| In recent years the use of cases as a pedagogical tool in teacher education has become popular. However, one basic question that has not been addressed empirically is whether discussion is a crucial variable in teachers' learning from cases. This study investigated what teachers understood from just reading and writing about a case, compared to what they thought when also discussing it. This study also looked at how teachers' thinking about cases was influenced by their level of experience. The quality, form, and content of the thinking of 8 student teachers, 8 beginning teachers, and 8 experienced teachers were examined by having teachers read a case about teaching writing in the 4th grade and write an analysis of it. Then half of the teachers from each experience group participated in a discussion of the case, and half had no discussion. All participants subsequently wrote a second analysis of the same case. They also wrote about another case with similar content four weeks later. All writing was analyzed using a holistic scoring rubric devised to reflect the quality, completeness, and elaboration of participants' analyses of the cases. Quantitative analysis of the original writing showed that experienced teachers scored higher than both beginning and student teachers. On the second writing the average score of the experimental (discussion) group was higher than that of control group (no discussion). On the third writing the experienced teachers scored higher than the less experienced teachers, but there was no difference between the experimental and control groups. Qualitative analyses of each participant's writing, and a discourse analysis of the case discussion, yielded data that showed how and what teachers with different levels of experience thought about these cases, and how the discussion affected their thinking. Less experienced teachers showed thinking that was declarative, critical, and less explicit or complex. More experienced teachers displayed metacognitive thinking and understandings that were elaborated, conditional, and contextualized. The work of both Piaget and Vygotsky provide the theoretical basis for interpreting how discussion affected teachers' thinking about cases. Implications for the use of cases for teacher education are discussed. |
