Abstract
This comparative case study explored pre-service teachers' (PSTs) understandings and concerns around creating inclusive classrooms before and after engaging in explicit instruction and practice surrounding issues of inclusion in elementary social studies methods. Findings illustrate that PSTs understood inclusion as an expansive concept, encapsulating various social identities, before and after explicit instruction. Engaging in a lesson planning project involving children's literature and a deep dive into anti-bias and inclusion literature helped to lessen concerns held by PSTs about creating inclusive classrooms but amplified other concerns, such as how to manage parental pushback and how to support students of marginalized backgrounds. This chapter addresses implications for elementary social studies teacher educators, such as the need to provide explicit practice and guidance when emphasizing the need for inclusive classroom communities, and the authors suggest ways PSTs' concerns could be lessened through interviews with parents and panel discussions with inclusive educators.
TopBackground
This study is informed by calls for social justice-oriented and inclusive approaches to elementary social studies teacher education (Alarcón, 2016; Alarcón & Bellows, 2018; Buchanan, 2016; Busey & Vickery, 2018; Hawkman, 2018; King & Chandler, 2016; Martell, 2017; Rodríguez, 2018; Saylor, 2018; Sibbett & Au, 2018; Ukpokodu, 2003; Ward, 2018). These calls in the field of social studies are buttressed by similar calls in the field of children’s literature and literacy education (Adam, 2021; Crisp et al., 2020; Colabucci & Napoli, 2017; Enriquez, 2014; Möller, 2012). The use of Picower’s (2012) six elements of social justice curriculum design is one way we as teacher educators have identified that we can bring social justice into elementary social studies teacher education courses. Picower’s framework, combined with the principles of anti-bias education, form the basis of the conceptual framework guiding not only this study, but our methods course designs. We detail this approach below, closing with our understanding of how and why social justice and anti-bias education through children’s literature is critical in the social studies.
Key Terms in this Chapter
Social Justice: Equitable distribution of wealth, opportunity, and treatment in society.
Inclusive Classrooms: Classrooms that include, represent, and affirm all identities and abilities.
Positionality: The social and political context that shapes one’s views of the world around them based on their lived experience.
Inclusion: The act of including all identities and abilities in classroom instruction and curriculum.
Multicultural Democracy: A democracy in which a diverse number of backgrounds, identities, and racial and religious groups co-exist.
Anti-Bias Education: A type of education in which young children learn to eliminate bias and prejudice and develop respect for people from a wide array of backgrounds and identities.