ABSTRACT
School permeated my girlhood and adolescence, captivating my adoration and foreshadowing my future in teaching and teacher education. Like all children I knew, I spent a great deal of time in school and studied the usual core subjects; yet, my school experiences and significant lessons extended beyond the bounds of the school day and the formal curriculum. I was not only a student in school but also a student of school. Searching for a desirable identity as a student and a way of being in relationship with my teachers and the other adults at school, one of my favorite “subjects” in school was the teachers themselves. Most compelled by benevolent women with a fondness for books and rule-following girls with inquisitive imaginations, I analyzed my favorite teachers’ behaviors and dress. I emulated a ponytail using a barrette instead of an elastic band and adopted a particular style of penmanship for signing my own name. My curiosity about school and teachers affected my time spent outside of school too. In play, I enacted teaching personas with real and imaginary friends, interpreting versions of my own teachers, and I often relied on strict dichotomies: compassionate or mean, creatively informative or tediously boring. Further, young adult novels and television shows often offered me additional images of teachers. Among my favorites were Miss Edmunds, the unconventional and gentle music teacher in Katherine Patterson’s Bridge to Terabithia, and Laura Ingalls Wilder both in the Little House on the Prairie books and television series. They further fed my understanding of what, who, and how students and teachers could be.
