Incorporating Research into Preservice Teacher Education

Few teachers keep up with educational research and make use of research findings in their daily work. Also the number of teacher educators actively engaged in research is limited. This paper describes how preservice teachers can be introduced to educational research by carrying out ‘minisearch’ projects under guidance as part of their methods classes. Examples of topics which lend themselves to this kind of research include identifying pupils’ alternative conceptions and ‘shadowing’. Such research projects are regarded by most preservice teachers as interesting and very useful, and teaching staff are able to pool together the findings of their student teachers to form a publishable article. Research data collected in this way can provide significant information, yet can be obtained relatively simply at low cost. Further research is needed to find out the impact of involvement in research within preservice education on the use of research by practising teachers.     

Cultural Memory Banking in Preservice Science Teacher Education

This study focused on the exemplification of cultural memory banking as an ethnographic tool to understand cultural practices relevant to science teaching and learning in a rural coastal village in a central island of the Philippine archipelago. Using the collaborative action ethnography as a research methodology, 10 prospective science teachers and a science teacher educator/doctoral candidate formed a research team and documented community funds of knowledge relevant to science teaching and learning through their participation in a Community Immersion course. The study employed the use of the cultural memory banking as a meditational tool to analyze, make sense of, and represent interview, focus-group discussion, and observation data, among others, for the development of culturally relevant science lessons. Originally used as an anthropological tool to preserve cultural knowledge associated with the cultivation of indigenous plant varieties, the cultural memory banking, as adapted in science education, was used, both as a data collection and analytic tool, to locate relevant science at the intersection of community life. The research team developed a cultural memory bank exemplar, ??Ginamos: The Stinky Smell that Sells,?? to highlight the learning experiences and meaning-making process of those involved in its development. Dilemmas and insights on the development and use of cultural memory banking were discussed with respect to issues of knowledge mining and mainstreaming of indigenous/local funds of knowledge, troubling the privileged position of Western-inspired nature of science.     

Conceptualising Art Education as Environmental Activism in Preservice Teacher Education

This article explores how art and design education can contribute to the imperative of climate change and help societies adapt to living more sustainably. Drawing on methods from arts‐based research and qualitative case study, it reports on an investigation into what can be learned from creating environmental art installations with preservice teachers (those training to be K‐12 teachers), as part of an environmental art education programme in a leading Canadian university. Findings support that preservice teachers experienced behavioural and attitudinal shifts towards sustainability after engaging in the processes of creating environmental art; involvement in the programme also provided opportunities for building community, engaging multiple domains of learning, modelling sustainable art‐making practices and prompting environmental activism. The results of this study inform a developing pedagogy for environmental art education in higher education settings.     

Making Research Relevant in Preservice Early Childhood Teacher Education

Increasingly, researchers, teacher educators and governmental agencies underline the need for early childhood professionals to be able to conduct and use relevant research in their practice. In contrast, early childhood teachers tend to draw exclusively on practical advice rather than research evidence to evaluate and develop their teaching. To address these contradictions in expectations, recently developed preservice early childhood teacher education programs have included a core research subject that aims to foster an appreciation of the value of research and its contributions to professional practice. This study examines the effectiveness of teaching and learning approaches designed to make research relevant to undergraduates at an Australian regional university by tracking students' changing views about research during a one-semester teaching period. The findings of this study show that relevant learning experiences, such as designing and conducting a simple research project, modeling research, collaborative inquiry, focused reading, and organizing a research conference, significantly changed student perceptions of the relevance of research to their teaching and their future role as early childhood professionals.     

Investigating Preservice STEM Teacher Conceptions of STEM Education

Surrounding the national emphasis on improving STEM education, effective STEM educators are required. Connected, yet often overlooked, is the need for effective preservice STEM teaching instruction for incoming educators. At a basic level, preservice STEM teacher education should include STEM content, pedagogy, and conceptualization. However, the literature suggests no leading conception of STEM education, and little is known about how preservice STEM teachers are conceptualizing STEM education. In order to explore preservice STEM teacher conceptions of STEM education, preservice teachers at a large, Midwestern research university were given an open-ended survey eliciting both textual and visual responses. Here, we report and discuss the results of employing this instrument in relation with the current STEM conceptualization literature.     

培养实践智慧的教师职前实践教学——以加拿大卡尔加里大学为例

传统的教师职前实践教学具有"理论之应用"取向。20世纪80年代以来国际范围内的教师职前实践教学改革推行"实践中之理论"取向。在新的取向之下,教师职前实践教学得到重新的规划与组织,呈现出一些不同于传统实践教学的基本要素,主要表现为:以培养实践智慧作为教师职前实践教学的目标,并以探究现场经验作为教师职前实践教学的核心。本文以加拿大卡尔加里大学的教师职前实践教学为例对此加以说明。     

芬兰加拿大两国职前教师教育:比较与启示

作为经合组织成员国的芬兰和加拿大两国的中小学学生在PISA测试中连续取得骄人的成绩而引起国际社会的广泛关注,也引起了研究者对两国的职前教师教育的研究兴趣。芬兰和加拿大虽位居两大洲,但其职前教师教育的一些举措却有着惊人的相似之处。两国的职前教师教育均有着严格的师范生选拔程序、合理的教师教育课程体系和全面的教学实习等措施,从而保证了职前教师教育的质量。比较两国的教师教育举措,揭示其规律,可以给中国的教师教育以一定的启示和借鉴。     

全程教师教育构想——教师职前、在职教育一体化

在对在职教师进行教学、教研困难以及接受继续教育愿望以及现行教师教育体制进行的调查研究的基础上 ,笔者构建了全程教师教育体制的基本框架。全程教师教育是指师范院校、成人教育学院、继续教育学院和各级各类教研部门分工协作 ,按照教师成长规律 ,实施教师职前培养和在职培训 ,以促成其综合素质在整个教育教学生涯中实现阶段性突破并得以持续发展。全程教师教育包括准教师、新教师、合格教师、优秀教师四个阶段     

“教师学习”研究的发展及其对职前教师教育的启示

20世纪70年代以来,人们对教师学习、教师专业发展、教师在教育改革中的角色的理解有了很大的转变。教师学习与职前教师教育密不可分,是教师个人专业成长的过程。近年来,有学者对国际上有关教师学习的研究领域的相关重要概念进行了梳理和分析,并探讨了其对职前教师教育课程的设计与实施的启示,他们的研究既能丰富教师教育中的实践元素,也能适时地补充当前我国教师教育课程改革的理论空隙。     

Advocating for Young Children: A Preservice Teacher Education Project

As experts on the nature and needs of young children, early childhood educators are in prime positions to advocate for the health and well-being of young children. Advocacy can take the form of personal, public, or private-sector endeavors. Personal advocacy is usually informal and involves educating others on an issue about early childhood education. Similarly, public advocacy involves educating policy makers, and private-sector advocacy is directed toward businesses. The project described here is a course assignment for undergraduate teacher candidates in which they learn about advocacy strategies and design and implement authentic advocacy projects. Sample projects are discussed. Engaging in this project has raised awareness for teacher candidates about the importance of and strategies for being advocates. The response from early childhood teacher candidates has been positive.     

Environmental Education in the United States: A Survey of Preservice Teacher Education Programs

Abstract

The status of the environmental education component of preservice teacher education programs is unknown nationally. This study surveyed 715 institutions of teacher education using a mail questionnaire. The response rate was approximately 63%. The results indicate that most schools have few requirements related to environmental education, and in the majority of schools environmental education is not institutionalized.     

Developing an Integrated Play-Based Pedagogy in Preservice Teacher Education: A self-study

This paper reports a self-study of developing an integrated play-based pedagogy in a preservice early childhood teacher education subject about play. It is framed by understandings of play in children's lives and adult learning. The self-study was initially driven by a contradiction between teaching preservice teachers about play through didactic means and learning about play through play. Other tensions subsequently arose in this self-study and required me to reframe my thoughts and actions so I could move forward. This paper documents the tensions and reframings as the self-study proceeded over the course of a semester. It reveals that developing an integrated play-based pedagogy not only involves play-based activities per se but also the atmosphere in which experiences and interactions unfold and the play qualities they embody. Ideally, students become major players in the process of the development of pedagogy.     

Preservice Teachers' Beliefs About Family Involvement: Implications for Teacher Education

Teacher educators have long recognized the importance of adequately preparing preservice teachers for their work with families. Preservice teachers express many concerns that they believe may impact the development of comfortable and collaborative relationships with members of children's families. In a previous study, the authors found that preservice teachers expressed concerns about the quality of the teacher–family relationship, meeting children's basic needs in school, and the role of parents in education. These concerns, along with some recommendations for incorporating family involvement across the teacher education curriculum, are the focus of this article.     

A Review of the Literature on Implications of Teacher Thinking Research for Preservice Teacher Education

Research on teacher thinking has been under way now for well over a decade. Implications of this research for the education of preservice teachers have been considered by a small but growing number of writers. This material appears to have received only scant attention in the literature on reform in teacher education, even though it bears directly on the contemporary search for more effective ways of preparing teachers to be reflective professionals rather than mere technicians. The paper begins with a brief discussion of the nature of teacher thinking research and its conceptual underpinnings. The rest of the paper considers implications and reform in teacher education.     

Making Ends Meet: Bringing Bilingual Education and Mainstream Students Together in Preservice Teacher Education

In some institutions offering certification for bilingual education and ESL teachers, the corresponding mainstream programs do little to ready their students to work effectively with language minority children. Yet today's mainstream classrooms are linguistically and culturally diverse, and all teachers must appreciate the role of language and culture in teaching and learning. This study describes one effort to consciously combine preservice bilingual and mainstream education teachers in a bilingual education methods cohort. Students reported promising gains in cross-cultural understanding and in cross-program appreciation. Some losses took place as well, however, and further innovation and research are needed in order to ensure that such efforts to combine programs strengthen, but not weaken, each program.     

Parent Teacher Education Connection: Preparing Preservice Teachers for Family Engagement

This article describes the Parent Teacher Education Curriculum, a Web-based curriculum focused on instructing teachers about best practices in family involvement and assesses its impact on the knowledge and attitudes of preservice teachers related to family involvement. Pre- and post-measures of preservice teacher candidate knowledge of and attitude toward parent involvement were analyzed using multivariate analysis of variance (MANOVA) and paired-samples t-tests. Findings revealed a significant multivariate main effect for the time of knowledge assessment administration (pre vs. post): Wilks' λ = .613, F(6, 449) = 47.308, p < .001, partial eta squared = .387. This suggested that overall Knowledge increased significantly from pre- to post-administration. In addition, multivariate analysis for the time of attitude assessment administration (pre vs. post) was Wilks' λ = .982, F(3, 1548) = 9.65, p <. 001, partial eta squared = .018. This suggested that overall Attitude increased significantly from pre- to post-administration.     

Assessment360: A Promising Assessment Technique for Preservice Teacher Education

The call for preservice teachers to exercise reflective practices has echoed through U.S. education policy and research for a number of years and is evident in U.S. preservice teaching standards. As a result, educator preparation programs are challenged to design learning experiences and assessments that foster reflection skills. This study describes a promising assessment technique, named Assessment360, which can be implemented during coursework to prepare future teachers to be reflective practitioners. Assessment360 is a formative assessment technique in which students reflect on the content of a quiz individually and collaboratively in order to develop a deeper and more integrated understanding of the material. Thirty-one preservice education students enrolled in an undergraduate educational psychology course participated in this research. Results of the questionnaire suggested participation in Assessment360 potentially (a) fostered reflection, (b) encouraged peer interaction and learning (i.e., collaboration), and (c) promoted timely and frequent feedback. Implications and significance are discussed.