Post Modern Image-Based Research: An Innovative Data Collection Method for Illuminating Preservice Teachers’ Developing Perceptions in Field-Based Courses

Abstract

As part of course requirements twenty -eight preservice teachers in a field- based content reading course create d a series of se lf-portraits that illustrated their concerns and perceptions about teaching content reading. They accompanied their drawings with dialogue. Analysis of the portraits indicates that arts-based techniques have the potential to provide insights about preservice teachers’ perceived realities and understandings that narrative data alone might not reveal. The preservice teachers experienced high levels of stress as they prepared to teach their first lesson and their anxieties continued pas t mid-semester. By the end of the course the majority developed confidence in their teaching abilities and they were able to list a wide-range of content reading strategies however, they overlooked the visual and communicative arts.