Habitus Patterns of Teachers and Habitus Sensitivity as a Cross-Cutting Task of Inclusive Teacher Education

Abstract

Educational opportunities and success in Germany are still strongly dependent on social background. School performance studies and education reports show time and again that despite educational efforts and reforms, it has not yet been possible to compensate for socially unequal educational opportunities. For teacher training, therefore, the central question is how origin-specific disadvantages can be more strongly compensated for in everyday school life. In the inclusive school system, dealing competently with heterogeneity is becoming increasingly important. Within the framework of the “Qualitätsoffensive Lehrkräftebildung” at the Leibniz University Hannover, it was therefore investigated how the different starting points and needs of the learners can be better taken into account. With the aim of concretizing heterogeneity-sensitive teacher training in a concept called Reflexive Handlungsfähigkeit (reflective disposition for teacher performance), significant diversity dimensions were identified and elaborated. Among them is the diversity dimension “habitus/milieu”, which is presented in this paper. In particular, the article follows up on work on the habitus of teachers that has emerged in the context of habitus and milieu research. After an explanation of the theoretical concepts, it is illustrated how the professional pedagogical practice of (prospective) teachers is interwoven with their milieu-specific habitus and how teachers can thereby (usually unconsciously and unintentionally) contribute to the reproduction of unequal educational opportunities. Subsequently, goals for teacher education are derived. The focus here is on the reflection of biographically acquired habitus patterns by (prospective) teachers, which has been increasingly discussed in recent years under the term “habitus sensitivity”.