Scenarios for the Future of Teacher Education in Europe

In this paper four scenarios are presented which illustrate possible futures of teacher education in Europe. These scenarios are the result of a project of Research and Development Centre 19 of the Association for Teacher Education in Europe. 1 The four scenarios differ from each other in their emphasis on four driving forces: pragmatism, idealism, individualism and social coherence. Each scenario is described in terms of characteristics of society, education and teacher education, roles of teachers and teacher educators, and is illustrated in a short scene.     

An Effective Teacher Institute for Curriculum Dissemination1

This article recounts the development of Living in Water, a science curriculum for the middle grades, and the teacher training institute that was developed to disseminate the curriculum. This article also reviews how the teacher training institute was modified in response to findings from the evaluations of each of the three institutes that the authors presented. The evaluations included analysis of the teacher training institutes, the attitudes of the master teachers, the attitudes of the in-service workshop participants, and the demographics of the students who ultimately were taught using the Living in Water curriculum.     

Personal and Social-Contextual Factors in K–12 Academic Performance: An Integrative Perspective on Student Learning

Our extensive literature review in the fields of educational, social, and cognitive psychology has led us to identify about a dozen variables that demonstrate direct empirical links to academic achievement at the K–12 level. Those variables are grouped into four major categories: student engagement, learning strategies, school climate, and social-familial influences. We then categorize the first two variables as personal factors and the latter two as social-contextual factors. We document empirical findings that have shown particular relationships between the reviewed personal and social-contextual factors and academic achievement, mainly in the areas of reading and mathematics. Based on our conceptualization, we propose an integrated perspective that students’ personal factors in the domains of behavior, affect, attitude, and cognition as well as their social-contextual environment have to work in concert to produce optimal school performance. We conclude with a discussion on educational implications and future research to be addressed.     

Reflections on Trends in Teacher Education in Europe Using the Scenario Perspective

In the preceding papers the scenario model of ATEE-RDC19 is used as a reflecting instrument on trends and development in teacher education in different European countries. In this short contribution, a reflection on those papers is made to see whether common trends arise. In this rough picture, it is possible to see that in all analysed countries there is a tendency towards a more pragmatic and individualistic approach in society, influencing teacher education. But these two trends (toward pragmatism and towards idealism) are not in all case studies strongly connected. However, bearing in mind some critical comments on the scenario model, strong and definitive conclusions are to be avoided.     

大家?小家?

我的单位不仅给我提供一份教书的工作, 还免费给我提供自行车、住房、医保和娱乐活动。人类学家用来界定文化的基本要素有: 语言、食物和行为举止。但在中国, 这三项标准却着实让外国人困惑不解。首先, 汉语之复杂让人们在跨文     

Prescription for learning? Meeting the development needs of the pharmacy profession

This article explores the use of open learning to meet pharmacists' continuing development needs in the UK—a topic that the researchers first explored in 1996. First, it sets those needs in the context of the changing role of the pharmacist within the health care team. Second, the authors report the findings from a one-year study conducted in 1999–2000 by the Scottish Council for Research in Education of continuing professional development (CPD) provided by the Centre for Pharmacy Postgraduate Education at the University of Manchester. Data were collected from a 10% sample of registered pharmacists, telephone interviews with some employers and focus group meetings with a sample of pharmacists and tutors. Changes in pharmacists' attitudes to, and uptake of, CPD over the period are highlighted, the most significant of which is the growth in informal learning, an approach that now requires to be incorporated into an integrated model of CPD.