Unpacking power: The role of critical reflection in preschool internship

Abstract

This study examined the potential role of critical reflection as a tool to support pre-service early childhood teacher interns in understanding and questioning pedagogical choices witnessed in their preschool internships while developing their own socially responsible teaching capacity. This study contributes to the field of critical reflection in teacher education by emphasizing an analysis of power, using Patricia Hill Collins’ matrices of power to understand the complexities of systemic injustices and identify potential solutions. The authors conducted an analysis of students’ critical reflections, which were completed weekly during their quarter-long preschool internship. The authors found that a critical analytic lens, using power, created intentional space to pause and expand interpretations of unequal and inequitable dynamics within the students’ preschool internship experiences, and had the potential to impact their subsequent pedagogical decisions. These findings hold the possibility for teacher preparation programs to bolster students’ reflective praxis and seed justice-oriented possibilities in early childhood education.