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Abstract:
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Teachers and children who were in schools on September 11 , 2001 harbor unique , personal , and accessible memories of the events that occurred that Tuesday morning . Educational research has attended to this (inter )national crisis in a multitude of ways , yet there exists a gap in the literature that attends to how today’s preservice teachers remember the crisis through the lens of citizenship . To add complexity , adolescents who were in classrooms on September 11 are now adults , and some are studying to be teachers . This dissertation study aims to highlight how preservice teachers remember 9 /11 , how they understand citizenship , and how they plan to teach about 9 /11 as an historical event to elementary students .
This study presents the findings of a qualitative instrumental case study of five elementary preservice teachers’ memories of September 11 , 2001 as experienced as adolescents in school . The author investigates how the preservice teachers’ memories intersect with understandings of citizenship , and how the young teachers plan to teach about 9 /11 in an elementary social studies setting . Preservice teachers in the study participated in two interviews and one think -aloud lesson planning session with the researcher .
Data analysis indicate the preservice teachers’ understandings of citizenship are still evolving , yet the crisis of 9 /11 further complicates—or interrupts—more critical notions of citizenship . The participants’ memories of 9 /11 are vivid and include reactions of their classmates and teachers . When participants were asked to create a lesson plan for elementary students , they felt overwhelmed by the amount of resources on the topic , and that they did not know enough about 9 /11 to teach about it effectively .
Findings suggest the singular understandings of citizenship held by participants are temporal and contextual . During a time of crisis—and specifically during and following 9 /11—citizens succumbed to more belligerent notions of citizenship , and later , their memories contribute to their still evolving teacher identities . Drawing from their own civic understandings and memories of 9 /11 , four of the five preservice teacher participants planned to use their lessons about 9 /11 to teach children how citizens come together in a time of crisis . One participant chose to design a week -long unit of instruction that allows students to examine the events of 9 /11 in more critical ways . Finally , the study raises questions about the drastic range of possibilities in teaching 9 /11 in elementary school , and exposes how teachers choose to include and exclude certain images , narratives , and accounts from the story . |