Good Readers, Good Teachers?: Subject Matter Expertise as a Challenge in Learning to Teach

TLDR

The article examines the role of subject‑matter expertise in secondary teacher training and argues that teachers must also view their expertise as a learned skill to effectively model and share it. Using a case study of Mary, a subject‑matter expert in a college‑level teacher‑training program, the author shows that expertise alone does not translate into the ability to model or share it with students. The study finds that Mary’s failure to regard her expertise as learned renders it unavailable for teaching, and it calls on teacher educators to help prospective teachers recognize and convey their subject‑matter knowledge.

Abstract

In this article, Diane Holt-Reynolds critically examines the importance placed on subject matter expertise in the training of secondary school teachers. Recognizing that knowledge of subject matter has been a major concern in national calls for education reform, Holt-Reynolds explores the role that such knowledge plays in a prospective teacher's conceptualization of skillful and successful teaching. Through a case study of Mary, one subject matter expert enrolled in a college-level teacher training program, Holt-Reynolds demonstrates how, for this teacher, subject matter expertise does not translate into an understanding of how to model that expertise or share it with students. Providing extensive data to support her identification of Mary as an expert reader, she then shows how Mary fails to see her expertise as learned and suggests that this failure causes Mary's expertise to be "unavailable" for teaching literature as a subject. Drawing on her conclusions from this case study, Holt-Reynolds expands the definition of subject matter expertise to include an awareness of that expertise as learned. She ends with a clear challenge for teacher educators to help prospective teachers recognize their subject matter expertise and learn ways to share and model it with students.