Beyond Knowledge: Exploring Why Some Teachers Are More Thoughtfully Adaptive Than Others
By: Colleen M. Fairbanks, Gerald G. Duffy, Beverly S. Faircloth, Ye He, Barbara Levin, Jean Rohr, and
Catherine Stein
Fairbanks, C., Duffy, G. G., Faircloth, B., He, Y., Levin, B. B., Rohr, J., & Stein, C. (2010). Beyond
knowledge: Exploring why some teachers are more thoughtfully adaptive than others. Journal of Teacher
Education,61, January, 161-171.
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Abstract:
As teacher educators, we have observed that knowledge alone does not lead to the kinds of thoughtful teaching
we strive for. Puzzled by differences in the teaching practices of teacher candidates having similar professional
knowledge, we explore what might account for these differences. We address what is necessary, beyond
traditional forms of professional knowledge, to support the development of thoughtful teachers who are
responsive to students and situations. We provide four perspectives, each drawn from areas in which we
conduct our research, and suggest a need to move beyond knowledge in teacher education. Our aim is to explore
questions about preparing thoughtful teachers and to challenge others to do the same. We postulate that self-
knowledge and a sense of agency with the intent of purposefully negotiating personal and professional contexts
may be as important, if not more important, than the more traditional conceptions of professional knowledge.
Keywords: knowledge, thoughtfully adaptive teaching, beliefs, vision, belonging, identity
Article:
Teacher educators have long valued knowledge. They have written about what knowledge teachers need
(Carter, 1990; Grossman, 1995; Shulman, 1986; Wilson, Shulman, & Richert, 1987), debated the role of
knowledge in teaching (Hammerness, Darling-Hammond, & Bransford, 2005; Snow, Griffin, & Burns, 2005),
and questioned whether any ―particular bits of knowledge can necessarily help teachers simultaneously think
about all of their areas of concern‖ (Kennedy, 2006, p. 208). Currently, various state governments are imposing
more and more standards regarding what to include in course content, apparently on the assumption that good
teaching is a rational and conscious application of knowledge.
Yet our experience as teacher educators who strive to develop thoughtful teachers, that is, teachers who are
responsive to students and situations, suggests that knowledge typically addressed in our courses does not
necessarily suffice. Not all of our teacher candidates demonstrate thoughtful teaching. Some become technically
competent but not particularly responsive to students or situations, despite our best intentions and our belief that
it is such responsiveness that constitutes thoughtful teaching and lies at the center of teacher effectiveness.
Puzzled by the inconsistencies we observe in our teacher candidates and the role of knowledge in this outcome,
we engaged in a 3-year conversation in which we questioned whether, as teacher educators, we overlook
important aspects of teaching in our concern for ensuring that teacher candidates are equipped with required
content knowledge, pedagogical knowledge, and pedagogical content knowledge. If so, what is necessary
beyond knowledge? This conversation became a collegial, almost philosophical, inquiry aimed at improving the
experiences offered our teacher candidates. It was not intended as a study, rather as a collaborative exchange of
perspectives on teacher education. As it evolved, we began to examine how our individual perspectives,
theoretical or epistemological, and our various research agendas informed our understandings of teacher
education and helped us think more broadly about the ways we prepared new teachers.
Ultimately we focused on four perspectives that represent our individual research areas: belief-based personal
practical theories, vision, belonging, and identity. As we describe below, talking across and through these
perspectives led us to the hypothesis that teacher educators must develop teachers’ self-knowledge and sense of
agency in addition to developing standard forms of professional knowledge. But our suggestions are tentative,
and our goal is to challenge our teacher education colleagues to join us in exploring what, beyond knowledge,
might help us better prepare thoughtfully adaptive teachers.
Background
Excellent teaching is relatively rare because, as Shulman (2004) said,
After some 30 years of doing such work, I have concluded that classroom teaching . . . is perhaps the
most complex, most challenging, and most demanding, subtle, nuanced and frightening activity that our
species ever invented. (p. 504)
Teaching is demanding because teachers must deal with numerous forces. The situations they face are often
dilemma-ridden and inherently ambiguous. For example, Kennedy (2006) described teaching as
an endeavor that requires simultaneous consideration of six different areas of concern, that strives
toward ideals that are inherently contradictory, and that happens in real time where the merits of
alternative courses of action must be weighed in the moment. (p. 206)
Bransford, Darling-Hammond, and LePage (2005) compared the complexity of teaching to conducting an
orchestra. Like conducting,
Teaching looks simple from the perspective of students who see a person talking and listening, handing
out papers, and giving assignments. Invisible in both of these performances [conducting and teaching]
are the many kinds of knowledge, unseen plans, and backstage moves—the skunkworks, if you will—
that allow a teacher to purposefully move a group of students from one set of understandings and skills
to quite another over the space of many months. (p. 1)
Similarly, Ball and Cohen (1999) explained the complexity of teaching in terms of what they called ―the
particulars‖— that is, ―particular students interacting with particular ideas in particular circumstances‖ (p. 10).
In short, successful teachers must recognize that virtually every situation is different, must see multiple
perspectives and imagine multiple possibilities, and must apply professional knowledge differentially. Such
teachers have been described variously as ―thoughtfully adaptive‖ (Duffy, 2002), as having ―adaptive expertise‖
(Bransford et al., 2005), as displaying ―disciplined improvisation‖ (Sawyer, 2004), as possessing ―adaptive
metacognition‖ (Lin, Schwartz, & Hatano, 2005), or as demonstrating ―wise improvisation (Little et al., 2007).
Duffy (1997) called such teachers ―entrepreneurial‖ because they see knowledge ―as tools to be adapted, not as
panaceas to be adopted‖ (p. 363), whereas Sawyer (2004) described them as applying knowledge in ―a creative,
improvisational fashion‖ (p. 13).
However, developing these entrepreneurial and creative characteristics in our own teacher candidates has been
difficult. Even though we introduce students to similar professional knowledge of effective practice, learning
theory, instructional strategies, and the like, we see them putting their knowledge to work in sharply different
ways when we observe their teaching. Only some of our teachers adapt knowledge in response to students and
situations in ways consistent with our intent and principles of effective teaching (Ball & Cohen, 1999;
Bransford et al., 2005; Kennedy, 2006); many others implement knowledge about teaching in narrow, technical,
or rigid ways.
But the problem extends beyond our teacher candidates and is exacerbated by recent school reform efforts.
Narrow and rigid application of knowledge is increasingly encouraged by policy mandates such as Reading
First and No Child Left Behind that prescribe programs and practices with minimal teacher input or flexibility.
This trend is cited by Olsen and Sexton (2009), who noted that current policy forces teachers into a ―tightening
of educational procedures, outcomes and teaching models‖ (p. 25); whereas others similarly cite a growing
pattern of policies that restrict flexible and alternative thinking (Miller, Heafner, & Massey, 2003; Pressley,
Wharton-McDonald, Hampston, & Echevarria, 1998; Smith, 1991; Watanabe, 2008). Our conversation was thus
spurred by both our concerns about our own teacher candidates and by the frequently cited and broader trend to
impose restrictive instructional practices through policy man-dates. The outcomes of this collaborative
enterprise follow.
Four Perspectives on Why Some Teachers Are More Thoughtful Than Others
Our discussions revolved around four different epistemological or empirical traditions that reflected our
individual research interests. We do not claim to be inclusive; there may well be other potentially useful
perspectives. Instead, our intent was to examine what each perspective contributes to developing thoughtful
teachers, to share our tentative conclusions, and to stimulate others to extend this discussion by exploring from
their perspectives what, beyond knowledge, might help us better prepare thoughtfully adaptive teachers.
Perspective 1: Teachers’ Beliefs and Personal Practical Theories (PPTs)
Few would argue that the beliefs teachers hold influence their perceptions and judgments, which in turn affect
their behavior in the classroom, or that understanding the belief structures of teachers and teacher candidates is
essential to improving professional preparation and teaching practices (Pajares, 1992, p. 307).
Beliefs are closely related to the study of teacher knowledge, especially practical knowledge that guides teacher
behaviors (Verloop, Van Driel, & Meijer, 2001). According to Verloop et al. (2001), ―In the mind of the
teacher, components of knowledge, beliefs, conceptions, and intuitions are inextricably intertwined‖ (p. 446).
Pajares (1992) suggested that although teachers may conflate knowledge and beliefs, the distinction is that
beliefs are more personal, whereas knowledge is based on objective facts agreed upon by particular social
communities (Richardson, 1996, 2003). But much of what is considered professional knowledge could be
categorized as belief (Kagan, 1992). In fact, Pajares claimed that attitudes, values, perceptions, theories, and
images are just beliefs in disguise and that beliefs are developed through enculturation (including expo-sure to
family and cultural influences), social interactions during one’s formal education, and schooling that takes place
outside the home.
There are many different kinds of beliefs, including beliefs about knowledge (epistemology), about the
performance of teachers and their students (attributions, locus of control, motivation, test anxiety), about
perceptions of self (including one’s self-worth, self-concept, self-esteem, and sense of agency), and about
confidence in one’s performance (self-efficacy). As Pajares (1992) noted, attitudes, values, judgments, axioms,
opinions, guiding images, ideology, perceptions, conceptions, conceptual systems, dispositions, implicit
theories, explicit theories, personal theories, personal practical knowledge, and perspectives are all closely
related to beliefs.
Beliefs have long been studied as a crucial aspect of teacher knowledge and teacher decision making in the
class-room (e.g., Borko & Putnam, 1996; Calderhead & Robson, 1991; Chant, 2002; Chant, Heafner, &
Bennett, 2004; Clandinin, 1986; Kagan, 1992; Richardson & Placier, 2001). Llinares (2002) asserted that
teacher candidates’ knowledge and beliefs serve two roles: They are both the lens through which teachers view
learning and the focus of that learning, both the means and the ends. Beliefs, therefore, serve as a filter through
which teachers sift knowledge gained in teacher education (Llinares, 2002; Richardson 1996, 2003) but can also
be considered to be the goal of teacher preparation. It follows that teachers’ beliefs might cause some teachers
to be more thoughtful than others. For instance, teachers may be more likely to resist being responsive to
students, if they believe the curriculum is fixed, rigid, or not negotiable.
There are many ways to study beliefs including narrative, biography, life history methods, and metaphors. One
major way is a process called personal theorizing (Cornett, Yeotis, & Terwilliger, 1990), which purposefully
turns tacitly held beliefs into explicitly stated personal practical theories, or PPTs. Cornett (1990) defined PPTs
as a systematic set of beliefs (theories) that guide teachers’ actions. They are influenced by family background
and past K-12 experiences as students, as well as by teacher education program requirements (Levin & He,
2008), although there is also evidence of developmentally different perspectives among teacher candidates,
cooperating teachers, and teacher educators (He & Levin, 2008). Several studies indicate that PPTs guide
teachers’ pedagogical choices (Chant, 1999, 2002; Chant et al., 2004; Clandinin, 1986; Cornett et al., 1990;
Marland, 1998; Ritchie, 1999), so helping teacher candidates uncover, explicitly state, and study the ways they
enact their beliefs in practice may increase their self-knowledge and support their developing sense of agency.
Consider, for instance, the following comparison of two teachers. Teacher A and B may both enter their teacher
education program believing that assessment and evaluation are the same thing and that paper-and-pencil tests
are the main way teachers determine what students know. During their teacher education program, both Teacher
A and B are taught that teachers should use a variety of formative and summative assessments to determine
what their students are learning, that assessments should be used as a source for planning future lessons, and
that assessments can and should be embedded in authentic learning activities. Teacher A finds herself doing
field experiences in classrooms that use traditional quizzes and tests given only at the end of a unit of study and
does not find any encouragement for using formative assessments to check for understanding, for planning
future lessons, or for trying out performance-based assessments. However, Teacher B finds herself in
classrooms that use a variety of formative assessment practices; sees a number of different ways teachers can
check for understanding so they can make adjustments to their teaching plans; and also sees students being
given choices for completing different kinds of authentic, performance-based activities that are used for
evaluating their learning. During the personal theorizing process, Teacher A expresses her belief in the form of
a PPT that states, ―Evaluation is important for learning what students know and helping the teacher determine
who needs further teaching,‖ whereas Teacher B expresses her PPT as ―Careful planning for implementing a
variety of authentic and varied assessments, both informally and formally, is essential in adjusting the teaching
and learning process for children.‖
As these two examples illustrate, teacher candidates do not always enact their PPTs in ways that are consistent
with knowledge provided in their teacher education courses (Stein, 2008). Because a personal theorizing
process allows teachers to make their beliefs explicit and, therefore, avail-able for conscious examination and
action, PPTs may help us better understand why some teachers are more responsive to students and situations
whereas others are not.
Perspective 2: Vision
Vision is a teacher’s personal commitment to seek outcomes beyond the usual curricular requirements. Though
rooted in beliefs or theories about what teachers envisage for their students, vision is different from beliefs and
theories because it is a teacher’s personal commitment to inspire children in ways that tend to be more morally
than cognitively based.
The notion of vision is not new. It has deep philosophical roots in idealism and is often invoked outside
educational circles. In business, vision is often thought of as the image of a desired future state of an
organization or corporation. For instance, Collins and Porras (199 1), writing about successful companies,
described vision as a ―core identity‖ that consists of values and purpose; and business leaders such as Kouzes
and Posner (1999) cited vision as the source of direction. Vision is also embraced as a guide to direction and
decision making in Warren’s (2002) best-selling The Purpose Driven Life, which posits that to accomplish
anything you must first have a mission, a goal, a hope, a vision. Hence, vision is seen as a broadly applicable
ideal.
Like teacher beliefs, vision has a long history in education (see, for instance, Feiman-Nemser, 2001; Garrison,
1997; Highet, 1950; Lampert, 2001; Pullias & Young, 1968), and has recently become the subject of empirical
study (see, for instance, Duffy, 2005; Hammerness, 2006; Turner, 2007). However, different educators talk
about vision in slightly different ways. Hammerness (2006) thinks of vision as the teacher’s ―image of ideal
classroom practice‖—what the classroom environment will be, what her or his role will be, and so on; Shulman
and Shulman (2004) described it as images of particular learning activities that represent how the teacher will
teach; Kennedy (2006) similarly sees it as a strong sense of purpose, direction, and momentum, but associates it
with envisioning a lesson before enacting it; and Duffy (2005) sees it as the teacher’s ultimate goal for what her
or his students will become as adults.
Despite these differences, however, vision encompasses a common theme. All versions feature the teacher’s
personal self-understanding about a commitment to extended outcomes. This emphasis is reflected in Greene’s
(1991) description of ―personal reality,‖ in Rosaen and Schram’s (1998) description of ―the autonomous self,‖
in Corno’s (2004) description of vision as an ―internal guiding system,‖ and in the description of vision as a
―moral compass‖ (Duffy, 2005). In this sense, a vision makes teachers’ ultimate ideals conscious.
But how does having a vision explain why some teachers are thoughtfully adaptive and other teachers are less
so? The assumption is that commitment to a vision disposes teachers to do more than dispense standard
curricular content. That is, while engaged in teaching the ―visible‖ curriculum of reading, math, social studies,
science and so on, they also commit to inspiring students to become something special. They focus on particular
images of how to use the mind or on particular aspects of morality or on particular understandings, dispositions,
or values. For instance, one teacher may envision her students as becoming adults who promote the ethic of
caring, so when teaching the visible curriculum, she looks for ways to incorporate ethics and caring into her
daily instruction; another may envision students as becoming adults who use critical thinking to solve problems,
so she looks for opportunities to couch curricular learning in problems requiring critical thought; another might
envision a commitment to cultural understanding; another to community and collaboration; and so on. In short,
vision encourages a teacher to look for ways to imbue day-to-day teaching with activity reflective of a unique
contribution. It provides a plat-form from which teachers initiate adaptations such as ―teachable moments‖ and
may be the source of the persistence, perseverance, and agency that fuel teachers’ efforts to resist restrictive
policy mandates.
Consider, for instance, the following example of a first-grade teacher. Her vision—that is, her deeper reason for
teaching—was for her students to embrace a sense of fair play and equity in their interpersonal lives. When
beginning a guided reading lesson, her goal was simply to develop reading skill. But when her students looked
at the pictures of the main character and said it was a boy because the character had short hair and was dressed
in jeans, the teacher saw an opportunity to develop her vision for teaching. She had them read the first page,
where (as she knew they would) they discovered that the main character’s name was Jennifer. At this point, the
teacher spontaneously inserted a minilesson on the danger of stereotyping, offering varying examples until the
students demonstrated understanding of her goals and objectives. She could have settled for routine
implementation of guided reading. But her vision for how she wanted to touch the future through her students
drove her to look for opportunities that went beyond standard reading goals and objectives.
In sum, teachers with a vision may strive to be more thoughtfully adaptive because they have a driving personal
commitment to impart more than just what is required. In this sense, vision may take teachers beyond
knowledge, instilling in them a commitment to inspire students to be something more than just academically
competent. As Shulman (2004) suggested, visioning may be the ―missing construct‖ in identifying high-quality
teachers.
Perspective 3: Belonging
Personal theorizing and vision do not occur in a vacuum. The enactment of these personal and professional
perspectives takes place in physical, local spaces in the actual classrooms, schools, communities, and systems in
which teaching occurs. Therefore, as teachers attempt to implement the particularities of teaching and their
individual perspectives (i.e., their beliefs/PPTs and vision), they are influenced by situational value systems.
The engagement necessary for thoughtful teaching may be energized by a sense of connectedness or congruence