Teachers' beliefs about learning

Abstract

This is a study of six elementary school teachers' personal constructs about learning. I used ethnographic methods to interview each teacher twice. The questions guiding this study are: How do these teachers believe learning happens? How clearly do they express these beliefs? And who are these teachers as learners themselves? My premise is that teachers must also be learners, and must be aware of their own learning if they are to help others learn. Besides being interested in whether or not these teachers were familiar with their beliefs, I was interested in their view of knowledge, whether constructivist (knowledge created by the learner) or objectivist (knowledge transmitted to the learner). I found that some teachers were more familiar with their beliefs about learning than others. This seemed to be related to the kinds of opportunities they had had for discussion and reflection: workshops and inservice sessions, or long-term training programs.