that the students experienced a lot
of success. I was happy about that because some of the lower kids really
have trouble--they can't read. They did choral reading.

143

R: And the other group?

N: They had a bunch of seed books that they looked at. I'd read them a
couple. They've been on the back table for them to pick up in reading time
but she took them out there and specifically gave them five minutes or so to
get a book, look at it, find a sentence or picture they thought was interesting
and then they shared it with the group. They were to make a picture, a
sentence or something. (10-16)

Nancy wrote in her journal on September 13 that she was thinking so much
about the children in her room that she identified as "struggling."

A question that bothers me a lot is how to reach the kids that are already
struggling: not staying on task, not getting work done, seemingly not caring
too much about learning and schoolwork. They're still young and soft and
could be more easily “reached” at this age but I don't know how to reach
them, to bring out the giftings [sic] in them that I see. There is so much
junk in their lives; I see weights and burdens distracting them and weighing
them down so they can't function as healthy children. Somehow there must
be a way to get past the junk and reach them. HOW?!?! (9-13)

I observed Nancy's class again on September 24 when she planned for the
students to explore different kinds of apples. During the lesson, I noticed that Erin
was not entering into the activities. At one end of the lesson, Nancy asked Erin, “did
you like the Red Delicious or the McIntosh the best?” Erin just stared at Nancy.
Several children who were nearby and heard Nancy's question then asked Erin, "Did
you like the first one or second one the best?" Erin answered, “the second one."

When I asked Nancy to tell me a little about Erin, she responded by saying that "this
girl is MiMH. She can't count 1 - 2 - 3. She can't do diddly squat. The other kids
cover for her. She's a real low functioning MiMH.” I asked Nancy what she meant by
low-functioning and she replied that “Eric can't count, she reads nothing, she doesn't

basically really catch on too much.”

144

In a journal entry on October 16, Nancy described the four children in her
classroom who were classified as learning disabled. She noted that these children only
leave the room very occasionally:

Alex; is learning disabled in math and reading. He can't remember many of
the sight words he learned last year and is basically a non-reader. He gets
flustrated in math and says he can't do it and he hates it. (He) can be
stubborn, often talks out in class, or flops his head on the desk. He can also
be very delightful, comes up with some right-on funny observations.

He was working on a story the other day during pre-writing time. He
wanted to write a story about his go-cart. I encouraged him because I knew
that was something he really liked, yeah. He was telling me stuff about his
go-cart. I said, yeah write it down. “But teacher, I don't know how to write
it down.” I said, “well go ahead, do the best you can.” And so he wrote
down some words and I came back and he did have go-cart (grt) but that
was the only recognizable anything.

Chris; is learning disabled in math and reading. Chris is able to read a at a
very low level and can manage to get through a simple book like Rosie's
Walk (I-Iutchins, 1968). He writes backwards in math. He's quiet, takes his
time getting things done.

Glen - is learning disabled in reading. He reads Brown Bear Brown Bear
over and over and when it comes to writing time, simply copies flom books.
He will not or cannot write anything of his own in any form. He's shy, quiet
and a very nice little boy.

Edward - is the behavior problem of the class (and I might as well add, the
one I have the most concern and care for). I know I shouldn't say that but
he is the only one we have on a special behavior program. He is learning
disabled in reading. He can read only a very few words. He has a severe
Speech problem and often acts and speaks like he is four years old. He has
flashes of brilliance. For example, he was able to pick out the names of
foreign cities on the globe but can't even figure out Simple words like “the.”
(9-24)

Even though at times it seemed that Nancy was flustrated with the children in
her class who had special needs, she clearly spent time planning and teaching in ways

that would help these children be successful.

145
(E) Gender

No specific data were collected on gender differences.

(F) EamilLEattems
Nancy noted early in student teaching that

most of the students in my room are different flom me. Many are flom the
Appalachian culture and some are Hispanic. Almost all are from homes that
do not contain the two original parents and are growing up in a town where
they are in much closer proximity to other kids and their influences. I had
neither of those situations growing up. (9-1)

Nancy also believed that life at school is quite different for her students than it
is at home. She perceived that many of the homes are in a “lot of chaos.” She also
believed that they received “inconsistent, very negative discipline” at home and that
the “children would often rather be at school than at home.” Several times during the
semester, she described children in ways that reflected the way she perceived their
home situations:

Alex, one of the kids I sent to detention, the one that I was giving a verbal
warning to, his parents just got divorced. And so you know that there's stuff
going on. It's like these kids aren't hardened kids and I don't want to do
stuff to make them hardened. I always want to find a way to affrrm them,
the way to get to their heart and pull out what's there, you know. (9-24)

In her last journal entry, Nancy wrote that “most of my students are different
from me.” She described two girls in the classroom, though, that seemed most like

her, particular in terms of family lifestyle:

Renee is a good student, kind of lonely and looking for fliends. She's
insecure and clingy, good reader and a goody-goody. She reminds me so
much of myself and I found I didn't like some of these things about here.
Because of that I felt like I understood her but at the same time I found I
was much more demanding of her and expected more of her. Jessica is
much more talkative, also has parents who are together and care. She's at
the top of her class academically. I found myself responding to her much in
the same way I did to Renee, except (should I say this?) I liked her better.

(1 1-9)

146

Nancy then went on to describe the children in her room who seemed the most
different flom her, those for whom her expectations were not as high. Often these
children came flom families whose social patterns and values were much different
flom her own:

The other kids, those who were different from myself, I didn't understand
and would get flustrated with why they couldn't obey. Many come flom
families where parents aren’t together. But, I probably had more patience
with these kids. Mentally, I could decide that they were dealing with a “lot
of stuff” and cut them some slack. I didn't necessary understand where they
were coming flom but I didn't expect as much of them.

A major difference is support at home that has to do so much with the
motivation and what they have to work with in the classroom. That just
really impacts. I saw major differences in the kids in the motivation that
they had to learn and the tools-the background that they had to work with.
Some of the kids were really--they wanted to learn--they could connect with
what was going on-the kids that didn’t have support at home--clear
differences there. (1 1-9)

Nancy recognized that her own upbringing was different flom many of her
students. At times this difference seemed to have an impact on her expectations of
students and of her perceptions about the support that these families were giving their
children. However, it was clear that she deeply cared about the students even though

her beliefs about family interactions may have been very different flom those of the

parents of her students.

El [111'] “.1 lEl'

Nancy conflonted a number of differences between herself and her students at
Chambers Elementary. She brought with her beliefs and attitudes that she had

developed over time flom her own home, school and community culture. The

147

development of Nancy’s multicultural attitudes and behaviors in these areas of
differences were analyzed using the adapted Nieto’s (1992) flame. Figure 5
summarizes Nancy’s development of multicultural attitudes and behaviors during
student teaching.
(A) Racinlendflhnic

Nancy came into student teaching with an image of what constitutes
appropriate behavior in the classroom, stemming flom the value and beliefs of her
home, school and community. One of the key elements of this image relates to the idea
that children are to obey their teachers. Nancy noted that the backgrounds of the
children in her classroom were quite different than her own in terms of what is
conceived of as appropriate behavior. She also recognized that the way she had been
parented and schooled was not necessarily a model she wanted to emulate. Nancy was
in search of an orderly classroom environment for her group of students but didn’t
know how to accomplish this without being “severe” in her approach to management
and discipline. Most of Nancy’s concern focused on herself, her need to establish
another way to communicate. Very rarely was there mention of the Appalachian or
Hispanic culture of students as a factor in thinking about appropriate school behavior.
Entering attitudes and beliefs in relationship to expectations for behavior seemed to be
at a Tolerance Level (Level One) and seemed to remain at this level throughout
student teaching.

Helping students make connections to prior knowledge was another goal for

Nancy. The issue that became most salient to Nancy in this area centered around her

148

need to figure out the kind of structure needed for students to be able to take charge of
their own learning, building on their own experiences, interests and needs. She
seemed to consider the prior knowledge of her students as important, but she struggled
with how to flame her teaching so that she could feel in control. Nancy thoughtfully
questioned and reflected on the issues related to helping students make connections to
prior knowledge and interests. She used various methods and materials in attempting
to make these connections. Using Nieto’s adapted flamework, her level of attitudes
and behavior grew but remained at Level Two (Acceptance) throughout student

teaching

(B) Language

No data were collected on language differences.

(C) Socioeconomioflackerormd

From the limited amount of data collected in this area, it seems that Nancy
entered and remained at the Tolerance Level (Level One) during student teaching. She
recognized that many of her students and their families had access to financial
resources quite different flom her own. Nancy admitted that her perceptions of
families who had fewer financial resources were challenged when she had personal
contact with one of her student’s parents. This personal interaction helped her realize
that the child’s family does care about her and her success at school regardless of their

socioeconomic situation.

149
(D) W

Nancy acknowledged at the beginning of student teaching that her own
schooling experiences had been quite positive. Her family had encouraged her to read
and explore her environment. In general, her entering attitude towards those who learn
differently than she does could be categorized as Level One, tolerance of the diversity
of learning needs without denying the importance of differences. At the beginning of
Student teaching she tended to think about the students in her classroom with special
needs as “problems” although there was little indication that she had doubts about
their placement in her classroom.

AS student teaching continued, Nancy tried various strategies with the four
learning disabled students in the classroom and valued their contributions to the
classroom. Nancy wrote that these four students always entered into her planning,
especially when it came to doing something with reading. She noted that she always
had to stop and think about what she would have them do. There are a number of
times she changed what she was going to have the class do because she realized that
these four really couldn't do any of the reading. Sometimes she paired them up with
readers who could read to them. She also noted that she continued to plan a variety of
activities to meet the needs of those children who might be auditory, visual, or
kinesthetic learners. She had them actively participating in hands-on activities like
planting seeds, sorting seeds, using math manipulatives, using movement to song, art
activities along with reading, writing and math. She usually tried to write most things

on the board. She also noted that

150

I find myself expending more energy on these four than on any of the other
students, trying to figure out how to help them and work them into the class
when they struggle so much. I keep thinking there must be some way I can
help them. The special education teacher doesn't seem to have much of a
clue as to what to do either. Her specialty was MiMH kids. Most of the
time I really feel at a loss as to what to do. (10-16)

In the area of exceptionalities, Nancy seemed to enter student teaching at a
Level One (Tolerance) and developed in her attitudes and behaviors in the area of
curriculum adaptations for her students with special needs to a Level Two
(Acceptance) by the end of student teaching.
(E) Gender

No specific data were collected on gender differences.
(F) W

Characteristics of the entering multicultural beliefs and behaviors of Nancy
towards differences in families seemed to be at Level One--tolerance for differences.
Nancy recognized that there were differences between herself and her students in
terms of how children are supported in the home setting. Even though she described
her own upbringing as “strict,” she found affirmation flom her family for achievement
in school. She also valued the fact that she had a two-parent family who worked to
provide a stable environment for her. At several points during student teaching, Nancy
associated behavioral problems of students with home situations, particularly in terms
of one-parents/nvo-parent families. Academic and behavioral expectations for
children flom different systems than her own were lower than that of those children

who were flom similar cultural backgrounds as herself. Nancy also attributed

151

differences between students’ motivation for learning to her perspective on what
constituted “support flom home.” In the her last journal entry, Nancy wrote:
Support at home affects so much the motivation and what they have to work
with in the classroom. That just really impacts. I saw major differences in
the kids in the motivation that they had to learn and the tools, the
background that they had to work with. And some of the kids really wanted
to learn, they could connect with what was going on. Those kids that didn't
have support at home, there were clear differences there in terms of
motivation to learn.
Nancy’s level of multicultural attitudes and beliefs in the areas of her

perceptions of “family” and of the social patterns and values of her students and their

families seemed to stay at Level One (Tolerance) during student teaching.

Summary

Nancy conflonted differences between herself and her students in the following
areas of diversity: racial and ethnic; socioeconomic; exceptionalities and family
patterns. She did not identify differences related to language or gender.

In the area of racial and ethnic diversity, Nancy’s expectations for classroom
behavior did not always match the way students responded to situations. She
recognized that many of the children in her classroom did not Share the same values
and beliefs of her own home, school and community. She tolerated these differences
although this area remained a source of flustration throughout student teaching.

Nancy did place value on the prior knowledge of the children in her classroom and

accepted their experience, interests and needs as foundations on which to build

curriculum.

152

Differences between Nancy and her students in relationship to socioeconomic
background and family patterns were identified and conflonted by Nancy at various
points throughout student teaching. While there was limited data gathered in these
specific areas, the data suggests that Nancy did tolerate these differences but seemed to
continue to have lower expectations for students who had fewer economic resources
and belonged to families with differing lifestyle differences and values.

Throughout student teaching, Nancy conflonted differences in the area of
exceptionalities. In the beginning, she seemed to welcome children with special needs
into her classroom but also tended to think of their needs as problematic. As she
continued teaching throughout the semester, she devoted much time and energy to
developing strategies and activities that would aid individual students with Special
needs in their educational progress. She grew to expect these students to learn even
though she often was at a loss as to what she needed to do to help them be successful

in the classroom.

153

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154

LEAH

S . l . E 1 l I E .

My field experience last term was in a fifth grade classroom. This was

the same age I was as my mother and I moved here fiom Arizona. I

was the only child fiom divorced parents in my class and I think

throughout the rest of my years in school. In the early 70 's, divorce

wasn't quite so prevalent, especially in this small town. There is a lot

of pain in reflecting on that feelinguand even though each

circumstance is unique, I can often put my heart into the kids I'm with

and still feel that "ache " I felt so many years ago.

Thirty-one-year old Leah, a former instructor of aerobics and the single parent
of two young boys, grew up in a southwestern state and moved to the Midwest at the
age of nine after her parents divorced. This was a difficult time for Leah but "my
mom was always supportive of me even though we didn't have a lot. She was like a
secretary and I was a latchkey kid where you had a key around your neck." In
elementary school, Leah changed schools every year or two. In junior high, Leah
became involved in sports and was a pioneer in establishing a girl's track team.
During high school she also focused on athletics rather than academics and graduated
with a very low grade point average.

Leah stated that she has always wanted to be a teacher. Her early image of a

teacher centered around the idea of a

caring person for children. I never really thought about the work they did
but just that they got to--l just thought it was so neat to talk to my teachers
and to interact with them and I thought, WOW, what a neat job!

155

What influenced Leah to go to college and pursue teacher education is her
experience working as a mother's helper in her oldest son's kindergarten classroom.
She realizes now how much work teaching is--”I look back and I think that when I was
in school that teachers didn't put that much work into it because it just didn't seem like
that it was hard for them.”

When asked to define her experiences with others outside of her own culture,
she responded that She had lived in Arizona for many years and was exposed to many
different Indian tribes. Some were bused into her elementary school and she also
visited the reservations with her class. Leah indicated that she had not had a lot of
experience with the Aflican-American or Hispanic culture but that she had had contact
with the Amish culture over the past three years. Her own sons were taken care of
during the day by Amish women. Leah noted that the “rituals, beliefs and ideas of the
Amish are different and I have learned to relate to them and have grown in knowledge
about their culture.” Leah expressed a desire to know about other cultures but at the
same time expressed a fear of "offending them with questions they may not find
appropriate."

Patterns which emerged flom Leah's participation in the pilot study were (1)
the acknowledgment that the multicultural setting was new to her and that she had
entered the classroom with some hesitation--however, the experience was not
particularly uncomfortable for her; (2) a strong belief that as a teacher she must stop to
consider "feelings" of children and the context in which situations happen before

responding to them in the classroom; (3) a sense that she needed to know herself--her

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own beliefs and values--before she could make decisions about how to create the kind
of classroom environment she desired for her students; and (4) a passion for taking
some kind of personal action through her teaching to “change aspects of our society
which contribute to the oppression of certain cultures and groups of people.”

Before entering the first grade classroom during the pilot study, Leah had little
experience with persons who are African-American. During the first day of field
experience she wrote that she

entered with hesitation and fear. I felt the children would prejudge me and
maybe be aflaid. This just did not happen. The first day probably half of
the class ran their fingers through my hair and smelled it. It reminded me
when the children in White Teacher would do the same to Ms. Paley's hair
to experiment with the feel and the texture. It is kind of a funny experience.
If I allow them to touch me and feel me and I touch their skin or we discuss
the differences, we learn together. I must admit I was scared my first visit
there. I felt I was “white” and in a “black” school, but soon I just felt like
an ordinary teacher and really didn't think of color so much.

Throughout the course, Leah emphasized the need to "stop, reflect, analyze and
decide what is more important than just reacting to a situation without considering all
feelings of the parties involved." She often made references to the way she felt as a
child when at school, reflected on some of the experiences of her own children in a
school setting and had observed a number of situations in her field placement which
led her to the belief that teachers must go beneath the surface to find out the “why” of

children's behavior:

I talked to a student teacher who had complained all week that this one little
boy in her class had just turned into a different person. His behavior was
mean, violent and unpredictable. She felt she had accomplished nothing
with him that week. Then on that Friday, he came up to her and put his
head in her lap and said he was happy today because his mom was coming
home. It turns out that his mom had been in the hospital all week and the
teachers were unaware!

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Learning to know herself became a priority for Leah. She expressed the need
to understand and explore her own ideas and feelings so that she could be firm and
strong in her convictions before she entered the classroom. She began to see herself as
an agent of change in the classroom as a result of exploring her own belief system. It
was also clear that Leah was beginning to think of issues of culture in relationship to a
multifaceted political and economic system:

It is then that I can choose carefully how to direct the students to live in a
classroom environment flee flom prejudices and to be able to transform that
outside the community to our community and even beyond. It is very
difficult to express our views out of fear. But, as a teacher, if I can
understand how I felt in their position as I began to challenge my thinking,
then I can provide discussions, films, and books to probe their minds and
help them to explore and express thoughts carefirlly. As a teacher, before I
can begin to do any of this I have to be secure in where I'm coming flom.
This system really kills me. We certainly are the “status quo” and set the

ground rules to fit this elitist society. I can't get discouraged but need to
fight on!

Leah requested to be placed in a classroom which had diversity in the student
population. She was interested in working with Hispanic children and also those

children with special needs who were placed in an "inclusion" classroom.

D'fifs 11 'fi 1

I haven ’t had a lot of experience with persons fiom other cultures. Our
schools were integrated with American Indians but I didn ’t have a
relationship with them. I knew some Afiican-Americans in athletics
during high school. I probably didn ’t get a real big taste of another
culture until I started thinking about it in Curriculum Studies and then
in SST (Study-Service Trimester) in the Dominican Republic. And for
me, I guess I thought in my mind so long, you know how it was before,
that we ’re all the same. Well, now we want to know about everybody ’s
culture and that 's really important. Ten years ago it was well, we ’re
all the same and we don ’t talk about it. Well, then I went on SST and I
found out a lot of neat things that I want to talk about. When I came
back here, nobody wanted to hear it.

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During the pilot study, Leah expressed some fears about entering a field
experience in a classroom where the children were flom a background with which she
was unfamiliar. The time She spent in the classroom, however, was not
uncomfortable for her. In fact, she was enthusiastic about this multicultural
experience and was determined to be the kind of teacher who could make a difference
in making changes in the system which would alleviate some of the difficulties that
other than majority students face.

Leah’s SST experience in the Dominican Republic that occurred during the
summer between the Elementary Curriculum Studies course and student teaching only
reinforced her commitment to take on the challenges that come with teaching
culturally diverse students.

Leah’s story during student teaching is told within the flamework of Six
particular types of diversity that impact teaching and learning, including differences in
(A) race and ethnicity; (B) language; (C) socioeconomic background; (D) gender; (E)
exceptionalities; and (F) family patterns.

(A) Racialendfithnic

In my initial interview with Leah, two weeks into student teaching, she talked
about how she learned to know more about her own culture during the term she took
Elementary Curriculum Studies along with a course called Liberation Theology. She
described her own personal awakening by saying that “taking these two courses at the
same time suddenly helped me see my own culture more clearly-~“Boom, it really hit!

And so for me, I feel like I have a better knowledge of myself.” She then went to

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Costa Rica in the summer before student teaching for her study-service term which
reinforced her belief that she needed to know herself and who she was within her own
culture.

The interdisciplinary unit Leah planned to teach during student teaching, titled
“Follow Your Dreams,” focused on helping her students to better know themselves
and their community. She used the curriculum to build on the prior knowledge that
her students brought flom their homes and community. In the first interview, she told
me that she believed that

the kids have a high need for community awareness and for developing their
own self-esteem. I think these are the types of things I really want to focus
on for the kids. I have specifically sensed that I need to concentrate on self-
esteem when I do begin my unit. 1 really want the kids to value their own
community but I also want them to get it into their heads that they can
dream, believe and get what they want in life. I feel some are kind of in a
vacuum and not really aware of everything around them and what the
possibilities are. The community is here to help them and I want them to
feel an important part of that. (9-13)

During my first visit to Leah’s classroom on October 6, Leah planned a lesson
where each student made a collage that told about him/herself. She passed out a
I variety of magazines, scissors and glue. After they were finished, each went to the
front of the room and presented a collage which represented their interests. As
examples, April’s collage had pictures of the Simpsons, chocolate, T.V., cars, Pepsi,
formal clothing and cars. Michael had pictures of Magic Johnson, pull-out couches,

candy and music. After the presentations, Leah gave an assignment: “Go home

tonight and talk to an adult who remembers when you were a baby. Don’t bring in a

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picture. Ask mom, dad, aunt, uncle, guardian why you were named the first name you

have.” After the observation, Leah commented that She

found the collages very interesting. I would have liked to start what I did
today on the first day of school but I’m really glad in retrospect that I waited
because the kids--this is the first time I’ve every had that many kids up in
flont of the room to present. And I think it takes this long for them to feel
comfortable to do that. I don’t think that’s something you could do on the
first day of school. So I’m really glad I waited. It will be fun to hear what
they come up with for their names. (10-6)

After the second observation in Leah’s classroom on October 11, I asked her
to describe what happened with the name activity:

It was fun. Found out that Marcus was named after his great-great-
grandfather but he didn’t know about it until he asked his mom. That made
him feel good. Then I have a Germain Brittany who is named after Morgan
Brittany who is an actress. Oh, and this is the best. I have a girl, Tonya Jo,
and she said she was named after an aunt or somebody and her middle name
was after a T.V. program that was on in the sixties-~there was Billy Jo and
Betty Jo--I said “Petticoat Junction?” and she said “Yeah!”. It was hilarious
and we just really had a good time. We had a good time hearing the stories.
But it was good. When you call Marcus on the playground, you’re actually
calling his great-great-grandfather. (10-11)

Continuing to try to help students make connections with their past and their
future, Leah brought in literature, poetry and arranged for fieldtrips and guest
speakers. Earlier in the week of my third observation to her classroom on October 20,
Leah had taken her students to the local cemetery to look at tombstones and to write
down some of the epitaphs they saw. During my observation to the classroom, Leah
read the book, Miss Rumphius, a story of a woman who made a difference in her
community by planting flowers. Leah first talked with her students about the various
epithets they saw at the cemetery:

L: What did you see on the tombstones?

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C1: Some just said their name.
C2: Mother--baby--the baby was real little.

C3: My grandpa Musser is buried under that big tall angel--like she’s
looking down on him.

C4: One said “Dust to Dust.”

C5: This one kid had his whole life on it. (10-20)

Leah then linked that trip with the book she had just read to them. She asked

her students to

think about your dreams and I want you to think about a difference you
want to make--like Miss Rumphius, what was the difference she wanted to
make? What are your dreams and goals? I want you to pretend that you are
eighty years old and you are writing about what you did to make a
difference in your community. What do you want to be remembered by?
Also, I want you to write your own epitaph..(10-20)

After the observation, we talked about one guest, a fireman, who had come into

the classroom to talk with the students earlier that week. He had been a former student

at Chambers elementary and had lived in the same neighborhood that many of them

do:

He did a great job. I didn’t tell him anything to say. I didn’t have a clue
what he was going to say. When I was out in the hall, I told him that he had
just reinforced everything that we’d been talking about since day one. I
mean the things he said are just exactly what has been coming out of my
mouth. The only thing I told him was that they had picked a dream and I
wanted him to talk about goals and future aspirations. He brought in a
poem by James Whitcomb Riley. 1 was just elated. He kept emphasizing
that the “north side of town” where he was flom was a positive place. He
said, “I’m flom the north side, I can do anything.” I’m also having a poet
come. One of my student’s grandfather is a truck driver and he’s also a
published poet and we’ve been reading some of his poetry. I got a hold of
him and he’s in between runs so on Wednesday he can come in. It’s a good
connection to the community, especially connecting with the culture of the
students. (10-20)

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Leah seemed to place high value on incorporating persons flom her students’
local community into the curriculum. She actively engaged in searching out people as
resources who had connections to the community and could talk with the children
about their own lives and occupations. Leah planned a variety of ways for her students
to develop in their understanding about themselves--their past, present and future

selves.
(B) Language

Leah had three children in her classroom who spoke limited English. In the
initial interview, after being in the classroom for two weeks, she spoke about her
communication with these students:

L: I have three children in my classroom who have limited English
proficiency. One of them, Morgan, told us that Cambodian is the only
language spoken in the home. He doesn’t go out for ESL help. Sondra has
only been in the United States for less than a year.

R: Do they have any problems fitting into the norms of the classroom?

L: If I sit down and talk to Sondra, she just kind of looks at me and
smiles. I didn’t even know she was ESL. She writes English but she can’t
say things back to me. I’ll look at her and she doesn’t seem to understand
what I’m saying. She kind of looks at people around her to see what they’re
doing. I try to talk with her in Spanish. I think she thinks it’s fimny that
I’m doing that because I speak broken Spanish. I mean, I can communicate
and she knows what I mean but --

R: I imagine it feels good to her that someone else in the classroom knows
her first language.

L: Yeah, it does. She likes it but she just seems really shy. I remember
flom a course in my teacher education program--it was in Reading Problems
1 think--when we have our own children we don’t expect them to talk until
they are two or three. If I think about her being--she probably would be that
eighteen month old that’s not talking yet. (9-5)

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Another student in her class, Raphael, was fairly proficient in basic English but
Leah believed that his level of English led to some miscommunication with her and
others in the classroom. After my second observation in the classroom, on October
1 1, Leah told of the following incident that happened during the first week of school:

Raphael is Hispanic and also L.D. We have a good relationship but one day
we had a go-around. Katie raised her hand and said, “Raphael just killed a
fly and threw it at me”--and this was my first week of school. I said,
“Raphael, did you do that?” He said, “Yeah.” I said “Go get a Kleenex ,
pick it up off her desk and throw it in the trash.” He did that and I was
scooting him back in his chair and I said, “I’m really sorry, Katie.” And
then I said, “wait a minute, I shouldn’t say I’m sorry. Raphael, what do you
say to Katie?” And 1 think part of it was, he wasn’t understanding what I
was doing, he’s not understanding my language, what I mean, because I
don’t think his first language is English. He kind of looked at me for a
minute and I said again, “Raphael, what do say to Katie?” And he looked
right at her and just seriously said, “It ain’t gonna kill you!” He didn’t
know--it was innocent-J kind of came down hard on him too but he really
didn’t understand. (10-11)

Leah seemed to respect students who had limited English proficiency. She
worked at developing relationships with these students and at finding ways to

communicate with them.
(C) Socioeconomic

Leah had recently returned flom the Dominican Republic. Living there for
three months gave her the opportunity to gain a different perspective on
socioeconomic status than the one she had before her visit to that country:

When I went to the Dominican Republic, the house I stayed in was a middle
class house which was high economic. There was one children’s book and
we just read it over and over. Most houses I went to had no children’s
books. The first assignment I had which I didn’t take was a village of 80
people that I was supposed to set up a preschool program for and they didn’t
have paper, pencils, books, equipment -- they just had a cement building. I
mean they had nothing, you know. There wasn’t any literature for them.
There were no books in the houses. I went to the toy store. The only books

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they had were Sesame books translated into Spanish. The one book that I
bought had 12 different Dominican children and things they did -- like they
sold ices in the street or they shined shoes was typically their culture but
there weren’t any other books which were about them or their culture. (9-5)

Throughout student teaching, Leah continued to make references to the Costa
Rican term but she also made connections between that experience and the one she
was currently having in the classroom at Chambers elementary:

I have a better understanding of the world environment. I mean, I have to
say that Costa Rica affected me as a person and just understanding a
different culture and what we really have. I can walk into a room like
Chambers and to me, I mean to me, they’re not poor. I don’t know, they’re
not poor. Before I left they were poor but to me, now, they aren’t poor. I
don’t feel sorry for these kids like I did. I know I did. The only thing I feel
sorry for is their situations you know. When I have a girl tell me that She
has to go to another town every night and work on cars because of her
mother’s boyfiiend or something, it’s not a good situation but she is not
without. I mean she’s taken care of and she’s okay. And that type of thing
is just, I don’t know, I feel like I can stand up in flont of the classroom and
look at the kids differently and think of myself differently since I’ve had
this experience in another culture. (9-5)

Leah seemed to be saying that while some of the children in her classroom bad
financial resources that might be considered to be very limited, she didn’t think of
them as being poor. Her own experiences with limited financial resources at various
points in her life certainly also seems to have had an impact on her attitude. In a
journal entry at the end of October, Leah wrote that she

didn’t feel like the kids in the classroom were much different flom myself
other than their lifestyles at home. We have families who moved here flom
Kentucky and they have a different culture. I often felt on the same
economic level and have used the welfare system myself as many of their

families do. Many of the kids come from single-parent homes, which is the
same as I was raised in and am now presently living. (10-29)

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Leah’s own life experiences prepared her to respect persons from a variety of
socioeconomic backgrounds. The financial background of children in her classroom

did not lessen her expectations for their school success.

(D)Exeeptionalities

Leah remembers that learning to read came easily to her in first grade. She
spent a difficult third grade year in school due to the divorce of her parents but her
learning'experiences were mostly positive:

I had a horrible time. I talked all the time. I had to stay after school
like eighty minutes. She put check marks and every check mark was 10
minutes after school. I had to do book reports for talking. I don’t think
I’ll ever assign a book report as punishment. I had to do a book report
on the tar pools of LA in California. I’ll never forget the book. But
other than that year, school was generally easy even though my grades
in high school doesn’t look like it was easy for me. (9-5)

During the initial interview, I asked Leah what she has been thinking about
most in the last two weeks since school began. We had the following conversation:

L: I’ll tell you one thing--we have ten identified kids--those are my
best kids.

R: Identified as...

L: I have an emotionally handicapped kid, four with learning
disabilities, three who are mildly mentally handicapped and two who
have English as their second language. But having those kids, and it
scared me to death at the beginning, but they’re just the best behaved.
They smile and believe it or not, they’re the first ones to raise their
hands to offer information. I remember the first time this girl Veronica,
I mean she’s LD you know and she raised her hand and my gosh I’ve
never called on her when she hasn’t given me a correct answer and I
just feel really good about it. She works very hard. Her handwriting is
very neat and she tries really hard on her spelling words. She just
concentrates. My learning disabled kids seem to concentrate more and
really try. (9-5)

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Leah continued this conversation by talking about a particular child whose
needs seemed to stand out in the classroom:

L: This one kid, he’s not identified because his mother won’t let him be
tested but what happened is that she took LSD when she was pregnant and
if you see him, he’s trippin’ and it pisses me off but I just love the kid. He’s
almost like autistic actually. They’re trying to talk to his mother again and
test him for autism.

R: What kind of work does he do?

L: If you give him an assignment, you have to set the timer. It he hears
the clickin’ he can get it done in a second. If you don’t have a timer he
doesn’t move. It’s really weird. We were talking about complete subjects,
complete predicates, simple subjects, simple predicates this week. Well,
that’s hard for me. I have a hard time with it and I asked a question about a
simple predicate. In this case it wasn’t one word, it was two words-~have
been. He was just begging to be called on. His eyes wouldn’t leave mine.
So I called on him. He got it and I was like YES! I was so excited. It was
great. So anyway, these kids that I have who are supposed to be my
inclusion kids, I’d rather have a whole room of them, you know. They’re
much easier for me to work with.

(9-5)

Leah also talked about the fact that there were some students who thought
differently than she did. For an example, she related an incident where a student took
her question very literally, instead of in the way she intended for it to come across:

Differences in thinking. It was so funny--yesterday one of the girls who is
LD and has a hard time reading--we have a blue sheet for her that she puts
on her book and it makes the words appear better for her--she left it at
home. I asked her, “Julie, is that blue sheet doing you any good at home?”
She said. “Yes.” I had to sit there and laugh because she just, the way I
asked it, she was being very honest. So I had to think about that. (9-5)

At other points along the way in student teaching, Leah talked and wrote about

various strategies used to include everyone in the learning process. One example is

cooperative learning:

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Cooperative learning for a variety of students, that works. I found that my
stronger achievers are very quick to help with the children who are MIMH
(mildly mentally handicapped). I’ve tried to help them work at feeling
comfortable in groups. It would be easier for me to stand up and teach and
have them do things independently. But groups are a better way to do it. (9-
17)

Another example came flom a journal entry written after the camping trip. A
particular incident reinforced for Leah that concrete, hands-on activities are needed for
many students to be successful in the classroom:

One of the neatest things that happened was at the archery range. I was the
instructor for this activity and Nicki’s group came for their turn. We gave
her help at every attempt and she did quite well. With ten points being a
bullseye, Nicki shot an arrow in the seven point range, beating many of her
peers. We all screamed!! It was great!! She had so many successful
experiences there, more so than I’ve seen her have with the resource teacher
at school or anything I’ve adapted to my curricultun. I realize that in
working with Nicki, LEA (Learning Experience Approach) and hands-on
activities are a must. (9-17)

One dilemma that arose for Leah during the semester was how to handle grades
for those students whose work she modified because of their learning needs. We had
the following conversation at the end of October:

L: One problem I had with modifying the grade--when it came time to talk
with parents--like Joey was so high in reading--he got A+ because he read
so many books. I almost felt like the parent thought he was not going to be
MiMh anymore--like he was going to grow out of it. I had a really hard
time with that-~because he’s doing very well for his potential but...we have
to be thinking about what is going to happen in junior high.

R: Was there any indication on the report card of a modified grade?

L: Yeah, she wrote on the side, this grade is modified so the parents knew,
but still they’re confused-J cold just tell.

R: There certainly are some dilemmas with that whole situation. Do you
expect the same behavior flom all of the children?

168

L: If all my kids could act like my inclusion kids, I would have been fine.
They worked so hard. There were times where they had different spelling
words--they had high flequency words like Don ’t Walk, Walk and Caution.
They were very well behaved. If you would ask them to hold the cafeteria
door--”oh, yes and you have a good lunch, Mrs. Harper.”

(IO-29)

Leah seemed to have high expectations for all the children in her classroom.
She adapted cuniculum to meet their needs and established the kind of learning

environment where they could feel successful.

(E) Gender
In her first journal entry on September 13, Leah wrote that

the kids this year really seem like a family. I was in this classroom last year
for field experience and felt tensions and groupings, especially with the
girls. I really don’t see that here yet this year. I don’t see the kind of

boy/ girl relationships like I saw last year. The boys and girls this year really
aren’t aware of each other in a relationship aspect as I witnessed last year. I
am beginning to lead Girl’s club in October at Chambers and I hope to get a
better insight on my fifth grade girls on a personal level. I think things may
arise here that I don’t see in the class. (9-13)

Nearly a month later, in an October 15 journal entry, Leah wrote about her
concern for the low self-esteem among the girls in her classroom:

It is sad to see kids with such low self-esteem. These are the ones I am trying
to hit. I found great success with “Girl’s Club.” I am planning on continuing
through the year with this activity because so many of my low self-esteem
girls are in this club. I don’t want to let them down and I think I could get to
them after a long period of time. I have to say, I had many more girls with a
low self-image than boys. I’m not sure why...possibly because the girls are
so horribly mean to each other...they are relentless!!! And so many of the
girls take the “catty” remarks to heart. I found out that is a big part of fifth
grade...taking care of spits and Spats that don’t even happen in the classroom.
(1 0-1 5)

In addition to taking on the Girl’s Club, Leah sought out resources that

particular addressed the academic needs of girls. She wanted to use the curriculum to

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encourage girls to have high expectations for themselves. Two of the resource books
she used were specifically related to planning successful educational experiences for
girls, especially in the areas of math and science.

During an interview in late October, Leah talked about the differences that she
noticed in developmental stages between these fifth grade boys and girls:

The girls seemed to be so much more grown up than the boys. I could just
see the girls sitting in groups smiling and doing things with their hair.

Some of the girls were so developed. I mean, I was just amazed. The boys,
they didn’t even notice. They’re clueless to what is going on—-they just care
about football! (10-29)

Leah recognized that the girls in her classroom needed special support in
gaining self-esteem. She not only recognized this need, but took specific actions in an
attempt to help them develop in how they perceive themselves and their abilities. Leah
took time to work with the girls in an after school club and planned curriculum that
would also positively impact their lives.

(F) EamibLBattems

Leah lived with her mother after her parents divorced when she was in third
grade. She thinks of her mother as being very supportive throughout her growing up
years. Leah went to church regularly, had grandparents close by and finished her last
two years of high school at a private Christian school. Her oldest son now attends a
private Catholic elementary school and her younger son is not yet in school. Leah is
currently a single parent.

Working as a parent helper in her own son’s kindergarten class and spending

time with a Dominican family were two diverse settings that helped Leah realize in

170

concrete ways that her own family and school experiences were quite different flom
those of many others:

When I was working in my son’s kindergarten and realized that 10 students
out of 25 who were kindergarten age didn’t get read to at home even 15
minutes a week, that’s when I realized there are some children who don’t
get read to. American children don’t get read to? (9-5)

During my initial interview with Leah, she talked about how helpfirl it had
been to live with a family in the Costa Rican culture. Our conservation about getting
to know the values and actions of families flom other cultures follows:

L: During my field experience at Hathaway (during the pilot study), I
really didn’t think about the cultures of the children when they left school
and went home. I don’t know enough about the Aflican-American culture
at home to know what would be different. But I learned a lot about what
happens in the Latin American home that’s different, just different, the way
things are.

R: Tell me about the family you stayed with.

L: It was excellent! She was a single mother--well, she was married but
her husband was living with another woman and had more of his kids--she
was really separated. She was thirty-four and had a five-year-old and a
three-ear old. So it was just us.

R: Could you communicate in Spanish fairly well with her?

L: I had to. I had to learn really quick. She didn’t speak or understand
any English. And she was lonely. She had a Master’s degree in Social
Administration flom Puerto Rico but She didn’t work. She would stay
home with those kids until they were grown and then she would work when
they were old enough. Her life was those kids.

R: How did she support herself financially?

L: He pays for everything. He’s an architect. He’s pretty well off. He
pays for her apartment, food clothing, he pays everything. I know that’s
how their culture is, at least in the capital. In the country most of the men
stay with their families but in the capital many men have several families.
But understanding that, even the first day, I was with her, I was trying to
talk her into getting a divorce. I mean, you gotta leave this guy, he’s no

171

good for you. Finally I understood that all the other women in this
apartment complex were single and their men were paying for it. Why
shouldn’t she have her life paid for too? Okay, I understand now, no
problem. But that was a cultural thing. (9-5)

Even though Leah didn’t particularly agree with the lifestyle of this Costa
Rican women, she learned to accept these differences without judging her. She began
to understand that She couldn’t superimpose her own belief system on someone who
has a different cultural understanding of family.

The second week in September, Leah went on a camping trip with fifty-four
fifth graders flom Chandler school. She spent three days and two nights at the camp
and slept in a cabin with seven of the girls flom her classroom. In a journal entry,
Leah wrote about a fifth grade girl who was in her cabin. She told about her attempts
to deal with a sensitive issue related to Nicki’s personal hygiene:

Nicki bunked in my cabin and the poor child did not have any socks. She
said there were none clean the day she left. She is very small and couldn’t
borrow anyone else’s and fit into her shoes. She never complained about
being cold and always said her feet were warm.

At school in the classroom, Nicki is often messy in dress and often smells
like cat urine. We have even had to tell her of this because it was disturbing
to the other children. She is also in kind of a “la-la” land and often wanders
in thought.

At camp, Nicki seemed like a different person. I made sure each night the
girls in my cabin went to the community bath house and took a shower.
They had to walk into the shower with soap and shampoo. We probably
could have bathed only once but I know they do not bathe everyday at home
and I wanted to instill the importance of this and how they have to SCRUB
their bodies all over. I took a shower as well and told them I took one every
day. I told them it was real easy and they should continue to bathe every
night at home as well. I don’t think Nicki does and I hope the small routine
helped instill this in her. (9-17)

172

Again, Leah’s notion of an appropriate lifestyle didn’t match up with the way
Nicki’s family took care of themselves. In this case, Leah seemed to feel that Nicki
did need to make some changes so that she could better equip herself for acceptance
among her peers. Through modeling and conversation she was able to provide some
instruction that could benefit Nicki without attacking the family’s lifestyle.

There were several specific instances where Leah became involved with
parents during student teaching. From the camping trip with the fifth graders came an
example that highlighted differences in family systems. In her journal entry of
September 17, Leah again wrote about Nicki:

Nicki came to school with her father Monday morning not ready to take off
on the bus as scheduled. Nicki lives with father only and both are on
seizure medicine for epilepsy. What I found odd was that Nicki’s father
gave me the meds, he said it was just his prescription and they both take the
same thing. He didn’t have a separate one for her. So, basically she just
takes her dad’s medicine. Her dad has a brain tumor that I have been told is
malignant. Nicki’s father said that she didn’t have a sleeping bag and asked
if I could provide blankets. I didn’t have any and asked him to run home
and at least get some blankets because it would be cold at night where we
are going. He only lives across flom the school and he agreed. I wouldn’t
say her father is mildly mentally handicapped but he is very hard to
communicate with. I don’t believe he works, I think he is on some type of
disability. (9-17)

Another camping trip instance, illustrating a difference between Leah’s family
patterns and that of her students, involved a student named Carmen. In this same
journal entry, Leah wrote that

Carmen is pretty overprotected. Her mother did not want her to come on
the camping trip. She had NEVER been apart flom Carmen for more than 8
hours! 1!!!!1!!! Carmen is a mix of cultures, but I’m not sure what. Her
mother is white with a Russian background and they live with the
grandmother who only speaks Russian. Apparently, Carmen’s first
language is Russian... I believe her father is Aflican-American or another
dark-skinned culture. Carmen’s mother did come to the camp for three

173

hours on Tuesday night, our second night there. She just sat flom afar and
watched. The grandmother came as well. Carmen didn’t seemed concerned
that they were there and kept playing games with her fliends and enjoyed
herself. Mother watched just like a hawk. When it was dark, mother had to
see where Carmen slept before she left and leave a glass of water for her to
drink in the middle of the night. It had a lid on it in case it spilled. The
water was warm because cold water gives Carmen bronchitis. (! ! !). (9-17)

In this situation, Leah seems to be somewhat critical of the way in which
Carmen’s mother intervened. However, it appears that this way of handling a child’s
overnight trip was so different than her own experiences that it was difficult to
understand.

Other kinds of differences in family patterns were noted by Leah. On October
6, after my first observation in Leah’s classroom, she talked about a child named
Richard who had been identified as having Attention Deficit Disorder. Leah was
flustrated with Richard’s mom for being resistant to putting him on medication:

L: I had a conference with Richard’s mom. Last year they finally talked
mom into putting him on Ritalin. His writing, I can’t read his writing, he’s
just so sloppy. He doesn’t understand consequences. If I ask him to do
something he’ll just say no. He has no fliends. When we called him in I
didn’t realize how many fliends he didn’t have. Mom doesn’t want him on
Ritalin. She took him off Ritalin this year.

R: Do you know why she took him off?

L: She doesn’t want him to be on Ritalin because she had talked to so
many nurses and these nurses say that this is a horrible thing. So I talked to
her and told her, well, this is what I’ve found with my son. She said
Richard doesn’t eat when he’s on Ritalin and la-la-la. I said, “you know
what--my son is on Ritalin and he eats flom 7 o’clock at night until he goes
to bed nonstop. At first I thought that was bad but he’s not fat you know
and that’s when he’s hungry so I just allowed it. We eat healthy things. I
don’t let him eat donuts and stuff. Make sure Richard has a good breakfast,
then give him Ritalin, and you’re going to be okay.”

R: What was her response?

174

L: She goes, okay, we’ll do that. She didn’t want to give him two pills,
she wanted to give him just the pill in the moming. That will cover him
until about 1:30. Monday morning came. I asked Richard, “did you take
your pill?” “Nope.” Tuesday morning --“Richard, did you take your pill?”
“Yeah.” Different kid. He got 97 on his spelling work, I could read
everything. He was just 100% different. Today I asked him in the middle
of the spelling test, “did you take your pill?” “No”, so I don’t know what
it’s going to be. I mean I had called his mom and laid everything on the
table and she doesn’t follow through! (10-6)

It’s clear that Leah found it flustrating that parents did not respond in ways that
she thought they should. However, she continued to work with parents and used her
own experiences to try and relate to them. She addressed issues directly when she
believed that a student’s success in school was at stake.

After my third observation in Leah’s classroom, on October 16, I asked Leah to
talk a bit about the parent conferences that had been scheduled for the previous week.

I asked her if she learned anything about the children and their families that she did

not know before. She responded by saying:
Oh, lots! Miguel Hershey! You talk about an automobile accident--he says
“cool.” You talk about somebody getting hurt -- he says, “cool.” He’s very
graphic. Yeah. We had to approach this subject with his mother at parent
conference. The whole time mom was holding her purse like this big wall
between us. She must have known it was going to be bad. But I mean, just
like a big wall. She was like, “well, you know, I’m having problems with
him at home and when I beat him he cries and when he cries, I beat him
more” and she was going on and on. We told her that he just needs
attention and love--that’s what he needs. He has to stay in almost every
recess. And I actually think he wants to be with us and that’s why he’s
doing it. So I’m trying to work at this with his mom. (10-16)

In addition to working with single parents and parents flom different cultural

backgrounds, Leah also had a child in her classroom who lived with foster parents.

175

She used an example flom a Language Arts lesson to describe a situation involving a
student’s writing about her biological home situation.

Terri-~we did a lesson on figurative language. She wrote this story about
someone who had been molested--about telling her brother a secret-~and it
was a really big secret. But he went ahead and told somebody-he let the
“cat out of the bag.” That was the figurative language she used. I felt bad
but she loves her foster mom. This is the second foster home she’s been in I
believe. (10-16)

During the last interview with Leah, she spoke about an incident that impacted
her thinking about differences in family values:

One of the biggest dilemmas we had was with Patty, a small Hispanic
student, whose mother speaks very little English. It was concerning her trip
to camp. She did not want to let Patty go, which would include a two-night
sleepover. We sent letters home and finally had our resource teacher
contact the mother to get the situation straight. Apparently, Patty’s little
sister would be celebrating her birthday during that time and she could not
miss the party. The family was not willing to change the date of her party
and Patty HAD to be there. I understood the importance of birthdays after
my experience on SST. But I understood much more during parent/ teacher
conferences with Patty and her mother. Patty was very important to her, I
really saw the tradition there was in their family as the mother spoke of both
her girls. Patty had also done a personal timeline for me in class and a very
important occasion for her was her lst birthday. She decorated this on her
timeline with cake and candle. I understood then, that there was no way
that Patty could have gone to camp and missed her sister’s celebration. (1 l-
9)

Leah developed in her understanding of differences in lifestyles and values as
She entered into personal contacts with families. Even though she did not always
agree with the way families interacted, she accepted the fact that differences do exist.
These differences did not seem to become a barrier to the expectations she had for

these children in terms of school success.

176

D1 [111'] l!'l llil'

Leah came to student teaching with attitudes and behaviors about diversity that
had been recently influenced by her study service semester in Costa Rica. She was
able to make connections between this cultural venture and her student teaching in a
classroom of diverse fifth graders. The development of Leah’s multicultural attitudes
and behaviors in these areas of differences were analyzed adapting Nieto’s (1992)
flamework. See Figure 6 for a summary of the development of Leah’s multicultural

attitudes and behaviors during student teaching.

(A) Raeielendfithnic

During the pilot study, Leah wrote about needing to know more about herself
and her own culture before she entered classrooms where there were a variety of
backgrounds among the children. During this time she also focused on how she could
be the kind of teacher who would actively work towards creating the kind of
environment where all children and their families were affirmed. Between the pilot
study and student teaching, Leah went to Costa Rica for her intercultural service term
where she experienced first-hand living in an unfamiliar cultural setting. Three weeks
after returning flom Costa Rica, She began student teaching. There were a number of
backgrounds represented in Leah’s classroom including Anglo, Hispanic, Cambodian,
and Appalachian. This diversity brought a variety of home, school and community

experiences together into a classroom community. Leah seemed to be at Level Three

177
(Respect & Esteem) of the adapted Nieto (1992) flamework for development of
multicultural attitudes and behaviors.

During student teaching, situations arose that challenged Leah’s thinking about
beliefs and values stemming flom the children’s’ home, school and community
experiences that were different flom her own. It was clear, however, that Leah
considered diversity in a positive light. At many points along the way she expressed
through speaking, writing and actions that she affirmed differences in the way children
had been brought up and the communities they came flom. In her first journal entry,
Leah wrote that

it’s almost the diversity in my class that brings the kids together. They all
know each other’s stories by now and they support each other. When I had
the kids do a collage of themselves I was amazed at what they shared with
the class and me. Not just their personal lives and wishes, but real things
that happened to them. One girl cut out a picture of a “mixed” little girl and
said she cut that out because she had a mixed little sister. She said in
matter-of-factly and went right on to the next picture in her collage. We are
beginning a week where we are talking about heroes/heroines and I’m sure
more diversity will arise.

Leah spent a great deal of time in student teaching thinking about how to
connect the curriculum to the children’s’ prior knowledge. She expressed the belief
that “teachers have to know their kids and what is relevant to them--they have to know
the content but let other things fall into it.” At the same time, she strongly believed
that she needed a relationship with the children that was based on mutual trust. She
felt that the camping trip was a turning point for her in developing this kind of bond
with the children in her classroom:

They saw me as just a real person who still has to--wake up in the morning

with her hair sticking up--likes to have her hair brushed and braided and
likes to sit around a campfire and eat popcorn and sing songs...I think you

178

have to have a working relationship with the kids--then a lot of things can
come out--what they say is just as valid as what you say. (11-9)

There was evidence throughout student teaching that Leah worked hard at
finding specific ways to take action so that her students could feel accepted and
valued. Leah developed multicultural attitudes and behaviors at Level Four

(Affirmation, Solidarity & Critique) by the end of student teaching.

(E) Lansing:

Leah’s positive experience in Costa Rica right before student teaching gave her
a clear picture of what it is like to be understood in a culture whose language is
different flom your own. It seems that she entered student teaching with multicultural
attitudes and behaviors that correspond to Level Three of Nieto’s flame. Three
children in Leah’s class knew little English. She talked and wrote about these children
several times but at no point did she seem flustrated by the differences in language
between herself and the students. She found humor in the ways that she
miscommunicated ideas or expectations. She involved them in all aspects of
classroom life. Leah seemed to continue at this same Level Three (Respect & Esteem)
throughout student teaching
(C) Socioeconomic

Leah’s experiences in Costa Rica and her own socioeconomic circumstances
gave her a feeling of solidarity with children in the classroom, especially in

relationship to financial issues. She seemed to be at Level Three in her development

179
of multicultural attitudes and behaviors. At the end of student teaching, during the
final interview, Leah commented that she
didn’t really think about economic differences very much during student
teaching. I could really tell the kids who came to school in warm clothes
that were nice and the kids who came to school in horrible clothes. I just
wanted to take this one girl home--it was fleezing and she just wore
shorts.(11-18)

It seems as if Leah continued to be at Level Three (Respect & Esteem)
throughout student teaching. Her own experiences with limited financial resources
and her visit to Costa Rica seemed to impact her understanding of socioeconomic
differences.

(D) Exceptionalities

Leah knew before student teaching began that she would have a number of
students in her classroom with diverse social, emotional and academic needs. She
noted that this fact “scared me a little” at first. At this point, Leah seemed to be at
Level Two of the adapted Nieto (1992) model of multicultural attitudes and behaviors
(Acceptance of Diversity).

Throughout student teaching, however, Leah found many ways to form
relationships with these students and to include them in the classroom community.
During the final interview, Leah commented that she was

just amazed as far as the inclusion kids--the help that everybody else gave to
them. I would give a writing assignment and maybe my MiMh kids would
have to write at least one or two sentences and then draw a picture. And
then we’d come together in small groups and trade ideas. And they were
never made fim of or ridiculed--it was like “look at what Joey did” and they
brought it out positively in the classroom environment. Or if somebody

would finish early first, instead of looking for something specifically to do,
they would offer to help of the three they knew needed help. (1 1-18)

180

In this same interview, I asked Leah how she managed to deal with differences
in terms of instruction and classroom management in relationship to children with
these special learning needs. She replied that

I didn’t. I just expected them to do what everybody else did. There were
some things that were modified--spelling was modified, for example. If I
ever gave a language assignment out of the book, I would maybe have them
do half of the assignment. (1 1-18)

Leah was actively involved with students who had special needs as she
encouraged them individually, worked at including them in the classroom community,
adapted curriculum to their needs and had high expectations for their success in
school. The level of multicultural attitudes and behaviors of Leah towards differences
in social, emotional and academic needs among her children seemed at the end of
student teaching to be in Level Four (Affirmation, Solidarity and Critique) of the
adapted Nieto flame. She highly valued children with special needs in her classroom
and worked hard at adapting curriculum so that they could be successful.

(E) Gender

Throughout student teaching, Leah’s interest in gender issues focused on the
self-esteem of the fifth grade girls in the classroom. In the beginning of student
teaching, she talked about the need for finding ways to work at nurturing females so
that they could develop to their potential. Leah’s multicultural attitudes and behaviors
seemed to be at Level Three (Respect and Esteem) at this point. As the semester

continued, Leah took action in this area by volunteering to lead the after school club

for girls and by searching out curriculum that specifically addressed the academic

181

needs of girls. Leah’s attitudes and actions best fit into Level Four of the adapted
Nieto flame (Affirmation, Solidarity and Critique).
0’) EamibLEattcnm

Leah had personal experience with growing up in a family with a single parent.
She was currently also a single parent with two sons. In addition, she had been in
other situations where she became acquainted with differences in who made up a
family and in family systems. Entering student teaching, it seems that Leah was in
Level Two (Acceptance) of the adapted Nieto flame.

In the final interview, Leah referred back to two situations involving families
that happened during student teaching. One was with Richard--when his mom did not
want to put him on Ritalin and the other was the dilemma with Nicki’s hygiene.

I even had Richard’s morn talk about me at a meeting called Moms-in-
Touch--how1 helped her. She also ended up coming to visit in the
classroom on a regular basis and we got along wonderfully. She had many
concerns with her son and we got him started on Ritalin which made a
world of difference in his behavior and school work. At first I had found
her threatening, but eventually we gained a mutual respect for one another
and she came to my party on my final day of class. I think it helps that I am
a parent too and have many of the same concerns as parents of the children
in my classroom.

We talked to Nicki again about the odor of her body but the problem
persisted. It was time...we had to talk with dad. He was very embarrassed
but at this point he was not handling all the responsibility very well. He
appreciated any help we could offer. Come to find out, there were not
clothes hangers in the home. She we sent home a grocery bag full of
hangers and hopefully, the clothes will be hung and the cat will stay away.
It was a delicate issue, but it came off quite well. Dad really is trying to do
the best he can. (1 1-18)

It’s clear that Leah developed relationships with parents that were based on

concern for the children involved. Through specific actions she indicated that she

182

affirmed parents for who they were even though she didn’t always agree with the way
they took care of their children. She also used her own position as a parent to identify
with dilemmas parents faced. It seems that Leah’s level of multicultural attitudes and
behaviors developed to Level Three (Respect & Esteem) during the student teaching

semester.

Summary

During student teaching, Leah identified differences in all of the areas of
diversity focused on in this study: racial and ethnic; language; socioeconomic;
exceptionalities; gender; and family patterns.

The data suggests that Leah expected all students to be successful. In the
category of racial and ethnic diversity, Leah highly valued the prior knowledge of
students and used a wide variety of instructional strategies to fmther their own
learning. During student teaching she seemed to grow even more in her ability to
connect curriculum to students’ interest and prior knowledge. In addition, she also
showed respect and esteem for differences in language as well as in areas related to
socioeconomic diversity and family patterns.

In two other areas of diversity, exceptionalities and family patterns, Leah
seemed to move forward in her level of multicultural attitudes and behaviors. At the
beginning of student teaching, she accepted students with special needs into her
classroom and did not lower her expectations for them. However, by the end of

student teaching, she had developed many strategies to aid these students in their

183

educational progress and had developed a sense of community among teachers and
students in the classroom.

Finally, while Leah went into student teaching with high expectations and
respect for both females and males in the classroom, she recognized special social and
curricular needs of the fifth grade girls. She did not accept the status quo but took

specific action to address these needs.

184

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CHAPTER 5

SUMMARY OF THE FINDINGS, CONCLUSIONS AND IMPLICATIONS

The first chapter of this study presented the fact that students in classrooms
across the United States are rapidly becoming more culturally diverse. Teacher
candidates, however, remain mostly white, middle-class, monolingual and female. A
problem for teacher educators is how to prepare prospective teachers for the
differences they will conflont between themselves and their students in today’s
classrooms. Chapter one introduced this study with the following guiding research
questions: (1) What differences did these teacher candidates conflont between
themselves and their students as they engaged in the personal process of constructing
meaning about diversity? and (2) What development took place regarding the
multicultural attitudes and behaviors of these teacher candidates as they conflonted
differences between themselves and their students?

This research study was based on the assumption that multicultural education
must be a salient component of the teacher education program. It also assumed that in
order for perspectives to change flom monocultural to multicultural, diversity issues
must be integrated throughout preparation for teaching and must include as many
experiences as possible with children who come flom different cultural backgrounds.
Another assummion was that becoming a multicultural teacher involves a continual
process that consists of more than acquiring certain skills, knowledge and dispositions.
Chapter one also discussed results flom the data collected during a pilot study which

provided rich background information on the teacher candidates.

185

186

The second chapter reviewed the available literature related to the preparation
of teacher candidates for culturally diverse classrooms. In the past few years, the door
to research in this area has been cracked open but there is no doubt that there exists a
need for further study. The chapter also described how this study approached the
problem, adopting the perspective that teacher candidates actively construct meaning
about diversity as they organize and reorganize the experiences they bring flom their
own home, school and communities in the context of teaching in culturally diverse
classrooms. Previous research confirms that the majority of teacher candidates come
into teacher education programs with little or no experience with others outside of
their own culture; there is little argument that multicultural education needs to be a
part of teacher education preparation both in theory and in practice. Other research has
shown that it takes more than a course, workshop or seminar on multicultural issues to
make a meaningful impact on a teacher candidate's perspective and that field
experiences in culturally diverse classrooms constitute a necessary part of teacher
preparation.

The concept of "multicultural education" is complex. It is difficult for teacher
educators to know where to begin the process of providing opportunities for teacher
candidates to become multicultural teachers. This study was designed to give a clearer
picture of what actually takes place as teacher candidates are in the process of
constructing meaning about differences between themselves and their students. It
looked closely at the experiences of four student teachers for the two-fold purpose of
identifying the kinds of differences that actually emerge between the teacher
candidates and their students in daily classroom interaction as well as tracking the
development of each student teacher’s multicultural attitudes and behaviors over the
student teaching period. While the complex nature of multicultural education will

remain, this study will contribute to the literature that focuses on building teacher

187

education programs that prepare teacher candidates for culturally diverse classrooms
and will also provide areas of focus for further research.

Data were collected by observing student teachers in their classrooms; taking
detailed field notes during these observations; interviewing student teachers after the
observations; and reading reflective journals written by the student teachers. Themes
emerged flom the various data sources which were then developed into interconnected
patterns. Data were analyzed by using the constant comparative method (Glaser and
Strauss, 1967) and by triangulating the various data sources. Nieto’s (1992) model for
categorizing levels of multicultural attitudes and behaviors was then adapted as a
starting point for individual and cross-case analysis.

Individual case study data in the fourth chapter were presented in three
sections. The first section provided background information on each teacher candidate
that was gained through the pilot study and flom additional information obtained
through an initial guided interview with each student teacher at the beginning of the
student teaching semester. The second section told the story of each student teacher
within the context of six particular forms of diversity that impact teaching and
learning. These include differences in (1) race and ethnicity; (2) language; (3)
socioeconomic background; (4) gender; (5) exceptionalities and (6) family patterns.
The third section described the development of each student teacher's multicultural
attitudes and behavior over the semester, adapting Nieto's (1992) model as a
flamework.

This fifth chapter is divided into four sections. The first section discusses the
findings flom the individual case studies and across the case studies in relationship to
the two major research questions. A summary of the conclusions of the study is
provided in section two. Section three explores the implications flom the study for

teacher educators who are working to prepare teacher candidates for culturally diverse

188

classroom settings. The final section suggestions directions for further research in this

area.

5 UPI -B 10 . 1!]
Findings flom the analyzed data related to the following two major research
question will be discussed in relationship to individual case studies as well as across

case studies.

Research Question #1 What dijfirences did these teacher candidates confiont
between themselves and their students as they engaged in the personal process of
constructing meaning about diversity?

I 1' . 1 . l C S I.
Tamara

Findings flom the data collected during student teaching suggest that Tamara
conflonted differences between herself and her students in the areas of race and
ethnicity, language; socioeconomic background; exceptionalities; gender; and family
patterns.

In the area of race and ethnicity, Tamara was challenged by the kind of verbal
interaction that emerged between herself and the students. Her students were much
more interactive than she was used to and she struggled with knowing how to manage
this different style of communication.

As Tamara taught her interdisciplinary thematic unit on "farms," she quickly
recognized that she came with background knowledge on this topic that was
completely different flom her students. Her rural orientation was not like the urban
one that her students brought to the classroom.

In addition, racial issues were present for Tamara as she became involved in

classroom situations that highlighted differences in color between herself and the

189

students as well as between students. These differences often arose in the
conversations of the children as they worked on projects or talked with one another in
the classroom.

In the area of language differences, Tamara discovered dilemmas related to her
students' use of unfamiliar terms and grammar usage. She also was puzzled by the
way her students did not respond directly to questions asked by adults in the
classroom.

The biggest issue for Tamara in the area of socioeconomic status related to the
financial means of families to provide lunch for their children. Students whose
families qualified because of a certain level of income received lunch at reduced or no
cost. At times, Tamara would refer to these children according to their lunch status:
for example, “Mario is a flee lunch student.” When Tamara went to school, having
lunch or lunch money was never a concern for her and it was difficult for her to accept

the fact that needing to get a flee lunch was a reality for many students at Hathaway.

The subject of children with special needs was brought up flequently by
Tamara. All of the classrooms were “inclusion” classrooms in the sense that those
children with special education needs were included in the regular classroom for as
much of the day as possible. Tamara found this to be a flustrating aspect of teaching
and considered the situations with these students as problematic--not knowing how to
“handle” the behavior or how to adapt cuniculum to meet individual needs.

Although not an area that seemed highly significant to Tamara, she identified
several situations during student teaching when gender issues rose to the surface. She

reflected on the way she reacted differently to the behavior of boys and girls in the

190

classroom. In addition, she observed differences between the response of male and
female students to the cuniculum.

Tamara had difficulty thinking about “family” beyond the traditional two-
parent perspective. She felt uncomfortable responding to the situations that arose
among students and their families. From her perspective and experience, parents were
generally considered to be non-supportive of school efforts and viewed as the

adversaries in the parent/teacher relationship.

lemma:

Findings showed that during student teaching, Jeremy experienced differences
between himself and his students in the areas of racial and ethnic diversity;
socioeconomic background; exceptionalities; gender and family patterns. Differences
in language did not emerge flom the collected data.

In the area of racial and ethnic diversity, Jeremy’s expectations for behavior
did not match the kind of behavior he was experiencing flom the children in his
classroom. He was aware that some of the behavior may have been culturally based
but he had difficulty in thinking about possible ways he could work at bridging these
differences.

The interdisciplinary thematic unit Jeremy planned was on "communities." He
thought of community in terms of his own experiences and never was able to figure
out how to find out what his students knew about the concept of community so that he
could build on this knowledge. As a result, what he taught and how he taught did not

connect with his students' prior knowledge.

191

In addition, Jeremy's unpleasant experiences in Costa Rica with persons whose
skin color was black seemed to have a significant impact on his student teaching
experience where the majority of the children were African-American. Jeremy
admitted that he had prejudiced feelings towards black persons but at the same time
wanted to do something that would erase those feelings. He chose to student teach at
Hathaway as a means to accomplish this goal.

In the category of socioeconomic background, Jeremy often referred to
children in relationship to their lunch status at school. His perception seemed to be
that the financial resources of the people in this commrmity were not used in the same
way that he used his own financial resources.

Jeremy Spent time thinking about the area of exceptionalities in terms of the
placement of children with special needs. Although he talked about making
adaptations for children, there was little evidence that he was able to carry out his
plans. He seemed to think about adaptations for children with special needs as
“special treatment” and worried about how this treatment was regarded by the other
children in the classroom.

In terms of gender differences, Jeremy used particular terms in describing boys
and girls. He seemed to have stereotypes of what differentiated male and female
characteristics and behaviors. At times, for example, boys were often characterized as
“noisy” and girls were “angel-like.” He had difficulty believing that the boys in his
classroom held hands on a field trip and noted that he associated this type of behavior

with females.

192

In the area of family patterns, the expectations Jeremy had for his students
often seemed to be based on assumptions he made about the values and behaviors of
children and their families. He considered single parents a “problem” and viewed his

students at Hathaway as coming flom “rough neighborhoods and home situations.”

Nanci

Findings indicated that the differences Nancy conflonted during students
teaching were in the areas of race and ethnicity; socioeconomic status; ertceptionalities
and family patterns. There was no evidence collected during this time indicating that
she conflonted language or gender differences.

The expectations Nancy had for student behavior did not match her own
experiences as a student in the classroom. She found that the students at Chambers
didn’t “obey” her and treat her with the kind of respect that she was used to giving her
own teachers. She did have a strong desire for her students to be interested in and
connected to the thematic unit she was teaching on "plants." The hands-on ways that
she approached teaching and learning was an attempt to help students construct their
own knowledge about the topic. Nancy, however, focused so much on her own role in
terms of how she was doing as a teacher, that student learning almost seemed to
became a secondary issue.

Although the area of socioeconomic status was noted infrequently by Nancy
throughout student teaching, she did refer to the stereotype she had of parents who had

limited financial resources and lifestyles that were different flom her own. She

193

associated these characteristics with a lack of cooperation with the school and with the
progress of their children.

Throughout student teaching, Nancy stressed her desire to reach the children
with “problems.” She did plan for children with special needs and worked hard to use
a variety of methods and materials that would help them be successful at learning. Her
overall perspective, though, continued to be one of a “problem”—-wanting but not
knowing how to “reach” them.

Nancy described the homes of her students as being “chaotic, inconsistent and
with negative discipline.” She tended to associate behavioral problems with what she
perceived as negative home situations. Single-parent homes were also considered to

be problematic.

Leah

From the data collected, it was found that Leah conflonted differences between
herself and her students in the areas of racial and ethnic diversity; language;
socioeconomic background; exceptionalities; gender; and family patterns.

Leah had just come away flom a summer of intercultural experience with a
new self-understanding in addition to high respect for the Costa Rican culture and the
persons she learned to know. She looked forward to Chambers Elementary as another
setting where she could learn more about diverse populations. She worked hard at
building on the prior knowledge that students brought to the classroom so that she

could help them connect school learning to what they already knew.

194

In terms of socioeconomic background, Leah felt a kinship with families who
had limited financial resources. As a single mother, Leah had many of the same
financial concerns as they did. Also, her recent experience in Costa Rica gave her the
perspective that being “poor” is a relative concept. While she knew that the children
at Chambers had fewer resources than children at other schools in the area, she did not
consider them to be handicapped by this fact.

Leah also had a strong interest in the area of exceptionalities. Leah viewed the
children with special needs in her classroom as an integral part of the classroom
community. She expected them to succeed and worked to provide curriculum
adaptations to meet their needs.

In the area of gender differences, the low self-esteem of the girls in her
classroom became a special area of interest to Leah. Her concern prompted her to lead
the after-school girls’ club and to search out resources which helped her plan ways to
meet the special academic needs of females.

Leah focused on working with parents rather than against them. She
passionately took on issues regarding children and parents in a way that did not judge
parents, but rather actively worked at ways to unite with them for the success of the
students.

I C S I.

Each teacher candidate had an individual story to tell growing out of his/her

past experiences in the context of home, school and community. However, in

analyzing the data across the four case studies, findings suggest that several patterns

195

emerged in six defined areas of diversity that impact teaching and learning: (1) racial
and ethnic; (2) language; (3) socioeconomic; (4) gender; (5) exceptionalities; and (6)
family patterns.

First, data sources revealed that all four student teachers conflonted
differences between themselves and their students in the area of ethnic and racial
diversity. Within this category, three findings emerged: (1) three of the four student
teachers conflonted differences between themselves and their students in terms of
expectations for appropriate school behavior as well as expectations for the type of
interactions between student and teacher. Tamara, Jeremy and Nancy all struggled
with their need to feel "in control" of the classroom. The common theme seemed to be
that all three had come to the classroom with an image of "teacher talking and
children listening." When this scenario did not happen, disequilibrium, confusion and
anxiety emerged. Tamara had particular dilemmas with the kind of verbal interaction
between herself and her Aflican-American students. Jeremy described this area in
terms of respect--or lack of respect--for him by the students. He experienced the most
conflict between himself and black males in the classroom. Nancy thought in terms of
children "obeying" the teacher. Leah, on the other hand, iviewed interaction between
herself and her students as one of a developing, ongoing relationship built on trust and
dialogue; (2) all of the student teachers recognized differences between the kind of
knowledge their students brought to the classroom in comparison to their own.
However, the ways in which they viewed this diversity resulted in different approaches

to teaching and learning; and (3) issues pertaining to race, especially that of color,

196

became a major focus for the two student teachers who were in classrooms where the
majority of the students were African-American. Tamara and Jeremy were the
minority race in the classroom. They both had the sense that they were in unfamiliar
territory and had many questions about how to deal with situations that arose in the
classroom regarding color differences. Nancy and Leah's classrooms had a number of
students from a Hispanic background as well as many Anglo children flom the
Appalachian culture. They, however, did not seem to confront dilemmas related to
racial issues.

Second, in this study, differences in language referred to English dialects or
languages other than English. It also included other aspects of language, particularly
terms used that are unique to a specific culture. From the data collected, it was found
that across the case studies, differences in language did not emerge for two of the
student teachers and only appeared in a minor role for the other two student teachers.
Leah and Nancy both had several students who spoke little English. Nancy seldom
referred to these students. Leah, however, related several specific instances where
language between her and the students was a barrier to communication but the results
were always portrayed in positive and/or humorous terms. Tamara had a number of
concerns with the English dialect spoken by her students, mainly in terms of not being
able to understand specific terms they used and of grammar usage that was unfamiliar
to her.

The only indicator of socioeconomic status that emerged in this study related to

the differences in financial resources available to the students and their families. It

197

was found that all four student teachers confronted differences in this area. However,
their perspectives regarding these differences differed flom one another. Tamara and
Jeremy approached the issue of financial resources in a way that cast negative
associations with “flee lunch” students and their families. Leah, on the other hand,
spoke of financial resources in a matter of fact manner without portraying judgment on
these students and their families. Nancy reflected primarily on the stereotypes she held
of families who had limited financial resources in relationship to their interest in the
school lives of their children. Data collected on Jeremy Showed no evidence that
socioeconomic differences emerged for him during the student teaching experience.

For the purposes of this study, “exceptionalities” included physical,
intellectual, social and emotional conditions that require special education adaptations.
From the data collected, it was found that all of the student teachers conflonted
differences between themselves and their students who had exceptional learning needs.
Two of these student teachers, Tamara and Nancy, viewed differences in students with
special physical, intellectual, social and emotional needs as “problems.” Jeremy’s
main concern was that he was giving “special treatment” to students with special needs
when he made adaptations for them in the classroom. Leah assumed that children with
special needs would be a part of the classroom community and she expected them to
succeed.

For three of the four student teachers, gender issues emerged flom their
classroom experiences. However, these differences were approached in contrasting

ways. Leah was concerned for the development of the females in her classroom,

198

especially in terms of self-esteem. Tamara thought about gender issues in terms of the
differences in her own behavior towards boys and girls in the classroom and on the
way each gender responded to certain aspects of the curriculum. Jeremy tended to
stereotype certain actions of his students according to female and male behaviors.
Finally, the category of family patterns includes differences in how a family is
defined--who is in a family; how families interact; and what is valued by the family
and the community. From the collected data it was found that all of the student
teachers conflonted differences between their own home, school and community
experiences and that of their students. Three of the student teachers perceived the
family life of students as problematic while the fourth one regarded families as an
integral part of a child’s school success. (See Figure 7 for summary of differences

identified across case studies).

199

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200

Research Question #2 What development took place regarding the multicultural
attitudes and behaviors of the teacher candidates as they confronted difierences
between themselves and their students?

Iamata

At the beginning of student teaching in August, Tamara experienced racial and
ethnic differences between herself and her students, especially in the area of verbal
interaction with her African-American students. Differences in communicative style
were tolerated but not necessarily accepted as appropriate ways to learn.
Uncomfortable feelings about how to handle specific situations related to color
differences were also present at the beginning of the semester. In addition, Tamara was
uncertain about the kind of prior knowledge her students were bringing to the
classroom that differed from what she knew about the world. However, as the student
teaching semester progressed, she began to feel more comfortable with the kind of
communication that had emerged and she started to realize that perhaps the way she
learned how to behave in the classroom was not necessarily the only way. She learned
to accept the fact that there were color differences and that she could talk with the
children in positive ways about these differences. Tamara also began to acknowledge
and accept the prior knowledge children brought to school and thought about how to
plan curriculum that would build on these experiences She built on what they did
know by planning experiences such as a field trip to a farm to give them hands-on

opportunities to construct knowledge. She also made attempts to integrate materials

201

and methods that tied in to the ethnic and racial heritage of her African-American
students. Using Nieto’s frame (1992), Tamara developed from a Tolerance (One)
Level to an Acceptance (Two) Level of multicultural attitudes and behaviors in the
areas of communicative style, prior knowledge and physical characteristics during this
particular student teaching situation.

Tamara found language differences between herself and her students,
particularly in the form of an English language dialect. She noted these differences
and addressed her anxiety about this particular area but did not seem to develop
beyond the Tolerance (One) Level in terms of her multicultural attitudes and behaviors
during student teaching.

In the area of socioeconomic diversity, Tamara acknowledged differences
particularly related to financial resources of children and their families. Most
frequently her comments focused on children who received free or reduced lunch fiom
the school. It was uncomfortable for her to think about the inequity among her
students in terms of financial resources. While she certainly was beginning to reflect
on socioeconomic factors, she began and basically remained at the Tolerance (One)
Level regarding socioeconomic diversity throughout student teaching.

Tamara seemed to begin student teaching with the acceptance of the idea that
all children could be and should be included in the regular classroom setting. These
differences were important considerations in planning and teaching. However, as
student teaching continued, she began to feel frustrated with those children who had

special needs and seemed to develop lower expectations for their classroom success.

202

She questioned their classroom placement and also began to question the concept of
“inclusion.” By the end of student teacher, she had shifted in her level of multicultural
attitudes and behaviors from an Acceptance (Two) Level back to a level of Tolerance
(One) in the area of exceptionalities.

While gender issues were not prominent on the data collected on Tamara
during student teaching, she did identify several instances related to gender. She
seemed to begin and end student teaching at a Tolerance (One) level in this area.

Tamara’s concept of “family” was challenged throughout student teaching as
she experienced differences in the composition of many of her students’ families in
comparison to her own. However, as student teaching progresses, she began to accept
the fact that “families” may be defined in a variety of ways. She seemed to move from
a Tolerance (One) level to a level of Acceptance (Two). Tamara also experienced
uncomfortable feelings about the differences in the social patterns and perceived
values of her students and their families. She entered and remained at the Tolerance
(One) level throughout student teaching. At the end of student teaching during the
final interview, Tamara was asked the following question: W
W? Tamara
responded by saying that

it means for me that just my language and my background and what I care
about and what I know about is a lot different than what people at college
know about...I know a lot about Appalachia that they don’t know. I know
their language and their customs. I just think I know more about that--and
more about how our people--how they came here and Hoosiers didn’t take
to them very well...so being aware that people are culturally different from
me and that they’re probably culturally different from each other and trying

to bring those things together...I don’t know how to explain it but the people
from my culture are like “down-home” I guess...When you invite people

203

over there’s a specific way you’re supposed to do things. It’s working out
those things...Another thing is religion...it is so hard to deal with cultural
issues--how to talk about them without causing conflict and being sensitive
to things.
I feel more comfortable about people who make fun of my culture who are
from my culture than people who don’t. I think that’s true of like the Black
people. It’s okay if they make fun of their own culture but it’s not okay, so
you know, just being sensitive to that and knowing where the kids are
coming from. .I guess I saw a lot of those things in the classroom but I just
didn’t know how to deal with them. It’s okay to be difierent and I never
really shared where I was from and what I understood I guess. It just seems
like it’s hard.
Tamara’s statement about what it means to teach children who are culturally
different from herself focused on language and customs. She also connected her own
experiences in the Appalachia culture with her experience in the classroom. However,

it still wasn’t clear to her how she could relate her own experiences to the differences

she observed in the classroom between herself and her students.

lemma

Jeremy entered student teaching with some uncomfortable feelings towards
people of color. He also expressed a desire to shifi these feelings. However, the
experiences he encountered during student teaching in relationship to behavioral
expectations, skin color and the kind of knowledge his students brought to the
classroom only seemed to intensity his biases and anxiety. He began and ended at a
Lack of Tolerance (Zero) level of multicultural attitudes and behaviors in terms of
expectations for behavior and prior knowledge of students. In the area of physical
characteristics, particularly skin color, he seemed to begin and remain at the Tolerance

(One) level through student teaching.

204

In the category of socioeconomic differences, Jeremy questioned the way his
students and their families used their available financial resources. He seemed to find
it difficult to look beneath the surface of a family’s economic status to understand
what might be the reasons that certain choices were made. Jeremy seemed to begin
and remain at 3 Lack of Tolerance (Zero) level.

From the collected data, it was found that Jeremy was tolerant of the students
in his classroom who had special needs. He noted the social benefits for having all
children included in a regular classroom setting but did raise concerns concerning
academic learning. In terms of classroom placement of children with special needs, he
began and ended at a Tolerance (One) level. However, Jeremy had difficulty planning
for and making adaptations for these students in the regular classroom. He thought in
terms of “special favors” for students with exceptionalities rather than building on
their strengths to give them opportunities to move ahead in the learning process. He
seemed to begin and end student teaching with attitudes and actions at the Lack of
Tolerance (Zero) level in regards to curriculum adaptations.

Gender issues emerged for Jeremy during student teaching in relationship to
specific situations he observed. He seemed surprised and very uncomfortable when he
saw two of his male students holding hands on a field trip. The language he used also
indicated that he stereotyped the behavior of boys and girls. He seemed to remain at a
Lack of Tolerance (Zero) level throughout student teaching in this area of gender
diversity. Expectations of a particular student were often tied to Jeremy’s perception

of that child’s family, their social patterns and values. From time to time he predicted

205
the future of a certain student based on his/her family system. Jeremy entered and
remained at the Lack of Tolerance (Zero) level during this August to December time
period.

During the final interview after student teaching, I asked Jeremy the following
question: ll... ' 0 ._ .l"t~-<.l'.l‘ I I h . "‘4 0 W... ..l rt. ' 'r.‘
children? Jeremy responded by to this question by saying that if he ever would get
into a teaching situation like at Hathaway he would

definitely talk with people from the community, parents of my students and
just ask them, and people in the school, just ask them-~what type of culture
is this? What is expected? What do parents expect? I guess I’d get more of a
sense of the culture and not just make assumptions. I’d actually go out and
see, possibly even visit homes of my students. I think that would be good,
to actually see where they live, see where they are coming from.
Relationships with the kids should come first and then the curriculum.

Jeremy’s statement indicates that he was in the process of thinking about his
student teaching experience in relationship to diversity. He focused his understanding
on the idea that he needed to find out more about his students’ communities and
families. Jeremy also seems to separate relationships with children from the
curriculum, indicating that he is not reflecting at this point on what his students are

bringing to the classroom that would help him know how to plan curriculum that

builds on their cultural backgrounds.

Nancy

In the area of racial and ethnic diversity, Nancy entered student teaching with

the notion that there was a particular way to establish a learning environment--the

206

teacher talking and the children listening. She clearly articulated her frustration when
this kind of scenario did not take place in the classroom. She struggled with her own
feelings of uncomfortableness with the differences she perceived between herself and
her students in terms of expectations for behavior. Although Nancy did seem to make
some progress in this area, she remained at the Tolerance (One) level throughout the
student teaching period. In relationship to the prior knowledge of children, Nancy
seemed to accept their ways of understanding the world and considered them
important as she planned for learning. In this area she seemed to enter and stay at the
Acceptance (Two) level of multicultural behaviors and attitudes.

Although socioeconomic diversity was not a major area that emerged for
Nancy during student teaching, several instances arose in which her stereotypes of
families with limited financial resources were challenged. She noted that she
sometimes thought of these families as not having much concern about the school
lives of their children. However, she found that as she observed certain situations
where families who had a very different socioeconomic background than her own were
very interested in the academic progress of their children. Her multicultural attitudes
and behaviors seem to stay within the Tolerance (One) level during student teaching.

Nancy focused much of her attention on children in the classroom who had
special needs. She accepted them into the classroom and in most cases expected them
to succeed. Adapting curriculum to these students became a major emphasis and she
continued to develop in her ability to plan for meeting these special needs. She shifted

from an attitude of Acceptance (Two) into a level of Respect and Esteem.

 

207

Family patterns is an area of diversity that Nancy acknowledged but had
difficulty understanding and embracing. She tolerated the kind of differences she saw
between herself and her students in terms of family upbringing and patterns but her
basic stance continued to be that the home lives of a number of the children were
problematic and therefore, less could be expected of them. For Nancy, her level of
multicultural attitudes and behaviors in the areas of perception of “family” and family
social patterns and values seemed to remain at a Tolerance (One) level throughout

student teaching.

To the question, “Wench
WWW? that was asked during the final interview, Nancy
responded by saying

It would definitely mean kids who spoke another language...I guess in

order to define culturally different children I have in my mind a culture

that is status quo--my culture...Culturally different kids--in this area it
would be Hispanic. I would also take into consideration the

Appalachian culture that would definitely influence the way kids

perceive...I don’t take it down to individual family differences being

separate cultures-J suppose maybe-J think that’s too extreme for me.

Nancy considered race and ethnicity as well as language differences when she
thought about teaching children who are culturally different from herself. She was

aware that differences in cultural background have an impact on how and what her

students understand and how they perceive the world.

Leah
Leah made several shifts during student teaching. Leah entered student

teaching with a high regard for the knowledge her students brought with them to the

208

classroom. As the student teaching semester continued, she embraced this prior
knowledge of her students as valid vehicles for learning and she committed herself to
providing numerous experiences that would build on this knowledge. In this area of
race and ethnicity she moved from Nieto’s (1992) level of Respect and Esteem (Three)
to the Affirmation, Solidarity and Critique (Four) level.

Findings from the collected data suggest that Leah entered student teaching at
the level of Respect and Esteem (Three) in the area of language diversity (non-English
languages) as well as socioeconomic diversity There were several students in Leah’s
classroom who spoke English as a second language. Leah acknowledged and valued
these differences as part of the classroom community. Leah’s personal experiences
with limited family resources seemed to give her a clearer understanding and respect
for those children and their families who also had limited financial resources. In these
two areas, Leah seemed to remain at the third level of Nieto’s model, Respect and
Esteem for differences.

In Leah’s classroom, there were quite a number of children who had been
identified with special learning needs. Leah seemed to enter student teaching with an
attitude of Acceptance (Level Two) concerning the placement of curriculum
adaptations to meet the needs of these children. During student teaching, she
continually developed in the ways she responded to them and in the instructional
strategies she used to teach them. She expected all students to learn and she connected
curriculum to student’s strengths, interests and prior knowledge. In these areas she

ended student teaching at the Affirmation, Solidarity and Critique level (Four).

209

Issues of gender were highly important to Leah as she observed the females in
her classroom having experiences which lowered their self-esteem. At the beginning
of student teaching, she had a deep respect for gender differences and planned to
provide opportunities for both males and females to build on their strengths. As
student teaching progressed, she took quite an active role in addressing the needs of
the girls in her classroom, particularly by leading an after school girls’ club and by
choosing curriculum that expanded their thinking about themselves and their futures.
She developed in multicultural attitudes and behaviors from a level of Respect and
Esteem Three) to Affirmation, Solidarity and Critique (Level Four).

Leah made munerous contacts with parents during student teaching. Even
though she didn’t always agree with the way parents were raising their children, she
accepted the fact that there were differences but that these differences didn’t lower the
expectations she had for them to succeed in school. She took a proactive stance in
communicating with parents so that she and the parents could both work towards the
success of the child. After entering at an acceptance level, she shifted to the third level
of respect and esteem.

Dming the last interview with Leah, I asked her the following question: What

0 H‘smtfio .uunu . 2.: lt‘. ...- u'w?Her
response was that she thought of culture

not only as their ethnicity but their home environment, their economic

environment, where they grew up, their community and family--

because there are different cultures of kids from Kentucky and kids

from here. I think it’s really important not to develop fear. I think if

you can take some of those fears away about differencesnat least it’s a

step toward wanting to learn more about other cultures--wanting to
experience more, wanting to research more.

210

Leah’s response focused on racial and ethnic differences, socioeconomic
backgrounds and family experiences. She expressed the need to have an attitude that
does not fear differences among her students and indicated a desire to actively
participate in experiences that would help her learn more about and understand
cultures different from her own.

Acrgssfiasesmdies

From the data collected across case studies, there are four main findings that
seem most significant in relationship to any shifts in multicultural attitudes and
behaviors that may have occurred during the student teaching semester in culturally
diverse classrooms. First, some shifts did occur from one level to another during this
time period for two of the teacher candidates. However, for the other two, there was
no movement from one level to another. In other words, change does not come quickly
or easily. Tamara made a shift from a Tolerance level to one of Acceptance in the area
of racial and ethnic differences. Over the student teaching semester she began to
realize that her way was not the only way to think about classroom interaction. She
came to accept differences in ethnicity and race as she planned curriculum and
responded more positively to the high exchange of verbal interaction in the classroom.
Leah made several shifts in multicultural attitudes and beliefs. Certainly Leah had the
most distinctive patterns of change in multicultural attitudes and behaviors out of the
four case studies. She entered at higher levels of multicultural attitudes and behaviors
and was able to move ahead in taking a proactive stance towards differences she was

confronting.

211

Second, shifis in multicultural attitudes and behaviors do not necessarily move
in the desired direction. Tamara made a shift in multicultural attitudes and behaviors
in the area of exceptionalities; however, this time she shifted from a level of
acceptance back to a tolerance level. She found it difficult to work with the
“inclusion” children and was disillusioned by all the scheduling problems and general
attitude of other teachers towards including children with special needs in the regular
classroom.

A third finding is that, in general, a teacher candidate who is at the beginning
levels of multicultural attitudes and behaviors in one area of multicultural attitudes and
behaviors tended to be at those same beginning levels regarding other areas of
diversity as well. Also, if a teacher candidate exhibited attitudes and behaviors at
higher levels in a particular area of diversity, s/he tended to be at higher levels in other
areas.

Finally, teacher candidates are at very different levels of readiness in terms of
becoming multicultural in their approach to teaching and learning. This study was
conducted on the assumption that adopting multicultural attitudes and behaviors is an
individual process. This assumption was confirmed in the study. These four teacher
candidates who had all participated in the same teacher education program came with
very different experiences that led them to their particular levels of readiness to
explore and develop as a multicultural teacher. (See Figure 8 for a summary of

multicultural attitudes and behaviors across case studies.)

212

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215
Conclusinns

As noted in the review of literature related to the preparation of teachers for
culturally diverse classroom settings, much of the previous research has been focused
on obtaining data on the attitudes of teacher candidates before entering a multicultural
course, seminar, workshop or field experience. Data were again gathered at the end of
these experiences to note any shifts in multicultural attitudes. This dissertation study
also provides information on attitudes at both ends of the student teaching experience.
However, in addition, it contributes toward the present literature by focusing on the
middle section that is often neglected--what happens in-between the beginning and end
of this multicultural course, seminar, workshop or field experience. This study
focused on specific situations in real classrooms that give some sense of the realities
that exist when differences are confronted by teacher candidates on a daily basis over a
four month period of time. Data was gathered on what kind of diversity these teacher
candidates confronted as well as what they said and what they did in response to
specific situations regarding differences between themselves and their students.

Several conclusions can be drawn from the findings. First, not surprisingly, the
study confirmed that trying to understand how people perceive and deal with
differences between themselves and others is complex. It seems that there are many
more questions after the study than before it began. In this study, six types of diversity
were identified that significantly impact teaching and learning. In addition,
multicultural attitudes and behaviors were placed in categories within a particular

model in order to get a sense of how teacher candidates were meeting the challenges of

216

diversity as they student taught in settings where children came from very different
backgrounds than their own. However, it is quite clear that there are many forms of
diversity that interact and overlap and as a result, multicultural attitudes and behaviors
cannot be neatly placed in the boundaries of these categories Added to the
complexity, diversity issues are not unique to teachers, students and schools but are set
within the context of a much larger social, political and economic system.

Second, this study confirmed in concrete ways that each teacher candidate
comes to a teacher education program with his/her own story. Teacher candidates
individually construct multicultural attitudes and behaviors over time as they bring
together their past histories, present experiences and visions for the future. While
teacher candidates often appear to be homogeneous--white, middle-class and
monolingual--they are certainly heterogeneous in how they view the world and how
they respond to differences. Experiences from family, school and community
certainly impacted how Tamara, Jeremy, Leah and Nancy thought about diversity and
how each responded to specific situations.

The study also suggests that it is valuable to place teacher candidates in
culturally diverse classroom settings so that there is opportunity to confront and
explore differences. However, the study also suggests that there are student teachers
who are not ready to be placed in a setting where there is too wide of a gap in the
differences between themselves and their students. There may be too much

disequilibrium for the teacher candidate to grow as a teacher.

 

217

Third, it was encouraging to note that prospective teachers in this study did talk
a lot about diversity. All were certainly aware of differences between themselves and
their students. However, it was discouraging to realize that diversity was mostly
talked about in very basic terms (ie. skin color, family life styles) rather than
addressing the core issues which include equity, power and justice. In addition, there
is a huge leap in moving from talk to action. In this study, it was rare that the teacher
candidate could initiate change. Leah, however, did transform her talk about the self-
esteem of girls in her fifth grade classroom into leadership of an after school club for
them.

Finally, the data suggests that becoming a multicultural teacher is more than
prescribing certain knowledge, skills or dispositions. although there do seem to be
particular kinds of knowledge, skills and dispositions which certainly are more
characteristic of a multicultural teacher than one who has a monocultural perspective.
As noted in an earlier chapter of this study, Canning (1993) suggests that becoming a
multicultural teacher involves a “way of being” that values diversity among persons
and promotes equity of opportunity. Fenstermacher (1992) conceptualizes this “way
of being” by using the term “manner,” meaning that behavior of an individual is
consistent across circumstances, indicating a relatively stable disposition. Analysis
across the four case studies provides evidence that some teacher candidates are much
further along than others on this path called “way of being” or “manner.” There were
definite differences between the “manner” brought to the classroom by the four

student teachers.

218
I l. . E I l E l

The above conclusions from this study have significant implications for teacher
educators in guiding prospective teachers towards multicultural attitudes and actions.
Even though teacher candidates personally construct meaning about diversity from
their home, school and commtmity cultures which frame their understanding of the
world and their actions, teacher educators do have the opportunity to impact this
process in a number of areas. These include (1) an understanding that constructing
meaning about diversity is a complex and individual journey that diverts into many
side paths as new situations are confronted; (2) careful consideration of field
placements in culturally diverse settings; (3) a focus on the key concept that all
children can learn and succeed; and (4) active participation in critiquing and changing
multicultural attitudes and actions.

First, teacher educators must understand that constructing meaning about
diversity is a complex and individual journey that diverts into many side paths as new
situations are confronted. Marilyn Cochran-Smith (1995b) used the metaphor of
“building a boat” as a way to describe the complexity and uncertainty that prevails in
the area of construction of knowledge about diversity. This metaphor aptly portrays
the process undertaken by the four student teachers in this study. It also provides a
way for teacher educators to think about the struggles that happen along the way
during this construction.

I use the term ‘construct’ as I describe the student teachers’ knowledge

of race and teaching in order to suggest that the process was not simply

a matter of grasping or understanding ideasufull-blown and clear--that

already existed. It was instead a labor-intensive and in some cases
protracted process of students’ invention of the issues in ways that

219

made sense for them, given their own prior experiences with families,
schools and communities, their own status as raced and gendered
persons in the world and their own fieldwork situations as student
teachers. The construction of knowledge, however, was not like the
process of constructing a house, wherein one stands outside the basic
structure and places each brick or board so that it rests on the ones
beneath and in turn supports the ones yet to be mortared or harmnered
in and from which, when the roof nicely overarches everything, and the
house is finished, the constructor can walk away or move inside.

The process of constructing knowledge about race and teaching was

more akin to building a boat while sitting in the old one, surrounded by

rising waters. In this kind of construction process, it is not clear how or

if the old pieces can be used in the new ‘boat,’ and there is no blueprint

for what the new one is supposed to look like. It is also not clear

whether the new boat will float, hold the weight of its builder, or hold

back the water. And, of course, as one is trying to build the new boat,

one is stuck inside the old one, struggling to negotiate tricky waters, not

to mention rapids, hidden rocks and unpredictable currents (Cochran-

Smith, 1995b, p. 553).

As a teacher educator, I must acknowledge the difficulty of the journey and
continually remind myself that all teacher candidates are at different places along the
way. This means that I must provide varied opportunities at different levels on which
to build on what prospective teachers bring with them to the teacher education
program. Teacher candidates must be given multiple ways to examine and reflect on
classroom diversity. Identifying and reflecting on particular instances of diversity that
these teacher candidates were actually confronting from day to day was helpful to me,
as a research and as a teacher educator, so that I could focus on “real” situations of
confi'onting diversity in culturally diverse classrooms as opposed to imagining what
kinds of issues might arise. Prospective teachers must be able to identify these

differences that are emerging for themselves so that they can begin to examine the

dynamics of their interactions with those who are different from themselves. Teacher

220

educators must provide support for teacher candidates as they examine their thinking
and actions in relationship to these differences.

In addition, in order to help prospective teachers sort out the complexities,
teacher educators need to help them gain knowledge about the different areas of
diversity as well as the process involved in moving from a monocultural to a
multicultural perspective. This may mean that a particular model, like Nieto’s (1992),
be introduced to teacher candidates as a way to identify the continuum of multicultural
attitudes and behaviors that lead to becoming a multicultural teacher. Teacher
candidates must know what a multicultural classroom might look like; the kind of
relationships that are developed; the way curriculum is thought about and
implemented and the attitudes that promote success for all students. From my own
work as a teacher educator, I now realize that I need to be more explicit about these
goals. At the same time, there also needs to be realistic expectations for what can be
accomplished in a teacher education program. It does not seem realistic to achieve
significant changes in the multicultural attitudes and behaviors of all prospective
teachers within the relatively short time that teacher candidates are in a teacher
education program. Findings fi'om this study indicate that expectations in growth for
individual prospective students will be different for each. Teacher educators must
provide a variety of opportunities for growth that meet individual needs.

A second implication for teacher educators focuses on the past experiences of
prospective teachers with cultural diversity that greatly influence the personal process

of becoming multicultural in perspective. In addition, fieldwork and student teaching

221

placements in culturally diverse classroom settings personally engage prospective
teachers in a way that theoretical examples cannot. However, all experiences are in a
context and that context is very important to the experience. Some of these
experiences will serve as a foundation for future encounters that will further the
individual’s intellectual, social, emotional and moral growth. In contrast, some
experiences limit the access and amount of control that individuals have in regard to
future experiences that will be beneficial to themselves and others (Dewey,
1938/1963). In Jeremy’s situation, it seems as if it was detrimental to his growth to be
placed in a classroom setting where there was too much dissonance at the time
between his cultural understandings and the cultural setting at Hathaway Elementary.
Another crucial element related to placement in diverse settings is the cultural
understandings of the mentor teacher. In this study, mentor teachers were an integral
part of the teacher candidate’s experiences even though this particular aspect was not
documented. It was clear from informal conversations with the mentor teachers of the
student teachers in this study that they were at very different places in their readiness
to adopt multicultural perspectives. Even though it is a personal process that is
involved in adopting multicultural attitudes and behaviors, there still needs to be
support from others who can model and help think through particular situations related
to diversity. Teacher educators must be selective in finding classroom placements for
teacher candidates which will further their growth in multicultural attitudes and

actions. In addition, teacher educators must recognize that the desire to work in a

222

setting that presents cultural challenges is not enough for some teacher candidates who
are not ready for the complexities such a situation might bring.

Finally, questions emerge concerning the expectations of teacher candidates to
challenge the status quo in order to enact change. Teacher candidates need to be
encouraged to become active in critiquing situations in schools and classrooms where
there are injustices related to differences among teachers and students. It has become
clearer that what separates the beginning levels of multicultural attitudes and behaviors
from more deve10ped levels is some kind of action. It is not enough that teacher
candidates tolerate or accept differences. They must become active participants in
various ways in order to make changes so that the status quo of inequality does not
continue. For Leah, this meant getting involved in the after-school club for girls in
order to develop relationships with them. It seems that teacher educators need to find
ways for active involvement to happen throughout the teacher education program,
providing opportunities for teacher candidates to realize that they can take a proactive
stance in making changes in the school environment and in the lives of students.
Liston and Zeichner (1990) suggest that “teacher education programs can serve to
integrate prospective teachers into the logic of the present social order or they can
serve to promote a situation where future teachers can deal critically with that reality

in order to improve it” (p. viii).

SuggestionsfcrfiurtherResearszh
Researchers and educators are beginning to gather information on how teacher

candidates construct meaning about diversity. However, further research is necessary

223

as schools and classrooms continue to grow more diverse. The following suggestions
for further research emerged as this study progressed.

First, it has become clear that this study serves only as an initial step in the
process of ascertaining how teacher candidates construct meaning about diversity. In
this study, I gathered data to identify instances where student teachers confronted
diversity between themselves and their students. Further research could move beyond
this phase by documenting the ways in which the teacher candidates themselves are
identifying diversity and documenting their own development in terms of multicultural
attitudes and behaviors. The design of this study as well as the findings from the
research may serve to aid teacher educators in establishing programs that move
research in this area to the stage where teacher candidates are reflecting more
deliberately on constructing meaning about diversity.

Second, it seems necessary to research how teacher educators construct
meaning about diversity. Where are teacher educators in the process of acquiring
multicultural attitudes and behaviors? Are teacher educators in a position to teach
others about diversity? Are there particular experiences that help teacher educators
gain multicultural perspectives?

A third area of further research focuses on the need to begin a study of this
kind earlier in the teacher candidates program so that there would be more time for the
development in multicultural attitudes and behaviors to be documented. If the data
collected on these student teachers had been gathered earlier, there would have been

the opportunity to find ways to address the particular areas of diversity that individual

224

teacher candidates confronted and opportunities to develop their reflective practices.
The study could have moved from researcher identification of the areas of diversity
that were being confronted to recognition of these differences by the teacher candidate.

Another component to be added to further research includes interaction
between teacher education candidates and teacher educators regarding diversity. How
do their interactions impact one another as they construct meaning about differences?
Adding this piece to the study would certainly add a helpful dimension in the area of
determining how the development of multicultural attitudes and behaviors may be
impacted by those around us.

In addition, further research needs to be conducted on the impact of the
cooperating classroom teacher as well as other members of the school community on
the multicultural attitudes and behaviors of teacher candidates. Some data were
informally collected during this study from the classroom teachers, but the focus of the
study did not allow another component to be introduced into an already complex
frame. However, adding to the research the way in which cooperating teachers
construct meaning about diversity could definitely have implications for field and
student teaching placements as well as for collaborations between colleges/universities
and schools. For instance, how might have Jeremy’s experience at Hathaway been
different if he would have been with another cooperating teacher.

In addition, it would also be beneficial to gather data from secondary schools
as well as elementary schools--secondary classroom teachers, secondary teacher

education candidates and secondary pupils. While similar issues may arise between

225

younger and older children and youth, the particular situations encountered in
culturally diverse secondary schools would likely be quite different fi'om those in
elementary schools.

Finally, it would be helpful to have input from children and youth from
culturally diverse classrooms to add to the data sources. It would be helpful to know
what differences students are identifying between their teachers and themselves and
how they are making sense of these differences. Comparison of data collected from
classroom teacher, student teacher and the student in the classroom would provide
helpful insights into the kind of perceptions each are bringing to specific situations

involving differences among them.

APPENDICES

APPENDIX A

 

226
APPENDIX A

ELEMENTARY CURRICULUM STUDIES COURSE SYLLABUS
Winter 1993

Anita Lapp John Smith
CC 21 Library 013

COURS_E DESCRIPTION

This course focuses on understanding the content areas of science, social studies and mathematics and on
teaching these content areas to students in elementary classrooms. We will explore the major questions,
themes, concepts, processes and ideas associated with each content area. These content areas will be
approached from a developmental perspective and connections between these three content areas will be
examined through a course focus on interdisciplinary teaching. Emphasis will be on the relationship
between content and student's backgrounds, interests and needs. Broadening multicultural perspectives
will also be a focus. The course will be divided into five major sections:

1. Science Math and Social Studies
A. What is Most Worth Knowing/Learning in Each Content Area
B. Planning for Learning
C. Implementing Lessons
D. Evaluation

 

11. Issues Related to Teaching
A. Multicultural Perspectives

B. Safety And Teacher Negligence
C. Classroom Management/Discipline

III. Makin Meanin Throu Inte ted Units
A. Choose A Theme Or Topic With Your Cooperating Teacher In Student
Teaching Placement
B. Plan An Interdisciplinary Unit On This Theme Or Topic Which You Will Implement During
Student Teaching

IV. Field Work

A. Designed For Students to Explore the Teaching of Math, Science and Social Studies in a
Specific Classroom

B. Individuals/Pairs of Students Teach Lessons In Science/Social Studies/Math To Whole
Group, Small Group, And Individual Students

C. Emphasis Placed On Thorough And Developmentally Appropriate Lesson Planning And
Thoughtful Evaluation Of Each Lesson

D. Placements Arranged At Two Urban Schools in Elkhart: Hawthorne Elementary And
Roosevelt Elementary

V. Student Teaching Placement
A. In Early February, Initial Requests For Student Teaching Placements Will Go Out To Area

Classroom Teachers
B. You Will Spend Two Full Days Or Four Half Days With Your Cooperating Teacher In The
Classroom At The End of March

227
APPENDD( A Cont’d

These five major areas of concentration during the course grow out of the guiding principles of the teacher
education department at Goshen College. These principles serve as a framework for connecting students,
teachers and content in the building of knowledge, compassion and commitment for living responsibly as
world citizens and for inviting teacher education students to

(1) Comprehend the content disciplines to be taught so as to draw relationships (a) within
disciplines; (b) across disciplines; and (c) to student's lives.

(2) Build a learning community based on the diversity of student's backgrounds and the ways in
which they learn by (a) starting from each individual's strengths and cultural resources; (b)
sharing responsibility for teaching and learning with all students; and (c) advocating for
alienated and powerless students.

(3) Flexibly employ a variety of teaching and evaluation strategies that enable students to make
meaning of content disciplines.

(4) Manage a classroom effectively and considerately in a wide variety of settings.
(5) Sense a strong call to serve and to nurture students with patience and humor.

(6) Develop a sense of self as an educational facilitator and leader who continually reflects on her/his
teaching in reference to her/his own guiding principles.

REQUIRED COURSE TEXTS
Burns, Marilyn (1992). About Teaching Mathematics, Math Solutions.

Liquid Explorations (1987). A unit of the curriculum: Great Explorations in Math and Science.
University of California, 1987.

Kozol, Jonathan (1991). Savage Inequalities, Crown Publishers, Inc.

Paley, Vivian (1989). White Teacher, Harvard University Press.

Pappas/Kiefer/Levstik (1990). An Integrated Language Perspective in the Elementary School, Longman.
One unit of your choice from Project AIMS

Minisubscription (January, February, March, April) to Arithmetic Teacher published by the National
Council of Teachers of Mathematics. '

TENTATIVE CLASS SCHEDULE
(A separate syllabus for each of the content areas of science, math and social studies will be available.)

CLASS SESSIONS (8:00 - 9:50) FIELDWORK
Hawthorne - 7:30 - 11:30
Roosevelt - 8:00 - 12:00

228

APPENDD( A Cont’d

Janm 7
Introduction to the Course

Janm 11
Science
Discussion of Articles: 1, Thou, and It” by David Hawkins

Janm 14
Science

Janu_ag 18 Janu_ag 19 & 20
Science Observe in Classrooms

mm
Science

Janm 25 Janna 26 & 27
Science Teach Lessons - Science

Jan—writ
Discussion of White Teacher by Virginia Paley and

"The Silenced Dialogue: Power and Pedagogy in
Educating Other People's Children" by Lisa Delpit.

Febr_u_ary 1
Science

Febm 4
Science

EM
Math

Febm 11
Math

Febr_u_ary 15
Math

Febgm 18
Multicultural Issues

Feb 22 & 23
MID-TERM RECESS

Feb 25
Math

Febgm 2 & 3
Teach Lessons - Science

Febgm 9 & 10
Teach Lessons - Science or Math

Februgrv 16 & 17
Teach Lessons - Math

F 24
Teach Lessons - Math

229
APPENDIX A Cont’d

March 1 March 2 & 3
Social Studies Teach Lessons - Math or Social Studies

March 4
Social Studies

March 8 March 9 & 10
Social Studies Teach Lessons - Math or Social Studies

March 11
Multicultural Issues

March 15
Legal Issues

web—l8
Interdisciplinary Teaching

March 22 March 23 & 24
Legal Issues Student Teaching Placements

March 25&29 March 30&3l
Unit Work Student Teaching Placements

April 1
Reading Days

April 5
Unit Work
Student Teaching Issues

April 8
Unit Work
Student Teaching Issues

Wednesday, April 14 at 3:00 pm.
Final Meeting of Elementary Curriculum Studies

COURSE RE UIREMENTS

1. Regular attendance and active involvement in class sessions and field experiences.

2. Completion of all assigned readings.

3. Completion of assignments related to class sessions or to readings. Further details will be available
throughout the term and specific assignments will be listed in each content area syllabus.

EVALUATION

Credit/No Credit with written evaluation based on the quality of work on written assignments; projects;
class discussions; fieldwork including planning, teaching and reflection of lessons; and other assigned
work.

APPENDIX B

 

230
APPENDIX B

INTERVIEW, JOURNAL AND OBSERVATION GUIDE

1 . . l I . . l l E S I I l
(1) Tell me something about your family and the community in which you grew up.
-urban/rural setting, family members, occupations in the community, what was

important to members of the community.

(2) Describe your schooling experiences in that community - elementary, middle-school and secondary
school.

(3) Do you remember when you decided to become a teacher? Think back to what your image of a
teacher was at that point. How does that image differ from the one you now hold?

(4) Describe your teacher education program up to this point. What stands out to you as having an
impact on your views about teaching?

(5) Describe other parts of your college program which have contributed to you learning to teach.

(6) Think about the multiple factors in teaching all of your students. Describe what seems most
important to you at this point. What do you think about the most?

(7) Describe the planning that went into your thematic interdisciplinary unit last spring. Now that
you've met your students, how might you take a new look at this unit?

(8) How are norms for behavior established in your student teaching classroom? What is hard for
students to do? to remember? Why? Are there individual students who seem to have some difficulty in
shaping their actions to fit the evolving norms of the group? Describe them.

(9) What has been the nature of your experiences with persons outside of your own culture?

(10) Describe the children in your classroom. What ways are they alike? different? How do they relate
to each other? to the teacher? to you?

(1 1) As you think about these past two weeks, what specific instances stand out in your mind in dealing
with differences among children?

(12) If you are teaching fiom your thematic unit, how did you plan for diversity among your students?

23 1
APPENDIX B Cont’d

1..” . 'IIEC 'II

(1) Tell me something about your family and the community in which you grew up.
-urban/rural, family members, occupations in the community, what was important
to members of the community

(2) Describe your own schooling experiences - elementary, middle and secondary. Are there particular
instances which stand out in your mind during those years?

(3) Do you remember when you decided to become a teacher? Think back to what your image of a
teacher was at that point. How does that image differ from the image you now hold?

(4) Describe experiences which have had an influence on your teaching and your views of what it
means to be a teacher.

(5) What was your first teaching position? Other positions? How many years have you been teaching?
How has teaching changed for you since that first position?

(6) Think about the multiple facts in teaching all of your students. Describe what seems to be the most
important to you at this point as you plan and teach.

(7) Describe the children in your classroom.

(8) How are norms for behavior established in the classroom? What is hard for students to do? to
remember? Why? Are there individual students who seem to have some difficulty in shaping their
actions to fit the evolving norms of the group? Describe.

(9) What is the nature of your experience with persons outside of your own culture?

(10) What kinds of diversity do you observe among your students? Does this diversity enter into your
planning and teaching? If so, in what ways?

232
APPENDIX B Cont’d

[IE G'll'flSlIl

Journal Entry #1 - Due September 10

(a) The first weeks of school are a critical time in laying the foundation for a classroom learning
community. How does your cooperating teacher orient students to routines, procedures and
expectations? What did your teacher say and do during the first days of school to let students know
what he/she wanted the classroom to be like? How do students respond? What is hard for students to
do? to remember? Why? Are there individual students who seem to have some difi'rculty in shaping
their actions to fit the evolving norms of the group? What seems to get in the way?

(b) Orientation Activities: How does your teacher begin the year in getting acquainted with the
students? How does the teacher get to know the children - names, interests, family, friends"? How do
the children get to know each other?

(c) What can you infer fi'om the arrangement and use of space about your teacher‘s hopes, values and
expectations for children in the classroom?

(d) How does the teacher gather information about the student both formally and informally? What
specifically does the teacher learn about students' knowledge and skills (e.g. math, reading, writing).
How does the teacher find out the student's attitudes towards learning and of themselves as learners?

(e) Describe the relationships in the classroom:

Teacher/Student; Student Teacher/ Student

Teacher/Student Teacher; Student/Student

Other adults in the classroom/teacher/student/student teacher/student

Describe specific interactions which stand out in your mind as ones which were particularly valuable
to you in learning about students.

(0 As you planned particular lessons to teach during these beginning weeks, what did you think about
as you planned? Give specific examples.

(g) If you were teaching lessons from your thematic unit, what emerged as the most important issues
for you?

(h) What kinds of teaching/learning issues did you deal with these beginning weeks? Describe how you
handled them?

(i) What questions/ issues are emerging for you as you teach?

0) Did diversity among your students enter into your planning/teaching? If so, in what ways?

233
APPENDIX B Cont’d

Journal Entry #2 - Due September 24

(a) One of the goals of the student teaching program is to help you become "kidwatchers". Good
teachers learn about their students and use that information in planning curriculum, assessing student
understanding and communicating with parents. Have lunch with at least three students to learn to
know more about them. Try to pick students who seem different to you in interesting ways. Afier the
lunch, make some notes about what was learned about the students - their family, their backgrounds,
families, friendships and interests. What kind of information did you elicit from these lunches and what
impressions did you form? Be descriptive. Provide specific examples of speech and behavior that
stand out to you.

(b) What kinds of studies or activities seem most interesting to your classroom or students? How does
this interest enter into how you think about your planning and teaching?

(c) As you planned particular lessons, what kinds of things do you really need to work on beforehand?

(d) If you were teaching lessons from your thematic unit, what emerged as the most important issues
for you? Describe any responses from individual children which stand out in your mind.

(e) Did diversity among your students enter into your planning/teaching these last two weeks? If so, in
what ways?

(1) What questions/issues are emerging for you as you teach?

Journal Entry #3 - Due October 11

(a) "Inclusion" is a common word heard in school these days. What does this concept seem to mean in
your school, in your classroom, to you? Describe the children in the classroom who are a part of this
program. How do they enter into your planning and teaching? What sort of dilemmas arise for you as
a result of "inclusion"?

(b) From the article by Carl Grant that you read for student teaching workshops, The Persistent
Significance of Race in Schooling?":

The nation's school population is not homogeneous but, rather, a collage of male and female students of
different colors, from parents with different incomes and educational levels. Teachers daily encounter
concerns related to students' race, class and gender.

Think about your own classroom. Describe the ways in which your students are not homogeneous.
How do these difi‘erences enter into your planning, teaching and interactions with students? Give
specific examples.

(c) In what ways or areas do you see instruction and/or materials that take into account students who are
not homogeneous as learners?

(d) What issues continue to emerge for you as you teach? What is the most difficult about teaching?
What seems to be getting easier?

234

APPENDIX B Cont’d

Journal Entry #4 - Due October 25

(1)at books and/or resources do you find most helpful or that you use most ofien as you plan and teach?
Why are they helpful?

(b) If you were planning your thematic unit again, what would it look like now? Would it be different
from the one you planned last spring? Is so, in what ways? What have you learned from teaching this
unit?

(c) Are there children who, from their responses/behavior seemed to learn more or make more
connections to their previous experiences during your unit than others? If so, who were these children
and why might they have made more connections? Are there those who didn't seem to make very many
connections between what you were teaching in your unit and their previous experiences? If so, who
were these children and why might these connections have been limited?

Journal Entry #5 - Due November 9

(a) How have your conceptions of teaching changed over the past thirteen weeks as you were involved
in student teaching?

(b) Which students in your classroom are the most different from you? In what ways? Which students
were the most similar? In what ways? How does your culture -- the way you grew up, your schooling
experiences, your beliefs and values, your language, the way you respond to instruction...compare to
the culture of students in your classroom? Are there dilemmas that arise as a result of differences in
culture? Be specific.

(c) Does life inside and outside of the school seem to be similar or different for the children in your
classroom in relationship to the norms for behavior, language and values. In other words, can children
apply what they have learned at home in school and what they have learned in school at home? Give
specific examples. If there are major differences between expectations at home and school, does this
seem to impact the child's success at school? In what ways?

(d) What have been your experiences with parents during your student teaching experiences? What
kind of communication have you had with them? Give specific examples.

(e) What do you think will be difficult during the first year of teaching? What are the areas in which
you feel the most ready, the least ready?

(i) How has your cooperating teacher influenced your drinking about teaching? What seems most
important to him/her in relationship to teaching? Are these same things important to you at this point
or do other things rise to the top for you? Are there others in the school who have had an influence in
how you think about teaching? Who are they and why?

(g) In what areas do you think if will be the most difficult to carry out your beliefs about teaching,
about what is good for children? Why?

 

235
APPENDIX B Cont’d

Classroom visits took place on the following dates:

Tamara

Thematic Unit: Farms

September 28, October 7, October 15, October 20, October 28

lemma:

Thematic Unit: Communities
September 7, September 13, September 15, September 22, September 30

Nancy
Thematic Unit: Plants

September 15, September 24, October 5, October 16, October 25

Leah

Thematic Unit: Follow Your Dreams
October 6, October 1 1, October 20, October 27, November 1

 

236
APPENDIX B Cont’d

1"l5lIllflB lDl'

(a) Were there any students whom you noticed got more or less out of the lesson than most of the
others? If so, why do you think this happened?

(b) I noticed this -- how did you perceive the situation?
(c) Why do you think the child said this?

((1) (If a problem arises) what do you think might have been done differently?

I? l I . . I l E S I I l
(1) If the Today show called you one morning and asked you to tell - in 8 minutes or less - about your
student teaching experience, what would you say? What were the highlights? What were some of the
low points?

(2) In the first interview, I asked you to describe your students - that was after you have been in the
classroom for perhaps two weeks. Describe them for me again at this point.

(3) After having completed student teaching, what do you think are the most important things that
teachers need to know?

(4) What are some of the things you want to work on when you get a teaching position?

(5) At the beginning of the term also I asked you to talk about the differences you saw among the
children in the classroom. How would you describe those differences now?

(6) What did you learn about the culture of the students in your classroom?

(7) Talk about what it means to you to teach culturally different children - what would that mean to
you?

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