Preservice Health Teachers Perceptions of Teaching Health at a Juvenile Detention Center

Abstract

The main purpose of this study is to explore how the perceptions of preservice health education teachers’ change over the course of teaching health lessons to at-risk youth at a Juvenile Detention Center (JDC). Undergraduate preservice student teachers enrolled in a Health Education course during the time of this study were invited to take part in group interviews as well as complete surveys before, during, and after their experiences teaching and observing Health lessons at a JDC. Through coding and thematic analysis, themes were developed from participants' responses to the interview questions and surveys. The results showed that majority of them had negative perceptions of teaching students at a JDC prior to their experience. Throughout the experience, preservice teachers' perceptions were positively changed. This study found that preservice teachers had a negative perception of at-risk youth before they had ever had any experience working with that type of youth. After going through experiences with at-risk youth we found that preservice teachers had gained enthusiasm and a positive outlook towards them. Undergraduate courses for preservice Health education teachers should consider providing opportunities to teach at-risk or incarcerated youth as a field experience.