Reflective practice that nurtures dispositions.

Abstract

This four-semester study examines the impact of reflective practice on the self-analysis of dispositions in beginning pre-service teachers. Pre-service teachers identified dispositional signals [behaviors], messages those signals sent to students; and the results of the signals on student engagement. They also set dispositional goals for their next teaching opportunity. Results over the four semesters indicate an increasingly sophisticated self-analysis of teacher dispositions both in dispositional categories and depth of analysis.

Introduction

Most educators in classroom settings tacitly acknowledge that even if teachers have the requisite content knowledge and pedagogical skill but lack an educational heart, they should not be in a classroom shaping the development of mind, body, and spirit. Both INTASC (1991) and NCATE (2002) address dispositions in their guidelines for effective teaching and teacher preparation. Dispositions embedded in teachers' formal and informal relationships with students as well as their perspectives on teaching and learning can make the difference between a bored, even hostile student and one that is engaged and resilient. The power and influence of building relationships and honoring learning diversity are suggested by findings from a study grounded in the Learner-Centered Psychological Principles (APA, 1997). Results of the Learner-Centered Practices Survey (McCombs, 2001) also indicate that K-12 student motivation and subsequent academic success are predictably high when relationship-building, learning diversity, and strategies for how to learn and think remain central to classroom life. If pre-service candidates had the ability to identify and reflect on dispositions that affect teaching and learning, then consider the heightened potential for creating authentic learning communities and optimum student engagement. Obtaining a kind of "perceptual objectivity" can enable educators to move beyond the knowledge (content) that teachers have used as a basis for education to developing more encompassing understandings of the possibilities for learning (Mentkowski & Associates, 2000, p. 174). However, in an age of accountability where tests of teacher content knowledge dominate the landscape, the affective nature of teacher dispositions remains the least addressed component in teacher education (Collinson, 1996; Shaker, 2000).

As teacher educators can we structure strategies that allow beginning candidates to examine the dispositions they bring into a teacher education program and to develop or further cultivate dispositions that secure those student-teacher relationships and perspectives towards teaching and learning that result in thriving classroom communities? We propose that fostering self-analysis enables pre-service teachers to consciously develop their teaching dispositions thereby positively impacting relationships and learning.

Bandura's Social Cognitive Perspective

Bandura (1977, 1997), among other cognitive scientists, posits that although we are born with "elemental reflexes and genetically influenced behavior potentialities" (p. 283), behavior is learned through reinforcement and modeling. Such constructs help us address the educational heart of teaching. Bandura's four-part modeling theory (attention to modeled behavior, retention of appropriate behavior, reproduction of behavior, and motivation and reinforcement to practice and perfect the behavior) leads to desired outcomes over time. Although Bandura acknowledges some external reinforcement of behavior, he eschews such a Skinnerian approach in favor of internal reinforcement, where the individual takes responsibility for choosing and examining his/her own behavior. For example, a teacher may receive external accolades or challenges from an administrator after a formal evaluation, but Bandura would maintain that the teacher's own analysis of her behavior and of its effect in the classroom leads to greater awareness, monitoring, and exercise of effective behavior. The cyclical practice of self-observation, feedback, goal setting, and action, results in emerging "self-motivation to behave in such a way to get self imposed standards" (Smith & Vetter, 1991, p. 268). Bandura (1997) has advocated the self-assessment process because it provides the best opportunity to determine any discrepancy between an intended behavior, the resulting outcome, and the consequent change in the subsequent classroom experience.

In addition, longitudinal research on student self-assessment in Alverno College's curriculum (Mentkowski & Associates, 2000) found that over time students can develop an increasingly sophisticated level of self-assessment, apply what they have learned in novel situations, and applaud their emerging competence (p. 233). In an educational setting, that "self-regard" surfaces when a teacher is aware of her behavior, can reflect and learn from it, and begins to operate with a sense of serf-efficacy (Bandura, 1997). She believes that she can produce the outcomes she wants. Self analysis, according to cognitive social theorists, is critical because it profoundly influences an individual's response to and resilience with the environment. How one consciously problem solves and engages with others is a form of reflective intelligence.

Boyatzis' Language

The core of the Boyatzis (1982) model for "Dynamic Interaction" (p. 35) provides a framework and language for describing the character of the dispositions that are developed by pre-service teachers. The crux of this theory is based on a belief that "unconscious and conscious dispositions represented by motives or traits lead to behaviors that are integrated into the self-image and that these same observations and thoughts can form the basis for social roles relatively consistent with the sell-image and motive/traits within that context (p. 195)." In other words, behavior related to chosen sell-image and social roles, (i.e., a classroom teacher), will increase the likelihood of patterns of effective teaching emerging. If a pre-service teacher possesses strong motive/trait relationships toward becoming an effective teacher, there is the likelihood that he will incorporate related behaviors to that social role of effective teacher into his performance goals. For Boyatzis then, behavior results from "a direct function of the dispositions, self-image, and social roles chosen within the context of the environment," in this case, the classroom (p. 196). The outer layer of his onion-like model describes the specific action or behavior demonstrated (skill) and conceptualizes increasingly complex layers of dispositions that may impact competency. Consistency between motives and traits and a conscious relationship to self-image and social roles aids in the development of positive behaviors.

Thus, the Boyatzis model suggests that a pre-service candidate's collaborative teacher identity can be developed, even though at times it lies relatively deep. In looking for measures of competence in teachers, Boyatzis' (1982) onion metaphor of a conscious self-image related to underlying dispositional motives can assist in clarifying the "heart" of a competent teacher (p. 149). Peeling away the layers of the onion model may enable future teachers to begin to conceptualize the reasons for the behaviors that demonstrate a disposition and move to the higher levels of agency that challenge the effects of their actions (p. 150).

The Role of Dispositions

If dispositions play a pivotal role in classroom relationship building and student learning, if they can be identified and nurtured, if a language exists for analyzing the depth of dispositional development, then teacher educators are positioned to address the heart of teaching. However, noticeably absent in research are the identification and analysis of the ways individuals send signals about their dispositions and how these signals act as specific, ongoing catalysts in relationship building. Nor does research seem to address pre-service teachers' self-reflection on dispositions in order to cultivate more effective ways of being in the classroom. More specifically, research does not examine to what extent practice in the self-analysis of dispositions a) heightens candidates' ability to identify their own dispositional signals, b) enables candidates to connect those signals to perceived messages and consequent actions of P-12 students within the context of fieldwork teaching, and c) supports candidates in setting personal disposition goals for the next teaching opportunity.

The Study

In this longitudinal study, participants were elementary, secondary, and post-baccalaureate students, most of whom were first semester sophomores at Alverno College. Semester one had 14 candidates; semester two had 19 candidates; semester three had 15 candidates, and semester four had 18 candidates. These pre-service teachers were predominately first generation college students. Alverno College's ability-based curriculum emphasizes the development of self-assessment across the curriculum (Alverno College Faculty, 2000) and the teacher preparation program more specifically (Diez, 1998). A pre-service teacher learns that self assessment equates to life long learning. Over time, she becomes adept at identifying her strengths and areas for improvement: "Self assessment is the ability of a student to observe, analyze, and judge her performance on the basis of criteria and determine how she can improve it" (Alverno College Faculty, 2000, p. 3). Therefore, the integration of Bandura's observational learning theory with the Alverno self assessment model promoted a cohesive approach to dispositional development. After starting with a conceptual grasp of dispositions based on our emerging definition, we used modeling and self-reflection as the vehicles to facilitate pre-service teachers' understandings of their own intentional dispositions.

We introduced the Boyatzis model in addition to cooperating teacher observations to provide further data and a specific language for pre-service teachers to analyze their growth in dispositional awareness. The pre-service teachers videotaped their own instruction in a field setting. Focusing on a rich twenty minutes in her videotape, each student prepared a written record of the dispositional signals sent, evidence of the signals, the messages pre-service teachers thought students were receiving, and the potential/actual results of the dispositional signals. Each completed a matrix that delineated four dispositional categories we developed from informal interviews with teachers, principals, colleagues, business professionals, and parents: (1) body language, (2) language use (for example, voice, tone, rate), (3) classroom practice, and (4) curriculum choices/adaptation. After completing a self-analysis using the chart, pre-service teachers used the same chart to analyze a partner's videotape. Afterwards, partners conducted a videotaped peer feedback conference focusing on a comparative analysis of data in each chart. We took a deliberate approach in introducing and studying dispositions as we shared a book chapter and scenarios that presented opportunities for analysis of dispositions as a prelude to having our students arrive at their own definition. Near the end of the semester, with dispositional awareness further heightened by the more explicit addressing of dispositions through discussion, we used the teaching sections of Dead Poets Society to examine dispositions through another medium. As a class we identified behaviors of the teachers in the film and connected them to the obvious dispositions. Candidates took their notes and completed the teacher dispositions chart, providing experience in analysis of behaviors and dispositions in advance of their own video analysis. Written responses as well as videotaped work were intended to offer the pre-service teachers a lens for concentrating on growth and discussing their own emerging dispositional awareness.

Although candidates engaged in reflection during the peer feedback conference noted above, two additional reflections occurred following the conference. Candidates responded in writing to a series of prompts, e.g., Identify consistency or dissonance among dispositional intentions, your behaviors, and your image of an effective teacher. Identify dispositions that you will strengthen or curtail in your ongoing work. In addition, we enlisted the College's Diagnostic Digital Portfolio (DDP), an electronic record of key performances, self assessments, and instructor feedback that students use to monitor development over time. Each candidate uploaded onto the DDP a five minute videotaped section of her teaching that demonstrated emerging or developed dispositions, analyzed the clip using the theoretical structure of Bandura and the language of Boyatzis, and set two dispositional goals. The instructor completed the DDP process by providing feedback on each candidate's self reflection.

Discussion

Study results indicate, a range in the quality of self-analyses of teacher dispositions. Early access to Boyatzis' skills layer was evident right from the start, with most pre-service teachers comfortably integrating the social role/self image into their analysis. Understanding the motivational layers of dispositions is the most challenging for students, probably because it required the most in-depth self-assessment. In the first semester, the quality of dispositional analysis appears to differ by dispositional categories, with the effects of body language being the most accessible to the beginning pre-service teacher followed by curricular choice, classroom practice and language use. However, in the following three semesters, a heightened emphasis on dispositional signal awareness and analysis resulted in the identification of a broader range of signals, the combination of signals in analyzing a particular dispositional stance, and how these behaviors connect to effective teacher dispositions.

The initially uneven but progressively reflective and analytic performance of students in the study confirmed for us that dispositional awareness on the part of teacher candidates cannot be assumed just because they are in a teacher preparation program. Nor can dispositional analysis and development be left to teachable moments or as a wishful by-product of methods classes. The cultivation of effective, intentional dispositions must be addressed purposefully and deliberately in a variety of educational contexts. In the data analysis, for example, we found that peer-conferencing enabled students to extend the depth of their dispositional analysis and validate their development and that instructor feedback on the DDP served the crucial function of directing the pre-service teachers' attention toward an external reading of behaviors and their objective effects. The social motivation embedded in both interactions may have also sustained the dynamics of their inquiry. Our belief that internal self-efficacy motivation will sustain efforts to develop new dispositional behaviors can only be tested through longer-term follow-ups of these pre-service teachers.

As pre-service teachers labor to develop a dispositional framework that supports their emerging identity as teachers, it is also important for them to observe and reflect on the characteristics they consider important and to set attainable goals within that framework. Throughout the education program, promoting the practice and reflective analysis of behaviors that specifically support intentional dispositions would assist pre-service teachers, at all levels, to maximize the ability to create invitational environments in classrooms. Further investigations into this vital affective dimension of teaching could facilitate greater student awareness, demonstration, and articulation of the connections among dispositional signals, messages, and results. Not only do pre-service teachers grow in the knowledge, analysis, and demonstration of dispositions from this reflective practice; but the potential also exists for all educators to nurture their own dispositional development through reflective practice. Nurturing dispositions throughout a teacher education program by continuously encouraging reflective practice further illuminates the often neglected affective element in teacher education. It completes the triangulation of knowledge, skills, and dispositions necessary for the effective learning communities that can and should characterize today's schools.

Conclusion

The four-semester study examined to what extent the strategic use of Bandura's observational learning, reflective analysis, and the dispositional language of Boyatzis can facilitate the identification and development of dispositions in beginning teacher education candidates. Data analysis indicates that the more students reflected on their and others' dispositional behaviors, the more they were able to discern effective teaching behavior that resonated with their image of the social role of teachers. Results over the four semesters indicate an increasingly sophisticated self-analysis of teacher dispositions both in dispositional categories and depth of analysis. The study suggests that reflection heightens both awareness and consequent behavior and that dispositions can be developed and changed.

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Lee Breese, Alverno College, WI

Rita Nawrocki-Chabin, Alverno College, WI

Breese, Ph.D., is Assistant Professor in the Education Department, and Nawrocki-Chabin, Ph.D., is Associate Professor in the Master of Arts Program.