Exploring the Facilitation of Critical Consciousness With Preservice Teachers

TLDR: Castro et al. as discussed by the authors explored and connected the key critical pedagogical teaching approaches that shaped the developing CC of preservice teacher participants, and found that these teacher educators were aware of the problem of abstract language and the potential of students being out of touch with critical pedagogogical theories and goals.

Abstract: esoteric, and out of touch with the conflicts and struggle that teachers, students, and activists act on” (p. 247). Although specific descriptions of teacher educator practices were not described by Apple (2000), he nonetheless warned that teacher educators who use critical pedagogy may unintentionally exclude students from adopting the critical pedagogical teaching approach due to the criticism stated above. Therefore, a critical question is, how does one know whether or not, and to what degree, the critically minded professors mentioned in the above studies, practised effective socially just pedagogy? Were these teacher educators aware of the problem of abstract language and the potential of students being “out of touch” with critical pedagogical theories and goals? Content (subject matter) and teaching methodology (the ways in which the subject is delivered) coalesce to construct a learning environment which will, in one way or another, affect the learning experiences of preservice teacher candidates. This study explored and connected the key critical pedagogical teaching approaches that shaped the developing CC of preservice teacher participants. While the overall historical patterns, shown in the meta-analysis by Castro (2010) suggest that preservice teacher candidates lacked the ability to frame diversity and equity in complex ways, recent studies have nuanced this theme. For example, the degree of preservice teacher candidates’ tolerance, acceptance, and prejudice toward diverse cultures and socially just pedagogies has shifted according to some of the studies reviewed (Castro, 2010). For example, Castro (2010) reports that the studies conducted between 2000 to 2007 indicated that millennial preservice teacher candidates showed a greater acceptance toward socially just oriented pedagogies and cultural diversity, and an