Thursday, October 23, 2008

Working with future teachers

I spend a good portion of my time with pre-service teachers. For a while I was reluctant to challenge them with arts integration. But now that I am bringing it up and even modeling a full VIEW process I can see the difference it makes. About a third of my students decided to integrate the arts into their writing lessons in practicum. The message has definitely resonated with my students and I am oh so curious to see what will happen.
For me this was in some waysan unintended consequence. While it makes sense it took me a while to connect this aspect of my research with my teaching. Now, I am consiously looking for ways to help future teachers see the connections. It is about turning the tide from a fragmented elementary curriculum to a more cohesive integrated approach.

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