CHAPTER 2: THEORETICAL PERSPECTIVES ON LEARNING AND TEACHING
2.5 R EADING T EACHERS
2.5.2 Teachers’ knowledge relevant to teaching reading
In the discussion of teacher‘s beliefs about reading above, it was indicated that the distinction between knowledge and belief is complex and problematic. Pajares says that knowledge and beliefs are inextricably intertwined, but new phenomena are interpreted through beliefs, and beliefs have a ―filtering effect‖ on thought processes (1992, p. 325).
Teacher‘s knowledge has often been characterised by proxy measures such as number of degrees/diplomas/certificates completed (Phelps & Schilling, 2004), but the complex realities of education prove that tertiary education does not necessarily translate into improved instruction or achievement. Shulman (1986) argued that research into teacher‘s knowledge was a ―missing paradigm‖ and stimulated an influential field of research in this direction.
Shulman (1987) identified seven types of teacher knowledge: content knowledge; general pedagogical knowledge; curriculum knowledge; pedagogical content knowledge; knowledge of learners and their characteristics; knowledge of educational contexts; and knowledge of educational ends, purposes and values. Shulman did not examine the interactions between these categories of knowledge (Hashweh, 2005, p. 279).
Shulman focused on Pedagogical Content Knowledge (PCK) because it ―identifies the distinctive bodies of knowledge for teaching‖ (1987, p. 8). At the intersection of content (knowledge) and pedagogy, PCK is concerned with the transformation of content into forms that are pedagogically powerful (Shulman, 1987, p. 15). It ―represents the blending of content and pedagogy into an understanding of how particular topics, problems, or issues are organised, represented ... adapted... and represented for instruction ―(1987, p. 8). Teaching, according to Shulman is the transformation of content into pedagogical forms (1987, p. 15).
Thus, from a practical perspective, PCK would have the reading teacher asking questions such as: What makes learning to read difficult? What misconceptions do students bring to learning reading, and how does the teacher re-organise the understanding of the student?
The concept of PCK has been variously criticised for being too narrow. Segall suggests a broader conception of PCK, one in which the teacher simultaneously ―learn[s] how to make content instructional [and] examine[s] the instructional nature of content‖ (2004, p. 501).
McCaughtry (2005) also suggests a broader conception of PCK, including an understanding of how teachers connect their knowledge of students with their pedagogy and curriculum.
Hashweh proposes reconceptualisation of PCK as a collection of Teacher Pedagogical Constructions (TPCs) that ―preserves the planning and wisdom of practice that the teacher acquires when repeatedly teaching a certain topic‖ (2005, p. 290). Kansanen (2009, p. 34), comparing the German concept of Fachdidaktik (subject-matter didactics) with PCK, also finds PCK too narrow in that it does not include the central process of how a school subject is created by transforming disciplinary content into classroom subject matter.
Hashweh (2005) usefully expands on Shulman‘s ideas on PCK by identifying seven characteristics of PCK:
1. It represents personal, private knowledge, which only becomes public through the researcher capturing and presenting it.
2. It is a collection of smaller knowledge units (called Teacher Pedagogical Constuctions).
3. It develops through experience, mainly the experience of repeatedly planning lessons and is therefore a construction. It does not seem to develop through traditional pre- service teacher education programmes (2005, p. 279). Hashweh also argues that teachers holding constructivist beliefs develop richer PCK than behaviourist teachers (2005, p. 287).
4. It is influenced by the interaction of various knowledge and belief categories
5. It embodies components of both event-based (linked to cognitive schema) and story- based (more episodic and emotional) memories.
6. It is topic specific.
7. It is labelled in multiple interesting ways that connect it to other teacher knowledge and beliefs.
Writers from a critical perspective challenge Shulman‘s idea that pedagogy is something that happens in classrooms only. For example, Bernstein (Bernstein, 1996 p. 17) sees pedagogy as ―wider than the relationships that go on in schools‖, and emphasises that pedagogy can take place anywhere where cultural production and reproduction occurs. Secondly they challenge the idea that content and pedagogy can be separated. Giroux and Simon state that pedagogy ―organises a view of, and specifies particular versions of what knowledge is of most worth, in what direction we should desire, what it means to know something and how we might construct representations of ourselves, others, and the world‖ (Giroux & Simon, 1988, p. 12). Lusted (1986/1992, p. 85, quoted in Segall, 2004, p. 494) says, ―How one teaches is ... of central interest but, through the prism of pedagogy, it becomes inseparable from what is being taught and, crucially, how one learns,‖ in other words pedagogy is not just a method applied to content but it is one with content.
The fact that content has pedagogical dimensions (Segal, 2004, p. 501) means also that the texts which contain this content are themselves not devoid of pedagogy. When students engage with texts, for example when children learning to read engage with the texts supplied
by the school for this purpose, they learn about the subject matter of the text but also about particular kinds of discourse, and constitute and regulate consciousness of self (Bernstein, 1996, p. 84). Segall argues that ―representations of subject matter are pedagogical; they do not only tell students something about the world, they also position them to know of and be in the world in some ways rather than others‖ (Segall, 2004, p. 500). Thus a Foundation Phase teacher and the texts she uses in her teaching children to read, contribute to the kind of literate subject which learners become.
Not many studies have focused on identifying teacher content knowledge for teaching reading in schools. One example is Phelps and Schilling (2004) who found evidence that teachers of reading in the USA need knowledge about the structure of language and text as well knowledge about the reading process. It should be noted that perceptions relating to what teacher knowledge is needed are influenced by and related to the emphasis on high- stakes testing in US schools. The research supported the idea that teaching reading requires specialised knowledge of content (2004, p.43) and that knowledge of comprehension used in teaching is distinct from more common knowledge of reading (2004, p. 41). They identified the following as defining factors in content knowledge for teaching reading (clearly meaning teaching reading in English):
Knowledge of antonyms and prefixes;
Interpreting student reading to assess comprehension;
Interpreting reading error rate to determine appropriate test difficulty;
Interpreting student ideas about genre;
Teaching students to use the structure of a word to understand word meaning;
Knowledge of spelling regularity, phonemes and word frequency;
Interpreting student spelling to assess phoneme knowledge and difficulties with spelling patterns;
Interpreting student reading to assess why students misread particular words.
Spear-Swerling (2004) cites the work of several researchers who have found that developing teachers‘ knowledge base about word structure and phonemic awareness improves learners‘
phonemic awareness, reading and spelling. In addition, professional development initiatives which improve teacher‘s comprehension and content learning improves these skills in their students (Spear-Swerling, 2004, p. 551).
Reflection by teachers is an important tool for enhancing knowledge about pedagogy. Risko et al. found that a major finding of research in this field is that teachers need ―explicit guidance and focused instructional support to deepen reflective thinking‖ (2008, p. 266).