Andrea K. Martin

Coherence and Collaboration in Teacher Education Reform.

Traditional teacher education programs, frequently criticized for ineffectiveness, are changing at several Canadian universities. A range of literature on reform in teacher education suggests that coherence among program elements and collaborative environments are key features of successful reforms. Using a framework of critical analysis, we examined shortcomings of traditional programs and considered some characteristics of alternative approaches, including authorizing prospective teachers’ voices and experiences, school-university collaboration, and scaffolded induction into the profession. Without direct attention to coherence in program design and delivery and collaboration among stakeholders, reform efforts seem unlikely to succeed. L’etude analyse les lacunes des programmes traditionnels de formation a l’enseignement et se penche sur certaines caracteristiques des nouvelles approches, dont la prise en compte des opinions et experiences des enseignants en formation, la collaboration entre l’universite et l’ecole et l’encadrement des nouveaux enseignants durant leur periode de probation. La coherence entre la conception et la prestation des programmes et la collaboration entre les interesses sont essentiels pour le succes des efforts de reforme.

Fostering Inclusive Beliefs and Practices during Preservice Teacher Education through Communities of Practice.

Increasingly classroom teachers are expected to create inclusive classrooms and make adaptations for exceptional learners. A field-based course in a teacher education program with an extended early practicum undertook to foster the beliefs and practices of preservice teachers about adapting teaching for exceptional learners. The teacher candidates discussed dilemma cases in communities of practice, on-campus and in schools. We analyzed dilemma cases written by 28 elementary teacher candidates about their experiences with inclusion. Themes included maintaining a critical stance, questioning ones own assumptions, and recognizing unresolved ambiguities. We also analyzed the adaptations as well as the content of written peer responses to the cases. Most of the cases were dilemmas and the peer responses showed challenging and supportive dialogue among the members of the school-based communities. The cases demonstrated beliefs and practices regarding inclusion and suggest that using case approaches within communities of practice may foster inclusive beliefs and practices during preservice teacher education.

Relative performance using haptic and/or touch-produced auditory cues in a remote absolute texture identification task

The current study assessed the relative effectiveness with which unimodal tactile, unimodal touch-produced auditory, and bimodal tactile + auditory cues contribute to the performance of an absolute texture identification task via remote touch. The study contributes to our fundamental understanding of the unimodal perception and intersensory integration of multimodal surface texture cues generated during surface exploration with rigid probes. The results also have significant implications for the design of unimodal and multisensory displays for use with teleoperation and virtual environment systems, as it addresses which modality(ies) may be used to most effectively present sensory information about remotely explored surface textures.

Seeing teaching as a discipline in the context of preservice teacher education: insights, confounding issues, and fundamental questions

Analysis of our own experiences teaching in preservice teacher education programs leads us to a range of insights, issues, and questions associated with the potential of seeing teaching as a discipline. We begin with the reality that teaching and teacher education appear to students as easy activities, while those who actually do them see them as quite complex. The unexamined influence of every student’s inadvertent apprenticeship of observation is explored as an obstacle to seeing teaching as a discipline. We also consider the influences of the history of schooling and the history of educational research. We close by considering the role of parody and paradox in making it difficult to see teaching as a discipline and by calling attention to the importance of interrogating our acts of teaching.

Listening to Preservice Teachers’ Perceptions and Representations of Teacher Education Programs

This chapter provides a range of data that we broadly characterize as listening to preservice teachers’ perceptions and representations of teacher education programs. Our first purpose is to illustrate the variety of ways in which it is possible to listen to those learning to teach and to illustrate the rich complexity of the replies we received. Our second purpose is to illustrate how these data have encouraged and sustained us in the development of our own teacher education practices, both in the university classroom and in practicum supervision in schools.

Reflective Practice: Epistemological Perspectives on Learning from Experience in Teacher Education

The argument presented in this chapter begins with the suggestion that reflective practice involves epistemological challenges that have not been adequately addressed in the context of traditional assumptions about the design and conduct of teacher education programs. An analysis of literature about technical rationality, reflection-in-action, and the central issues of reflective practice is followed by a discussion of the significance of mindfulness. We propose that one way to address the neglected epistemological challenges involves a new epistemology for professional practice generally and for teaching and teacher education specifically. We pose a series of significant questions arising from the argument, and we suggest various points of entry for teacher educators willing to accept the complex epistemological challenge that we have identified. Relevant concepts include mindfulness, habits of mind, teaching artistry, explicit instruction, listening, authorizing voice, reflective teaching, tacit knowledge, critical reflection, and mastery. Because teacher educators possess teaching experience that their students do not, it falls to teacher educators to introduce and model an epistemology of practice for those learning to teach.

Exploring the Complex Concept of Quality in Teacher Education

What is quality in teacher education, why is it so elusive, and what are the major challenges? We begin with issues that illustrate the sheer complexity of the concept of quality when considered in the context of initial teacher education. Three fundamental challenges to achieving quality in teacher education are examined: the problem of the apprenticeship of observation, the problem of enactment and the problem of complexity. We then identify three additional challenges: dissonance and drift, resistance as a barrier to quality, and cultural barriers to achieving quality. The argument continues with a focus on quality as it may be perceived by the four major players: teacher candidate, mentor teacher, faculty supervisor and teacher educator. Each plays a significant and significantly different role in a program of teacher education. The four different roles lead to at least four different interpretations of the meaning of quality in initial teacher education. We continue our argument by presenting the voices of a number of individuals who have spoken directly to the issue of quality or excellence in programs of teacher education. Finally, we explore perspectives that could help to achieve greater quality in programs of teacher education: listening to those learning to teach, searching for quality learning, fostering metacognition and learning from experience, promoting knowledge integration, and connecting epistemology to the challenge of quality.

Challenges to Promoting Quality in Preservice Practicum Experiences

This chapter arises from our concerns, developed over 10 years of practicum supervision experiences, that while the practicum continues to be perceived as the single most important and valuable element of our preservice program, the practicum still falls far short of its full and necessary potential in preparing new teachers for their full-time teaching responsibilities.

In Search of Ways to Improve Practicum Learning: Self-Study of the Teacher Educator/Researcher as Responsive Listener

Abstract Teacher education programs that appear to be more successful work to thread practicum experiences and on-campus courses with an eye to achieving overall program coherence. As part of a funded research project centred on understanding how teacher candidates perceive quality in their practicum experiences and, by extension, in their professional learning, focus groups were recruited for a series of discussions that extended over an academic year. I undertook this self-study in an attempt to examine the conditions for learning that made these focus groups so successful by virtue of participants’ commitment, engagement, focus and drive to become the best teachers they could possibly be. Self-study was an avenue for me to develop insights into my practice and to identify ways to move forward to become a more effective teacher educator who could model and scaffold responsive listening and relationship-building for future teachers. The two questions driving this self-study were “How does adopting and promoting a listening perspective improve participants learning?” And “What is transformative about responsive listening?” Identifying and challenging my assumptions were initial steps in understanding what a listening perspective entails, the importance of authorizing student perspectives and developing their pedagogical voices. Responsive listening became a means to interrogate my practice, to reframe my experience, to work in and from action, and to become more comfortable with the uncertain spaces where deep learning can occur – for myself and for those whom I teach. In so doing, I came closer to appreciating the possibilities for transformation.