Investigating New Literacies Among Teacher Educators: A Multi-Institution Collaborative Self-Study

Abstract

This multi-institutional, collaborative self-study explores how teacher educators learn to embed new literacies (NL) in teacher education coursework. Utilizing collaborative self-study methodology, seven faculty engaged in a year-long collaborative study focused on the incorporation of NL in preservice teacher education courses, meeting regularly over the course of the year to share reflections, provide feedback to one another, and continually revise course and assignment designs related to NL. Data sources included recordings of collaborative planning meetings, written reflections, annotated teaching artifacts, notes and transcripts from partner and whole group recorded Zoom sessions and post-meeting reflections. The findings describe diversity in both conceptualizing and teaching NL, parallels between teacher educators’, preservice teachers’ and P-12 teachers’ challenges integrating NL into their teaching, and institutional barriers to collaborative study, curricular revision, and the use of new technologies. The authors discuss these findings in relation to the potential value of multi-institutional study groups and collaborative self-study as a methodology for helping support literacy teacher educators’ ongoing learning.