The Difficulty of Teacher Dispositions: Considering Professional Dispositions for Preservice English Teachers

This article explores the place of teacher dispositions in English teacher preparation by contextualizing the issue of dispositions in English teacher preparation. This allows consideration for the importance of developing professional dispositions during English teacher preparation by recognizing that various stakeholders (teacher educators, university supervisors, mentor teachers, and preservice teachers) in teacher education often understand dispositions differently. The authors reflect and offer suggestions on how professional dispositions might be more effectively addressed in an English teacher education program through richer interactions among all stakeholders.     

Professional judgment and dispositions in teacher education

The word “dispositions” has suddenly emerged in the lexicon of teacher educators in the United States of America, and around the globe as found in publications such as The International Journal of Diversity in Organizations, Communities and Nations and the Journal of the International Society for Teacher Education. However, it is clear from the literature that educators are just beginning to grapple with the definitional and philosophical aspects of the construct. This work seeks to assist the field of teacher education, both in the United States and internationally in gaining a better understanding of “dispositions,” and, at the same time to offer working connections between professional judgment and dispositions, and provide grounding for the construct as “habits of mind” that render professional conduct more intelligent.     

Dispositions as goals for teacher education

It is proposed that professional dispositions be added to professional knowledge and skills as goals for teacher education programs. Dispositions, which are defined as summaries of act frequencies or trends in behavior, are contrasted with habits, skills, attitudes, and traits. Professional dispositions are treated as “habits of mind” that give rise to the employment of skills and are ideally manifested by skillful behavior. Justifications for including dispositions in the goals of teacher education are also proposed.     

Preservice Special Education Teachers' Reflections on Their Developing Professional Awareness Via In-Context Learning

The highly complex demands of the profession often overwhelm new teachers. Burnout and attrition are known consequences of inadequate preparation, burdening the education system with costly turnover and schools with disproportionate numbers of inexperienced teachers, including special educators. Many teacher preparation programs embed field experiences as a formative aspect of professional development with the intention of exposing candidates to the realities and demands of the profession. Little is known, however, about the ways in which preservice teachers’ professional awareness develops via in-context learning through field-based experiences. Using an exploratory, qualitative approach we analyzed end of course reflections of 31 special education preservice teachers for insights into the development of their professional awareness (professional roles and responsibilities) following a strategically aligned field experience. Findings suggest that participants expressed a growing understanding of professional practices, teacher dispositions, and professional relationships. A discussion of the findings and implications for teacher preparation are presented.     

Defining Dispositions: Wading Through Murky Waters

Abstract

Efforts to professionalize teaching have coincided with a shift in teacher education programs. Recent requirements of accrediting bodies have resulted in initiatives to assess dispositions in addition to knowledge and skills. However, for such assessment to maintain construct validity, it is imperative first to develop some common understandings about the nature of dispositions and then to explore how teacher education should be addressing them. This paper explores dispositions from both a conceptual and a practical perspective. Dispositions are described as a point of convergence, representing a filter through which thinking and behaviors related to teaching are framed, and a point of inception, from which knowledge and behaviors emanate. This dispositional filter encompasses the teacher s awareness, inclination, and ability to reflect. Teacher education programs can foster dispositions by helping teacher candidates engage in self‐exploration of their personal theories and identify their own values and assumptions related to teaching.     

The Failure of Inquiry: Preparing Science Teachers with an Authentic Investigation

This mixed methodology action research study examined the impact of a curricular innovation designed to provide an authentic science inquiry learning experience for 15 secondary science teacher candidates enrolled in a master’s level initial certification program. The class investigated the question “How can peak autumn color in New England be determined?” The project goals were to help teacher candidates acquire the skills, knowledge, and dispositions necessary to foster learning through inquiry in their respective content areas as defined by teacher preparation professional standards. Though the teacher candidates were successful at identifying a likely answer to the question, the project failed to achieve its learning goals. Reasons for the project’s failure and implications for the science education community are discussed.     

Passion and enthusiasm: Exemplifying the place of disposition in teaching in New Zealand

Abstract

There is an inconsistency between the importance of professional dispositions for teaching perceived by practitioners and other stakeholders in literature and the omission of dispositions in professional standards in New Zealand. Taking passion and enthusiasm as an example, this study explores the reasons for the inconsistency. Within the context of New Zealand early childhood education (ECE), interview data were collected from 21 practitioners and parents from seven ECE services and 15 teacher educators from eight universities and institutes of technology. Contextual, conceptual, and role-related factors are found to determine the teacher educators’ perceptions of the omission of passion and enthusiasm in the standards documents. “Conditional inclusion” and “contextual mediation” are proposed to negotiate a place in the government-imposed standards for passion and enthusiasm.     

Engaging in and engaging with research: teacher inquiry and development

The connection between teacher inquiry, professional development and school improvement was recognised 30 years ago by Lawrence Stenhouse. Stenhouse contributed many valuable insights into the role of practitioner enquiry in creating and utilising knowledge about teaching and learning, much of which is still to be applied systematically in teacher education and professional development. This paper draws on the Learning to Learn Phase 3 Evaluation, a three‐year‐action research project in which teachers in primary and secondary schools across the UK completed three cycles of practitioner inquiry to explore tools, pedagogies and other innovations which would promote dispositions of ‘learning to learn’ (L2L). The paper focuses on identifying those aspects of being involved in L2L that support teachers’ learning and the way that the teachers themselves understand the impact on their professional development. Data from over 60 semi‐structured interviews undertaken over the three years of the project, the case study reports compiled by teachers at the end of each year of the project and collaborative workshops involving teachers and university researchers as co‐inquirers are used to explore teachers’ learning. Qualitative methods are used to develop a thematic analysis of the interviews, case studies and the teachers’ understanding of the relationships between inquiry, research and continuing professional development (CPD) in order to identify categories and generate key concepts that can inform a theoretical understanding of the impact of professional inquiry on teachers’ learning. The findings contribute to our understanding of the role of inquiry and research in schools in supporting professional learning by suggesting how tools and models of working are developed.     

论教育生态学视域下的教师成长力及其养成

教师既是个体生命的存在,又是教育生态系统中的重要生态因子。基于教育生态学的视角来分析,教师成长力是指教师个体在其职业生涯、由新手型教师到专家型教师的成长过程中,教师个体生命存在的学习状态、行动状态、思考状态、创造状态及其持续发展的可能性、能力与潜势,其基本构成是学习力、行动力、反思力、创造力、发展力的合力。人生价值观与职业责任感、知识资本、学校环境与教育群体、首创与合作、反思与批判是影响教师成长力的生态因子。     

当代美国教师教育课程思想的三种价值取向分析

学术取向、专业取向、社会(公正)取向共同构成了20世纪80年代以来美国教师教育课程思想的三大价值取向。专业取向教师教育课程思想以教育学科为中心,相信教育科学研究和教学知识基础的作用,在教育研究和专业评判的基础上,致力于建立专业教师队伍。学术取向教师教育课程思想以通识教育、任教科目为中心,通过教师掌握其知识结构,并把其注入教师教育课程中,完善教师的知识体系,促使教师形成良好的教育判断力。社会取向教师教育课程思想是在美国面对日益多元化的教学环境下,把教师当做转化型知识分子,赋权增能,以社会重建、改造为中心,实现教育和社会公平。三大价值取向的思想体现出了融合与多元模式的思想特征和发展趋势,构成了当代美国教师教育课程思想的基本图景。     

The Metal Trades

Universities and schools are struggling with the critical issues surrounding teacher quality, student learning, and the gap between research and practice. This study employed a collective case-study design to explore the impact of leadership teams and school-university partnerships on teacher leadership, professional development, and overall participant dispositions of three grant-funded projects connected by their approach to implementing school reform. Analysis of interviews, focus groups, observations, and project documents yielded three primary themes: transformation of teacher roles, improved meaningful professional development, and increased collective efficacy. Discussion of the findings addresses implications regarding teacher leadership, professional development, and school-university partnerships, especially as they impact teaching and learning.     

SIGNIFICANT ISSUES IN DEFINING AND ASSESSING TEACHER DISPOSITIONS

Teacher preparation programs are required by the National Council for Accreditation of Teacher Education (NCATE) to assess the knowledge, skills, and dispositions of teacher candidates. Dispositions and the personal values that support them are defined differently by NCATE and other experts in the fields of education and business. In order to better understand dispositions the researchers examined the relationships between the personal values and dispositions of teacher candidates and successful teachers. Using the Rokeach Value Scale, results showed significant relationships between values and dispositions for teacher candidates and successful teachers.     

Discriminating participants and non-participants in continuing professional education: the case of teachers

There are a number of theoretical perspectives established for studying adult participation in education, but they are seldom examined together in single studies; neither are participants and non-participants examined simultaneously. This study examines the relative power of the major perspectives in distinguishing between and predicting participants and non-participants. Secondary school teachers who were participating or not participating in continuing professional education programmes were taken as target respondents. Results show that the theoretical perspectives of situations, dispositions, attitudes and beliefs in continuing professional education, and social norms and pressure, do not discriminate teacher participants and non-participants and are therefore not good predictors of the participation status of teachers. Only a few factors in the perspectives of motivations and socio-economic background are significant and meaningful in distinguishing the two teacher groups and in predicting participation status.     

From isolation to symphonic harmony: Building a professional development community among teacher educators

Professional development among teacher educators requires a framework in which collaborative learning can support growth and change. This study describes a professional development project modeled on a professional development community focused on thinking education in a teachers college. Qualitative measures revealed a multilayered process consisting of breaking personal and professional isolation through interdisciplinary collaboration, talk about student learning, improvement of teaching through skill acquisition, and professional development with the adaptation of new teaching dispositions and a sense of efficacy. The community was characterized by a safe environment which encouraged risk taking and mutual support, enabling significant change in college courses.     

“I had no idea”: Developing dispositional awareness and sensitivity through a cross-professional pedagogy

This research scrutinized the diffusion of a medical education pedagogy to the context of teacher education. Specifically, it focused on the use of standardized parents as an emerging pedagogy in teacher education. Preservice teachers taking part in a six case, fifteen-week intervention showed advances in multicultural awareness and ethical sensitivity as they engaged in multiple simulated parent–teacher conferences. Implications center on the use of this pedagogy within teacher education contexts to further advance the professional dispositions of teachers as they prepare to teach in diverse scholastic environments schools.     

Transforming critical and participative teacher research into communicative action: a possible direction for teacher professional learning

ABSTRACT

This paper is an account of how a group of Japanese English language teachers, who questioned current teacher professional education and English language education reforms, learnt to challenge the dominant discourse and find ways of conducting more democratic teacher professional education. It describes how those teachers, including the author, generated a collective theory on communicative competence through the process of their inquiry. It explains how they came to appreciate the action research methodology used for this study, grounded in reflective practice, which in turn helped to develop the author’s understanding of second person action research. It also tells how the teachers learnt to take the initiative in communicating the thinking which informed their practices to others and began to engage in ‘communicative action’ As a result of these outcomes, the paper suggests a potential new form of teacher professional learning aimed towards more democratic relationships between participants. It is hoped that the implications of the research findings could contribute to broader discussions about policy pertaining to teacher professional development.     

外语教师自主专业发展探究

教师自主专业发展是国际教师教育新的发展趋向,是教师持续专业发展的内在动力.外语教师要成为自主专业发展型教师,应树立教师专业发展的自主意识,合理制定个人专业发展规划;树立科研意识,自主地开展行动研究;明确反思手段,自主进行系统化的自我反思实践;提高自身的信息化素养,增强促进专业发展的自主能力;建立教师教学档案袋,加强自我专业发展评价.     

Theorising teacher performance dispositions in an age of audit

This article provides a critical and theoretical exploration into teacher performance dispositions (orientations towards performance). The article explores research literature on dispositions, highlighting the representation of teachers in education policy and standards documents across several nations of the OECD: Australia, the USA and the UK. The article draws on aspects connected to the Bourdieuian conception of dispositions, arguing that economic imperatives continue to drive research and policy directions of teacher performance, shaping teaching practice/s distorting the educative process. The article suggests that the work of teachers is increasingly being repositioned towards narrow conceptions of pedagogy and performance, aligning the educative experience with the ability to compete in the knowledge economy. Developments of this kind commodify knowledge, which may have implications for what it means to be educated or to educate. The research in focusing on teacher performance dispositions reminds teachers and policy-makers about the moral and ethical importance of a person-centred education policy approach. Such an approach eschews prescribed curricula and standardised learning, opting instead for the professional judgement of teachers in crafting studies with educative potential tailored to individual student need.     

Principals Judge Teachers by Their Teaching

This quantitative study investigated the relationship between teacher dispositions, subject content knowledge, pedagogical content knowledge, and reasons that school principals recommend non-renewal of probationary teachers' contracts. Principals in the Southeastern Unites States completed an e-mailed survey. Two nonparametric tests, Kruskal-Wallis and Mann Whitney U, were used to statistically analyze group responses. Principals reported that they observed most a lack of pedagogical content knowledge from ineffective teachers and they prioritized the importance of instructional skills in deciding whether to non-renew a teacher contract. Principals identified teacher integrity, dependability, and honesty as important dispositions. The studies' findings are important for universities that prepare preservice teachers and also for the planning of professional development initiatives. The study findings suggest that principals tend to view dispositions as personality characteristics rather than as teacher competencies and that teacher expertise in both subject content and pedagogy must be woven together.     

Student-teachers doing action research in their practicum: why and how?

Teaching in today’s changing society requires teachers’ independent judgement and development. One way of fostering professional development is action research; described, however, as a challenging and time-consuming process. This qualitative study asks whether action research is worthwhile already in pre-service teacher education, or whether the challenges outweigh the gains. Furthermore, it asks how a teacher educator, here the author of the article, could guide student-teachers’ action research projects. The main data source is student-teachers’ research reports, which are analysed and reflected upon in light of professional development. The study revealed that action research under certain conditions offers a potential for professional development for student-teachers.