Date of Award
2025-05-18
Degree Name
PhD Education for Social Justice
Dissertation Committee
Maya Kalyanpur, PhD, Chair; James Fabionar, PhD, Member; Luz Casquejo Johnston, EdD, Member
Keywords
teacher education, Montessori, instructors, ABAR, mattering, racial literacy
Abstract
Prior to the racial reckoning of 2020, Montessori teacher education programs (MTEPs) have only narrowly focused on social justice education (Aronson et al., 2020; Bartolomè, 2004; Cook, 2015; Cross, 2005; D’Cruz, 2022; King, 1991). Although MTEPs began to respond differently post-reckoning, support for implementing practices like antibias antiracist (ABAR) instruction was often absent. This study sought to understand how the racial reckoning and efforts to include an ABAR lens impacted the teaching practices of instructors in MTEPs. While ABAR-related studies exist in general teacher education (Blanchard et al., 2018; Madkins & Nazar, 2022; Martinez-Alba, Herrera, & Hersi, 2022), few focus specifically on Montessori teacher education. The study explored how eight instructors in Montessori teacher education (1) made sense of adopting an ABAR perspective post-2020, (2) navigated tensions in implementing ABAR in lectures and assignments, and (3) approached ABAR-aligned lesson presentations. Data from interviews and journal entries provided rich insight into their motivations, victories, and challenges. Six instructors made significant strides in applying ABAR efforts, which required intentional investment, reflection, racial literacy, and cultivating a personal culture of mattering to disrupt whiteness, bias, and racism. Lived experience made full commitment more natural, while limited personal experience posed barriers. Nonetheless, all participants demonstrated the potential to deepen their commitment. Findings suggest that instructors new to ABAR need explicit training for awareness and implementation. This study (1) adds to the call for critical awareness in both mainstream and alternative teacher education, (2) highlights the value of racially diverse instructors, and (3) underscores self-awareness and critical consciousness as essential to ABAR teaching.
Document Type
Dissertation: Open Access
Department
Learning and Teaching
Digital USD Citation
Williams, Jasmine E., "Post Racial Reckoning: Montessori Instructors' Perspectives on Teaching Through An Antibias Antiracist Lens" (2025). Dissertations. 1061.
https://digital.sandiego.edu/dissertations/1061
Copyright
Copyright held by the author
Creative Commons License
This work is licensed under a CC BY-ND License.
