ERIC Number: EJ974358
Record Type: Journal
Publication Date: 2011
Pages: 13
Abstractor: As Provided
ISBN: N/A
ISSN: ISSN-1540-9392
EISSN: N/A
The Elephant in the Room: A Conundrum in Democratic Teaching and Learning
Toth, Shannon Lindsay; Morrison, Serina Cinnamon
Scholar-Practitioner Quarterly, v5 n4 p347-359 Win 2011
This study reflects an autoethnographic conversation between two graduate students whose purpose is to explore the tensions teachers face in the classroom as they are confronted with the demands of a standards-based curriculum while striving to assert themselves as educators for democratic citizenship. These tensions manifest in the most fundamental ways as a teacher seeks to define her or his role in the classroom, offer authentic and meaningful instruction, comply with increasingly prescriptive standards, and negotiate student resistance. In trying to navigate the demands of a system only concerned with end products and stratification of a citizenry into performers and nonperformers, the authors confront concerns of otherization. The proverbial elephant in the room, then, is how to create teachers capable of successfully navigating the system as it exists by empowering them with the tools to "play ball" while at the same time honoring their higher calling of educating for democratic citizenship.
Descriptors: Graduate Students, Tenure, Citizenship, Democracy, Faculty, Teaching Conditions, Academic Standards, Curriculum, Democratic Values, Teacher Role, Resistance (Psychology), Citizenship Education, Social Justice, Power Structure, Minority Groups
Educator's International Press, Inc. 18 Colleen Road, Troy, NY 12180. Tel: 518-271-9886; Fax: 518-266-9422; e-mail: office@edint.com
Publication Type: Journal Articles; Reports - Research
Education Level: Elementary Secondary Education
Audience: N/A
Language: English
Sponsor: N/A
Authoring Institution: N/A
Grant or Contract Numbers: N/A