Transformative Learning in Teacher Education: Building Competencies and Changing Dispositions

Acquiring a repertoire of competencies for creating and maintaining successful parent partnerships is an exceedingly important yet difficult task for pre-service educators. This mixed-methods study compared non-traditional and traditional approaches to transforming undergraduate student dispositions and competencies toward parent/professional partnerships. Results suggest that embedding parents of children with disabilities in the classroom, together with the use of activities that promote regular discourse, reflection, relationship building with professionally-relevant partners, transformed student dispositions toward parent/professional partnerships and increased student competence. Implications for teacher education programs are discussed.