Collaboration and Connectedness in Two Teacher Educators' Shared Self-Study

In this self-study we examine our collaborative practice across two undergraduate early childhood education methods courses. Framed by our larger question of how teachers and teacher educators do school, we drew on multiple data sources to investigate how we were modeling teaching, listening, and learning to and with these students in our science and literacy courses. Through our analysis, we identified three categories of connectedness that define our collaborative approach: (1) collaboration as intellectual connectedness, (2) community as emotional connectedness, and (3) integrated disciplines as pedagogical connectedness. In this paper we address these areas of connectedness across disciplines and model our approach using reconstructed dialogue and analysis of our collaborative process to illustrate our actual practice. Through our discussion and joint narrative we hope to highlight the value inherent in small moments of communication.