WHO AM I: sJ MILLER, Ph.D., ASSOCIATE PROFESSOR
JOB TITLE: URBAN TEACHER EDUCATION/SECONDARY ENGLISH AND LANGUAGE ARTS
WHERE I TEACH: UNIVERSITY OF MISSOURI, KANSAS CITY
OFFICE: Room 320, School of Education
EMAIL: sjmiller@umkc.edu
OFFICE PHONE: TBA
HOW TO CONTACT ME: Twitter, Facebook, Amazon
LIKES: My cats, working out, social justice, art-house films, reading, teaching, NPR, building intentional communities, love.
RESEARCH INTERESTS: I am interested in continuing to study how critical race theory, feminist theory, geospatial theory, spatiality and temporal theories, critical discourse analysis, and critical literacy, shape and construct schooled identities and marginalized literacies. These research interests are deeply fueled by a commitment to social justice.
JOB TITLE: URBAN TEACHER EDUCATION/SECONDARY ENGLISH AND LANGUAGE ARTS
WHERE I TEACH: UNIVERSITY OF MISSOURI, KANSAS CITY
OFFICE: Room 320, School of Education
EMAIL: sjmiller@umkc.edu
OFFICE PHONE: TBA
HOW TO CONTACT ME: Twitter, Facebook, Amazon
LIKES: My cats, working out, social justice, art-house films, reading, teaching, NPR, building intentional communities, love.
RESEARCH INTERESTS: I am interested in continuing to study how critical race theory, feminist theory, geospatial theory, spatiality and temporal theories, critical discourse analysis, and critical literacy, shape and construct schooled identities and marginalized literacies. These research interests are deeply fueled by a commitment to social justice.
My
Teaching Philosophy
My pedagogy is framed by a deep commitment to social change
and social justice through constructivism, social activism, and liberatory
teaching practices. These theories lay the foundation for my teaching practices
and praxis which are student-centered. I teach to enable preservice student
teachers to develop a beginning teaching pedagogy by interrogating how their
prior experiences shape their belief systems and how those belief systems shape
their teaching practices and goals. I encourage preservice teachers to make
meaning of how their belief systems have shaped their eventual teaching
identities. Together we interrogate and deconstruct how we have been shaped by
hegemony and the institutions in which we are embedded and discuss how we can
reconstruct ourselves away from institutionalized thinking and practice. We do
so by examining how our own prejudices, and if gone unchecked, can escalate
into detrimental teaching patterns and practices. I assist my student teachers
in creating socially and culturally relevant lesson plans that will meet the
needs of the diverse learners with whom they will engage.
Amazing News From President Obama
As Howard Zinn (2002) points out, educational practice is never neutral and the university is hardly benign in its various spheres of influence (e.g., the corporate, scientific, and military sectors of society) or its need to perpetuate business, governmental, and social practices, however corrupt or antidemocratic.
Be the change you want to see in the world.
-Gandhi
