Chapter 16: Mining the Fields of Teacher Education: Preparing Teachers to Teach African American Children in Urban Schools

For many years there has been a continuous battle against illiteracy being fought in the United States. Researchers and other educators have attempted to eradicate illiteracy, especially among school-age children. Despite their attempts, many African American children continue to struggle in their academic subjects in classrooms all across this country. Innovative programs providing early intervention, such as Head Start, have improved the educational experiences of some African American students, but others remain “at risk” in their poor, urban schools. Some of their teachers, who are usually White, middle-class females, develop creative methods to reach and teach their African American students; but many are unprepared to effectively negotiate the multiple tasks and roles of teachers who teach students culturally different from themselves. Oftentimes when seeking answers to educational problems, we look to examples of best practices to provide insight concerning tested and tried methods of approach. These examples are unique instances of victories, when everything seems to work for the best. In this chapter, the authors have chosen to take a more realistic approach by presenting an example of an urban school where the problems and complexities became overwhelming, and resulted in teacher frustration and resistance to the changes suggested by a research team that attempted to provide assistance.