Student Teachers’ Thinking about Knowledge, Learning and Learners in India

Abstract

Prospective teachers enter classrooms that are not very different from those that they have attended as students. During their School Experience Programme (SEP), they often behave like their teachers did. The nature of the beliefs that students bring to teacher education needs to be explored to understand the direction that they may take once the student teachers are placed as regular teachers. The thinking and beliefs of preservice teachers should be a focus of dialogue in teacher education programmes. Teachers need to reflect on and evaluate their own thinking and beliefs and at times the metaphors they use in their classrooms. They need to begin to assess their own practice and to reflect upon how these influence their perceptions and decisions within their own classrooms. Keeping in view the 'text book culture' prevalent in India this paper explores and analyses the thinking of teachers about 'knowledge', 'learning' and 'learners' and its implications in the Indian scenario.