Making sense through dissonance during preservice teacher preparation

Abstract

Dissonance during teacher preparation is commonplace. Rather than presenting a roadblock, dissonance may be critical for preservice teachers' learning. This case study examines how to organize teacher education to embrace dissonance through deliberative dialogue. Findings suggest that scaffolding during dialogues created conditions where participants could engage with peers' perspectives, rethink assumptions, and deepen interpretive power for understanding students’ ideas. Dialogues encouraged persistence when dissonance threatened to prohibit further sense-making. By persisting, tensions became productive rather than prohibitive for sense-making. Findings have implications for the design of teacher preparation experiences and for theorizing about how beginning teachers learn across experiences.