Majority Teachers’ Perceptions of Urban Adolescents and Their Abilities: Probes from Self-Reflection and Teacher Autobiographies

Abstract

This article presents a small scale, qualitative study of nine majority alternate-route teachers and the perceptions they hold about themselves as urban educators and their urban students’ academic abilities. Data for this study was collected through selfreflective, written interviews and meta-reflective responses to two published teacher autobiographies. Culture shock theory was used to understand the evolution of the participants’ perceptions through the responses they provided. The study’s findings revealed that the participants underwent positive changes in their perceptions of themselves as urban educators and of their urban students’ academic abilities. Implications highlight the value of using published teacher autobiographies in urban teacher education

Keywords

• alternate-route teachers, autobiography, in-service teachers, majority teachers, pre-service teachers, urban adolescents, teacher perception, teacher education