NARRATIVES IN TEACHING PRACTICE

MILE Narratives in Teacher Education: A Framework for a better Practice

     The bell rings, teacher and students enter in the classroom and the action starts. Speak, write, listen to, read. Write again, socialize, express results, learn from mistakes. It seems as if writing scholar pieces of lives permeate and shape a teacher’s routine. Educators write, students write, all the time, with different purposes, to different audiences. But, an inquiry emerges. Are teachers sufficiently aware of their interventions? Are they accurate observers and strategic writers? What could be done to delve into expertise perspective? Dolk, M. & del Hertog, J. (2008) in Narratives in teacher education. Interactive Learning Environments,  provide student teachers a useful tool to observe, analyse and finally reach to a meaningful interpretation as regards their daily practice. Knowing the constraints that vignettes and journal entries might present, the experts go beyond the common sense in teacher’s beliefs when being an observer in the process of writing their vignettes.

     “Experience without reflection doesn’t support prospective teachers”, Dolk, & del Hertog,  (2008, p. 215)  state  while describing a redesign of narrative uses which is being held in The Netherlands. Incorporating Multimedia Interactive Learning Environment, (MILE), has become a rich method to foster the study on critical incidents and episodes in primary schools. Teachers are exposed first as observers and later as being observed, not without a purpose of ease their professional work. Other professionals, as the headmaster or an inspector, are invited as on outsider observer, who are also considered as helpers in the analysis and interpretation of episodes, video recordings, vignettes, diaries teachers have.

     In MILE, lessons are presented in fragments, and each one is provided with a labelled abstract (Dolk, & del Hertog, 2008) offering a starting point to transcend the dichotomy between experience, practice and theory. To exemplify this, the specialists describe a critical incident of a student called Zavayna, who was asked to put a 68 number card in a line which was holding in Mathematics class. As she read it upside down, she couldn’t find the exact place until her peers try to help her and furthermore until the teacher herself realized that the card was upside down. Zavayna finally corrected herself. In consequence, what could might been considered a mistake, after watching the episode video, turned to be a revealing incident. (Dolk, & del Hertog, 2008).

     MILE theoretical framework consists of six steps which help to construct meaning of narratives. They are a) observing, b) sharing and discussing observations, c) analyzing, d) reflecting, e) developing narrative knowledge, f) expanding personal repertoire and generalizing the situation into a didactic for teacher education. (Dolk, & del Hertog,  2008). The above mentioned steps should not be consider as independent, but as dynamic parts in a dialectical process. What is more, they become crucial in the professionalism of student teachers, as they go from novice observers to expert participants.

     The bell rings, teachers and students enter the classroom and the action starts, again, but now, the actors are embedded in a peculiar, significant improvement, which has been brought by MILE framework reflection tool.

References

Dolk, M. & del Hertog, J. (2008). Narratives in teacher education. Interactive     Learning Environments, 16, 215–229 http://dx.doi.org/10.1080/10494820802113970

          

Analysis of in-text citations

     The purpose of this activity is to analyse in-text citations in the article.  Many ways of paraphrasing and use in-text citations or direct quotations has been displayed by Dolk, M. & del Hertog, J. (2008), and strictly attained to APA rules.

     It’s paramount requirement to follow APA standards ; 6^th edition manual constitutes a useful tool for researchers and peripheral participants who aim to be members of Discourse Community in sharing Conversations of the Discipline and in Academic Writing. It helps scholars and teachers to avoid plagiarism, and even self-plagiarism. It gives a formal layout to structure. APA rules provide credit to academic writing elaboration. And the cited authors have been followed APA rules, as in the following examples:

     An in-text citation is presented to paraphrase Bruner (p.217) focusing on his idea that, in narratives what is meaningful is the story within the story itself. As a result, narratives are more concern with meaning that with truth.

     A second in-text citation which deserves to be analyzed is when paraphrasing Freudenthal, (p.222). The attention is put in paradigmatic observations which are worth reporting and furthermore, they help teachers to observe and to understand what they observe.

     A block citation (p.221) of a student teacher vignette, is presented to emphasize separation between observation and further interpretation, as a revealing tool for teachers, and finally to respect -as it is remarkable for research purpose-, the student teacher own discourse:

he moves his right index finger from block to block. We do not hear him count. At the fifth block his fingers   stops for a second or so longer. He moves his left index to the fifth block. After that he or his friends say “five” and he continue moving his right index finger from block six to block ten. His left index finger stays at block five…Wow, this kid seems to have a better number sense that I ever thought! (…)

     To cite Shon’s suggestion, (1983, p.227) about his idea of constructing knowledge from reflection.

     Finally, to cite Freudenthal (1991, p. 228) again, with his parallelism construct as useful tool of analysis and reflection upon practical experience as a source for constructing meaning of teaching.

     As a final and personal conclusion, I can only add a simple thought: the more we learn to be academic writers, the more doubts we have to face and get across. It seems the only path to acquire a better professional profile which will allow students, teachers and researchers to evolve from novice to experts members of a community sharing the same objective.

References

Dolk, M. & del Hertog, J. (2008). Narratives in teacher education. Interactive     Learning Environments, 16, 215–229 http://dx.doi.org/10.1080/10494820802113970

American Psychological Association. (2010). Publication Manual of the American Psychological Association. (6th, ed.). Washington, DC: American Psychological Association.