27BP.

Curriculum Inquiry
March 2008 - Vol. 38 Issue 2 Page 119-226
Section: 1

Title: Listening to Students, Negotiating Beliefs: Preparing Teachers for Urban Classrooms

Source: Curriculum Inquiry, Vol. 38 Issue 2, pages 155–187, March 2008.

Authors:
Katherine Schultz Kathys@gse.upenn.edu
Cheryl E. Jones-Walker
Anita P. Chikkatur

University of Pennsylvania Graduate School of Education

Philadelphia, PA, USA

Keywords
Listening
Beliefs
Urban Classrooms
Ethnic backgrounds
Class backgrounds
Ethnographic study

‫תמצית‬

In this article, we report on a 2-year ethnographic study designed to investigate how new
teachers enacted a listening stance in teaching that was introduced in their preparation
program. Taking a listening stance implies entering a classroom with questions as well as
answers, knowledge as well as a clear sense of the limitations of that knowledge (e.g.,
Cochran-Smith & Lytle, 1999; Lytle & Cochran-Smith, 1992; Schultz, 2003).

‫מאמר‬

Source: Curriculum Inquiry, Vol. 38 Issue 2, pages 155–187, March 2008.

Learning to teach in urban schools is difficult, particularly when prospective teachers come
from different racial, ethnic and/or class backgrounds than their students. The task of urban-
focused teacher education programs is to prepare prospective teachers to learn and enact
practices that enable them to teach successfully in under-resourced districts that offer both
opportunities and constraints.

In this article, we report on a 2-year ethnographic study designed to investigate how new
teachers enacted a listening stance in teaching that was introduced in their preparation
program. Taking a listening stance implies entering a classroom with questions as well as
answers, knowledge as well as a clear sense of the limitations of that knowledge (e.g.,
Cochran-Smith & Lytle, 1999; Lytle & Cochran-Smith, 1992; Schultz, 2003).

The article focuses on how four teachers attempted to adopt a listening stance in their
classroom practice, while also responding to the constraints of the standardized curriculum of
their district. We conclude that the process of negotiating among teachers’ beliefs, practices
introduced in a teacher preparation program and district mandates is a critical practice for
teachers to learn. We further suggest that in the current climate of high-stakes testing and
mandated curriculum, explicit teaching of negotiation skills is likely to support more teachers
to enter into and remain in classrooms.
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Section: 2

Title: Male Teachers as Role Models: Addressing Issues of Masculinity, Pedagogy and the
Re-Masculinization of Schooling
Source: Curriculum Inquiry, Vol. 38 Issue 2, pages 189–223, March 2008.

Author:
Wayne John Martino
The University of Western Ontario
London, Ontario, Canada

Keywords
Canada
Male Teachers
Role Models
Masculinity
Pedagogy
Re-Masculinization

‫תמצית‬

This article focuses on the call for more male teachers as role models in elementary schools
and treats it as a manifestation of "recuperative masculinity politics" (Lingard & Douglas,
1999). Attention is drawn to the problematic gap between neo-liberal educational policy–
related discussions about male teacher shortage in elementary schools and research-based
literature which provides a more nuanced analysis of the impact of gender relations on male
teachers' lives and developing professional identities.

‫מאמר‬

Source: Curriculum Inquiry, Vol. 38 Issue 2, pages 189–223, March 2008.

This article focuses on the call for more male teachers as role models in elementary schools
and treats it as a manifestation of "recuperative masculinity politics" (Lingard & Douglas,
1999). Attention is drawn to the problematic gap between neo-liberal educational policy–
related discussions about male teacher shortage in elementary schools and research-based
literature which provides a more nuanced analysis of the impact of gender relations on male
teachers' lives and developing professional identities.

In this sense, the article achieves three objectives: (1) it provides a context and historical
overview of the emergence and re-emergence of the male role model rhetoric as a necessary
basis for understanding the politics of "doing women's work" and the anxieties about the
status of masculinity that this incites for male elementary school teachers; (2) it contributes to
existing literature which traces the manifestation of these anxieties in current concerns
expressed in the popular media about the dearth of male teachers; (3) it provides a focus on
research-based literature to highlight the political significance of denying knowledge about the
role that homophobia, compulsory heterosexuality and hegemonic masculinity play in "doing
women's work."

Thus the article provides a much-needed interrogation of the failure of educational policy and
policy-related discourse to address the significance of male teachers "doing women's work"
through employing an analytic framework that refutes discourses about the supposed
detrimental influences of the feminization of elementary schooling.