Exploring Student Teachers’ “Stuck Moments”

AFFECT[ING] THE THEORY-PRACTICE GAP IN SOCIAL JUSTICE TEACHER EDUCATION: EXPLORING STUDENT TEACHERS’ “STUCK MOMENTS” by Erica Eva Colmenares Dissertation Committee: Professor Daniel Friedrich, Sponsor Professor Nancy Louise Lesko Approved by the Committee on the Degree of Doctor of Education Date ______ 16 May 2018___________ Submitted in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree of Doctor of Education in Teachers College, Columbia University 2018 ABSTRACT AFFECT[ING] THE THEORY-PRACTICE GAP IN SOCIAL JUSTICE TEACHER EDUCATION: EXPLORING STUDENT TEACHERS’ “STUCK MOMENTS” Erica Eva Colmenares Set within a discursive field of humanist and neoliberal thought, this post- qualitative study attended to student teachers’ “stuck moments” in a university-based, social justice-oriented teacher education program (SJTE). It sought to problematize the familiar tendency of ascribing student teachers’ stuck moments as symptomatic of the theory-practice gap, an argument frequently lobbied by policy makers to dismantle university-based teacher education in favor of alternative (read: more lucrative) programs. Challenging the representational logic that undergirds prevailing conceptualizations of stuckness and the theory-practice gap obsession in teacher education, this study conceptualized stuck moments as a fluid, moving assemblage of bodies (human and nonhuman), and discursive, affective, and material forces. Informed by posthumanist theories of affect, this case study of six preservice teachers enrolled in an SJTE program used a rhizomatic mapping process that entailed assembling a series of wonder cabinets to map the discursive, affective, and material forces that shape student teachers’ stuck moment(s) and explore what these stuck moments do to student teachers. Data sources included field notes and jottings, individual and group conversations, and the creation of wonder cabinets of stuckness. The findings of this study suggest that the materiality of field placement sites (i.e., the physical and discursive), the pressure on student teachers to achieve teaching mastery, participants’ desire to have an impact on their students, and the challenges of enacting critical/justice practices, constitute the stuck moment assemblage. These constituting elements also illuminate the infiltration of learning discourses in student teachers’ stuckness. With their focus on mastery, normative teacher identity categories, measurable goals, and telos-driven progress narratives, learning discourses—while seductive for student teachers—collide with the tenuousness and uncertainty of social justice work. These discourses also generate and intensify the negative affects that animate student teachers’ stuck moments. These affects include, among others, worry, shame, and loneliness. This research foregrounds how stuckness holds the potential to simultaneously expose and oppose the conflicting discourses, affective attachments, and intensities, that student teachers encounter as they navigate through the various spaces of their SJTE program. © Copyright Erica Eva Colmenares 2018 All Rights Reserved ii DEDICATION To my students. (Past, present, and future). iii i ACKNOWLEDGMENTS This work has been “aided, inspired, and multiplied” by “variously formed matters” (Deleuze & Guattari, 1987, p. 3). To this end, there are numerous (human and nonhuman) “matters” I would like to thank. To my dissertation committee: Dani Friedrich, Nancy Lesko, Irv Epstein, and Laura Smith. Thank you for your unwavering input and guidance throughout this unwieldy process. Dani, over the last 7 years you have not only been my advisor, but you have become a trusted mentor, incredible colleague, and dear friend as well. I couldn’t have imagined a more supportive and intellectually invigorating guide for this crazy journey. You believed in me and this work even when I/it started to flounder, simultaneously becoming my pillar of support, cheerleader, and my (favorite) “Ron Swanson.” Nancy, you pushed my work and thinking in profound ways, helping me to sense connections that I could never have on my own. Thank you for encouraging me to “play” and “experiment” with my data, and most of all, thank you for introducing me— all those years ago—to affect. You opened my world and this study. Irv, pescador de sueños, your insight and thoughtful reflections have greatly enriched and deepened this dissertation. Laura, your own scholarship impacted mine before I even met you. Thank you, dear committee; I am forever grateful. My family—FPM, cuchita, papito lindo, Lancito, Chris, Lucas, Beatriz, y Carlos—thank you for your support and encouragement along the way. A special outpouring of love and gratitude goes to my other half, mi cuchita linda, and FPM, who have been there through it at all. This work is also for you. Thank you for reminding me that life is much more than just a dissertation. You are my everything. And to FPM and iv Lancito, thank you for letting me crash your first six months of retirement so that I could work on this “thing.” Tran, you are the best friend and peer a woman could ask for. I love you and your “chubby tears.” Although I love you most when you’re grumpy or when it’s summer, my love and gratitude for you surpasses emotional states and seasons. What would I do without you? Quite frankly, I don’t know. My doctoral cohort—Alex, Cassandre, Cati, Deirdre, Elizabeth, Estrella, Eun (my heroine and Deleuze warrior!), Jenny, Karmela, Laura (the best arepa maker outside of Venezuela!), Lindsay (the ultimate cheerleader; “you got this!”), Mia, Patricia, Rebecca, Sharon, Sima, and Tran. The title of our Facebook Group Page created 7 years ago puts it best: “Girls Keep Girls Alive.” Truer words have never been written. To the professor who opened the doors of her program so that I could actually “do this.” I wish I could scream your name from the rooftops in gratitude. To the participants of this study: Ben, Beth, David, Harper, Kaiden, and William. Thank you for letting me tag along through your “ferocious” year. This study would not have been possible without you. To my C&T colleagues—Britt, Jodene, Detra, Indu, Katie L., Katie N., Kala, Celia, Molly, Sarah, Claudia, & Megan. Thank you for keeping this work relevant and engaged. To Noamie—For keeping me company during all those late nights; you kept me going with your puppy eyes. To Roy—Undoubtedly, the best “matter” that I encountered over the last 7 years. To the handful of people who will ever read this, let it me known that romantic love and v dissertations can co-exist. After my proposal defense, while taking a break to mentally regroup and finally(!) catch up on piles of overdue laundry, I met my chosen life partner in a laundromat. Thank you for your love, support, humor, ice cream sandwiches, and tea-making skills! I love you so. And to the many others that I have forgotten to thank and acknowledge, please know that any absence is the result of sleep deprivation. I value and appreciate you! E.E.C. vi TABLE OF CONTENTS Page I—INTRODUCTION ......................................................................................................... 1 Prologue .................................................................................................................. 1 Theory-Practice Gap in University-Based Teacher Education ............................... 4 Social Justice Teacher Education ................................................................ 7 Stuck Moments in Social Justice Teacher Education ............................................. 9 Statement of the Problem ...................................................................................... 10 Initial Theorizations .............................................................................................. 13 Purposes of Study and Research Questions .......................................................... 14 Rationale ............................................................................................................... 15 Rationale for Posthumanist Theories of Affect ........................................ 15 Rationale for University-Based Teacher Education ................................. 17 Rationale for Social Justice Teacher Education ........................................ 18 Theoretical Framework ......................................................................................... 19 Affective Turn ........................................................................................... 19 Affect theoryàaffect theories or theories of affect ...................... 20 Posthumanist Theories of Affect .............................................................. 22 Potential Significance of This Study ..................................................................... 24 Concluding Thoughts ............................................................................................ 26 II—REVIEW OF THE LITERATURE ............................................................................ 28 Literature Review .................................................................................................. 29 Contemporary SJTE .............................................................................................. 30 Stuck Moments in SJTE ....................................................................................... 31 Stuck Moments Converging in the Field .............................................................. 31 Stuck Moment Source #1: Theory-Practice Gap .....................................

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