Towards a psychological anthropology in teacher education

Abstract

ABSTRACT This article aims to draw the outlines of a psychological anthropology programme in teacher education based on Wittgenstein’s philosophical approach to relationships between experience, consciousness and language. Conceptually, the challenge is to support the idea that a professional experience may be documented not only through the deliberate reasons pre-service teachers spontaneously link to actions, but also through sensations that are less verbally accessible, also named ‘perceptions’ in social psychology. An empirical illustration is used to show a potential reconciliation between a research program in cultural anthropology and the social psychology bases of teaching competency acquisition. From a methodological standpoint, we examine whether an analysis linking self-confrontation interviews and questionnaires provides an original insight into pre-service teachers’ training experiences. This path inserted into a transdisciplinary program provides alternatives to reconsider a cooperative training program implemented to foster the self-efficacy of pre-service teachers in physical education.