Rethinking Contradictions and Inconsistencies in Teachers’ Sensemaking and Actions

Abstract

Teacher education research, by and large, has been profoundly influenced by psychological interpretations of beliefs, particularly the assumption that teachers attempt to reconcile, rationalize, minimize, or avoid contradictions. Building on research across multiple disciplines, which demonstrates that people live harmoniously with contradictions in many situations, we argue that suppositions that people feel compelled to address contradictions have obscured the multitude of inconsistencies that teachers navigate without notice in their everyday lives. Through a multisited, in-depth analysis of a teacher across planning, teaching, debrief and interview contexts, we show that what appears to be contradictory from the perspective of researchers is not necessarily inconsistent for teachers. We explore the theoretical, methodological, and professional learning implications of this shift in interpreting teacher contradictions and inconsistencies.