In spite of debate, ambiguity, and tension around teacher dispositions, in the past over two decades, the place of dispositions in initial teacher education (ITE) has been widely supported among ...policy makers and researchers.
Specifically, debate on whether dispositions are teachable has largely given way to action to foster dispositions. Adopting a two-cycle participatory action research design, this study explored ways to teach the first-year teacher
candidates' dispositions in an early childhood ITE programme in New Zealand. The intervention included eight focus dispositions and corresponding strategies to teach each focus disposition. Data collection methods included student self-
assessment surveys, individual and focus group interviews with students and teaching staff, team meetings, and a variety of pedagogical documentation. Ethnographic content analysis generated three themes: legitimacy of the intervention,
experiential orientation of the intervention, and effect of the intervention. The study exemplifies how dispositions intervention can be incorporated in ITE programmes. Author abstract
Preparing, recruiting, and retaining high-quality teachers into the profession has been a concern of policy makers and practitioners for some time. Teacher attrition is problematic and costly for ...schools and districts. However, relatively few studies have investigated the relationship between preservice teacher quality and teacher attrition. In this study, we analyze data from an apprenticeship-style teacher preparation program to understand the relationship between a measure of preservice teacher quality—student teachers’ observational scores—and their decisions to (a) enter into the profession, and (b) stay in the profession within the first 2 years after graduation. We find that more qualified student teachers are more likely to enter into the profession and stay in the profession, even after controlling for student teachers’ demographic characteristics and their academic achievement.
Understanding language teachers' mental lives (Walberg, 1972), and how these shape and are shaped by the activity of language teaching in diverse sociocultural contexts, has been at the forefront of ...the subdiscipline of applied linguistics that has become known as language teacher cognition. Although the collective research efforts within this domain have contributed critical insights into what language teachers know, believe, and think in relation to their work (cf. Borg, 2006), limited progress has been achieved in addressing some of the most pertinent questions asked by applied linguists, policy makers, and the general public alike: How do language teachers create meaningful learning environments for their students? How can teacher education and continuing professional development facilitate such learning in language teachers? By revisiting the domain's epistemological, conceptual, and ethical foundations, this special issue sets an agenda for reinvigorated inquiry into language teacher cognition that aims to redraw its current boundaries and thus reclaim its relevance to the wider domain of applied linguistics and to the real-world concerns of language teachers, language teacher educators, and language learners around the world.
A growing trend in primary schools in recent times has been to outsource Physical Education (PE) to external sport and activity providers. The impact of this has not yet been examined on new teachers ...entering the profession. Drawing upon Critical Theory, this paper aims to explore and understand pre-service teachers' (PSTs) school-based experience of learning and teaching in primary PE. A total of 625 PSTs took part in the study, representing a variety of routes into primary teaching. Quantitative data were obtained, identifying the number of lessons taught by PSTs, and their perceived confidence and willingness to teach. Qualitative data were also gathered to examine the contextual factors influencing PSTs' development. Findings showed that while PSTs were both willing and confident to teach primary PE, over a third were unable to do so. Reasons were predominantly attributed to curriculum outsourcing and perceived low subject priority in initial teacher education.
Despite the preparatory service as a second practical phase of teacher training, German secondary geography teachers often experience a reality shock at the beginning of their teaching careers. ...Teacher trainers, the teacher educators of the second phase, guide trainee teachers through their transition from university to school. This qualitative study provides beneficial insights on geography trainee teachers' school practice from an expert point of view. Twenty-three teacher trainers from twelve different German states were interviewed. The data material was analysed with Mayring's qualitative content analysis. It was found that trainee teachers' preconditions vary massively, especially in terms of geography didactical knowledge (PCK). However, their average PCK preconditions seem to have improved over the last years. The teacher trainers perceive several subject-specific difficulties in the beginners' lessons, e.g. didactic reduction or applying geography didactical theory. Furthermore, the empirical data reveals the experts' perspectives on competencies of excellent geography trainee teachers. A need for a greater focus on actual teaching in initial teacher training as well as discrepancies between the different phases of geography teacher education are addressed at the end of the article.
Mainstream teachers throughout the world are increasingly expected to differentiate instruction for primary-grade students with diverse learning needs, including second or English language learners ...(ELLs). Does teacher preparation translate into instructional practices for English language development? What do graduates of those programs do differently, if anything, for ELLs in their classrooms? This mixed-methods study examined the beliefs and practices of two focal teacher graduates of a teacher preparation program that included second language training. Findings show that teacher graduates working with ELLs in primary classrooms with low numbers of ELLs used some generic accommodation strategies and just-in-time scaffolding techniques, but they rarely instituted specific ELL practices to facilitate the English language development of ELLs. The authors discuss implications for second language educators.
Recent research highlights the importance of providing teacher candidates with opportunities to approximate practice. Less attention focuses on tools teacher educators use within and surrounding ...approximations to focus candidates’ attention on features of practice. This multi-case study investigates how three teacher educators use different approximations in ways that strategically reduce the complexity of learning to teach and scaffold the development of practice. Data indicate teacher educators capitalized on four tools that scaffolded and shaped approximations into spaces for co-constructing shared understandings of practice. These tools include: instructional activities, representations of practice, planning templates, and specified texts and instructional goals.
•Multi-case study of approximations in three ELA methods courses.•Approximations may serve as a space for developing shared practice.•Tools used by teacher educators serve as scaffolds for approximations.•Two new structures and routines for approximations are presented.
Este artigo apresenta uma análise das normativas brasileiras sobre formação docente publicadas no atual século – Resoluções n.1/2002 e n. 2/2002 (MEC/CNE, 2002a, 2002b), Resolução n.2/2015 (MEC/CNE, ...2015) e Resolução nº 2/2019, BNC-Formação (MEC/CNE, 2019b) – com foco nas presenças e nos sentidos das noções de “prática” e de “estágio” e na retomada, como objetos de memória (Amorim, 2009), das normativas federais brasileiras do século XX. Como fundamentação teórica, lança-se mão da Sociologia do discurso do Círculo de Bakhtin (Bakhtin, 2003, 2005, 2016; Volóchinov, 2017, 2019) e das reflexões sobre currículo, especialmente, no que diz respeito à formação docente (Andrade et al., 2004; Ayres & Selles, 2012; Tardif, 2000, 2002). Os resultados encontrados mostram o predomínio não apenas de uma disjunçãfo entre teoria e prática, mas também o silenciamento da docência e da escola nos documentos, embora haja alguns avanços pontuais, especialmente na Resolução n. 2/2015. A BNC-Formação, com seu caráter de um currículo nacional (Apple, 2014), demonstra uma tentativa de controle político da formação docente.
Classroom management (CM) is one of the core issues in student teachers' learning. In teacher education, however, CM often has a marginal place in the curriculum. This is striking, since most student ...teachers struggle with this competence, especially during their internship. This study investigated the intended CM internship curriculum. The intended curriculum for CM is mapped by analysing curricular documents (written curriculum), by interviewing teacher educators (ideal/preferred curriculum) and by comparing these findings to topics suggested by literature (theoretical curriculum). A variety of potential CM topics emerges from the literature, but limited and implicit attention for CM was found in the written curriculum. For the preferred curriculum, teacher educators recognised CM as essential, considering student teachers' relationship with pupils' as the core of CM. In addition, they stressed the practical side of CM: encouraging student teachers to get experience and expand their repertoire by teaching independently.
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