Personal History-Based Beliefs as Relevant Prior Knowledge in Course Work

This study explores the relationship between the personal history-based beliefs preservice teachers brought to their study of teaching and the principles of reading, writing, and discussing to learn that one professor advocated. This analysis represents an effort to look closely at how preservice teachers use the knowledge they bring with them from their lives as students to make decisions while engaged in course work about the value of ideas they hear there. This study documents (a) the lay theories and beliefs that participants had developed out of their personal history-based experiences, (b) the decisions that participants made about the potential value of the principles of good instruction encountered as part of their course work, and (c) the relationship between their personal history-based beliefs and those decisions as explained by each preservice teacher.