Supporting Preservice Teachers' Reform-Based Practices: The Importance of Intellectual and Emotional Support in a Community

Background: Research has demonstrated that teacher candidates enact reform-based teaching practices more consistently while they are in their teacher education programs than they do after they graduate. Purpose: To understand why science teacher candidates' practices of attending to the substance of students' thinking diminish after they leave their one-year masters certification program. Research Design: Qualitative. Findings: While candidates were in the program, they were involved in a constant interplay between attending to the substance of students' thinking in their internship placements--enacting the central reform-based practice--and discussing their experiences in their science pedagogy courses. This interplay stabilized a framing of teaching as being primarily about student thinking and provided candidates with community support in making sense of students' ideas and reasoning. Moreover, in addition to intellectual support, the community also provided candidates with emotional support. Without community support, candidates became less stable in their practices of attending to the substance of students' thinking. Conclusion: This study draws attention to the importance of community support in promoting the enactment of reform-based teaching practices. (Contains 3 footnotes.)