Joce Nuttall

Changing Research Contexts in Teacher Education in Australia: Charting New Directions.

This paper examines research into initial teacher education in light of current Australian policy initiatives concerned with both the quality of research conducted in higher education and the quality of teacher education programs. The purpose of the paper is to explore some ways in which the research is, and can be, positioned in the current policy context. The paper begins with a brief overview of some of the main characteristics of the research concerned with initial (pre‐service) teacher education in Australia over the last decade. In terms of scope, scale and methodology, the research can be characterised in the following way: typically small‐scale; many one‐off studies; localised in nature; and a growing application of qualitative research methods. An obvious strength of this type of research is that it is closely tied to practice and to the day‐to‐day workings of initial teacher education programs. An equally obvious weakness is that the research does not necessarily have so called ‘impact’ in relation to policy debates and/or other measures of success in the wider research community. The paper charts some possible new directions for teacher education research in ways that build on the strengths and address the weaknesses. The directions can be characterised as follows: a ‘big funding’ approach; an ‘institutional aggregation’ approach; and a ‘platforms and protocols’ approach.

Cooperating Teachers' Perspectives Under Scrutiny: A comparative analysis of Australia and Canada

The ways in which cooperating teachers give shape and meaning to their work in practicum settings is one of the most critical elements of initial teacher education. This international comparison draws upon surveys of Australian and Canadian cooperating teachers. The global contrast highlights taken‐for‐granted assumptions in local settings that in some instances are cause for celebration and in other instances concern. The comparison of the two settings illustrates, among other things: some striking similarities in the profiles of cooperating teachers; important differences with respect to the cooperating teachers preparation and remuneration for their role in practicum settings; and deeper complexities regarding the relationship between schools and universities.

Embodying pre-tense conditions for research among teacher educators in the Australian university sector: a Bourdieusian analysis of ethico-emotive suffering

ABSTRACT Interviews conducted as part of the Work of Teacher Education (WoTE) project in Australia highlight emotional and ethical suffering embodied by teacher educators who find their research aspirations thwarted in the context of high-stakes research assessment exercises. We argue that government-run assessments, such as Excellence in Research for Australia, and localised institutional strategies developed in response, provoke “pre-tense” conditions that unsettle institutions of the Australian university sector regarding future claims for research status. Drawing on interviews with an early- and a mid-career teacher educator, both of whom evidence significant research aspirations, we portray and analyse their ethico-emotive sufferings, linked to contemporary pre-tense conditions in which they work, which thwart their dispositions to do research. We conclude by reflecting on the need for systemic response within the field of teacher education to ensure its research future, including an ethico-emotive politics that mobilises across generations of academics, with particular responsibilities for senior researchers.

Time and temporality in early childhood educators’ work

ABSTRACT This article reports on the persistence and significance of notions of time and temporality in interviews with early childhood educators in Victoria and Queensland, Australia, in two studies designed to explore the concept of ‘pedagogical leadership’. Interpretive analysis of the interview transcripts of the 19 participants identified three basic categories related to the concept of time: ‘time use’, ‘time scales’ and ‘perceived time’. Drawing on contemporary philosophical discussions on the nature of time and temporality, and the sociological literature about the relationship between time and work, we argue that time and temporality merit further empirical and theoretical exploration in early childhood. We suggest that approaches that understand time and temporality from the perspective of the (gendered) body may provide a way forward.

Teachers, technologies and the concept of integration

The integration of digital technologies in educational settings has not been simple. While technologies themselves are often credited with potential for increasing student engagement in learning, the integration of technologies with teaching practice continues to be problematic in some settings. Levels of technology uptake, or integration with teaching practice, have attracted a great deal of research attention, with significant attention paid to the range of barriers likely to impact teacher use of technologies including, in particular, teacher attitudes towards technologies (e.g. Ertmer, 2005). More recently, the study of barriers in terms of teacher attitudes or skills in using technologies has begun to take a more nuanced approach. Research now considers how integration can be supported by relating knowledge about technologies to pedagogical and content knowledge. Thus, the popularity of the concept of “TPACK” (Koehler & Mishra, 2009) in education has risen. Research now also considers teachers’ understandings, perspectives and personal orientation to technology use in education and in supporting and fostering the learning of their students. This issue of the Asia-Pacific Journal of Teacher Education takes a focus on pre-service educators’ and in-service teachers’ use of technologies and the relationship these technologies hold to their identities as teachers, use of technologies as a teacher, and the role of design processes in fostering the use of TPACK as a pedagogical construct for understanding technology integration in teachers’ classrooms. The journal opens with a contribution from Koh, Chai and Tsai. This paper considers the extent to which the concept of TPACK aligns with Singaporean teachers’ capacities for lesson design dispositions and lesson design practices. They present an argument by which TPACK itself is not considered the predominant vehicle for fostering technology integration in classrooms. Rather, the relationship between TPACK and teachers’ design dispositions and lesson design practices are situated as an aspect of technology integration. This paper reports the development of a survey instrument intended to measure the relationship between teachers’ perceptions of TPACK, their design dispositions and lesson design practices. TPACK alone is characterised as an insufficient basis for supporting technology integration by teachers. Koh et al., therefore, argue that greater attention should be paid to how teachers engage in design dispositions and lesson design practices when using technologies to support student learning. Two further papers, both from Turkey, also engage with TPACK. For example, Tokmak’s work with pre-service early childhood educators illustrates how developing and designing games for use by young children increased early childhood educators’ understandings of TPACK. Tokmak argues that increased understandings of TPACK form a basis for teachers’ use of technologies in early childhood settings. Meanwhile, Cengiz’s paper considers the interface between physical education provision and the concept of TPACK, also with pre-service educators. This paper focuses on fostering the capacity of pre-service educators to develop websites dedicated to explaining planned and enacted physical education practices, including the development of resources related to a range of physical skills. This study suggests that TPACK should not be excluded as a concept for Asia-Pacific Journal of Teacher Education, 2015 Vol. 43, No. 5, 375–377, http://dx.doi.org/10.1080/1359866X.2015.1074817

Researching teacher education in the context of teacher education reform

As we sign off on this issue of Asia-Pacific Journal of Teacher Education, the Executive of the Australian Teacher Education Association is finalising its submission to the Teacher Education Ministerial Advisory Group (TEMAG), announced in February 2014. By the time you receive this issue, submissions will have been closed and teacher educators across Australia will be bracing for the implications of yet another federal review of teacher education. Many readers will have been involved in preparing submissions from individual Faculties and Schools of Education and through professional bodies. In calling for public consultation, TEMAG has sought feedback on “pedagogical approaches”, “subject content”, and “professional experience”, thereby re-inscribing an outdated notion of teacher education as primarily a dialogue between theory and practice. In the Issues Paper accompanying the call for consultation, the term “relationships” is used only once, despite what we know about its centrality to teaching and learning; unsurprisingly, it appears as a call for “stronger relationships and partnerships between schools and universities” (TEMAG, 2014, p. 5). By contrast, the word “research” appears throughout the issues paper, albeit in a way that implies that teacher education does not capitalise upon research. For example:

Integrated children’s services: re-thinking research, policy and practice

The integration of human service work for young children and their families is now a global policy trend. Policy initiatives in England, Australia, New Zealand, Portugal, Germany and elsewhere are actively supporting the development of new sites and modalities of inter-professional/trans-professional/multi-professional work in early year’s health, welfare, education and care. Such initiatives give recognition to features of early year’s practice that have always been evident to practitioners: that working with young children is complex, context specific, culturally located, rich with creative possibilities and highly demanding. These initiatives have also arisen in response to what Rittel and Webber (1973), after C. West Churchman, called ‘wicked problems’. Writing in the context of urban planning, they argued:

Engaging With Quality Improvement Initiatives: A Descriptive Study of Learning in the Complex and Dynamic Context of Everyday Life for Family Child Care Providers

ABSTRACT Research Findings: This article reports on family child care providers’ views about their engagement with professional development programs, including providers who were and were not participating in Quality Rating and Improvement Systems in Los Angeles, California. Most providers participating in the study were taking active steps to improve their work with children, but only a few providers described themselves as satisfied with the programs available. First, we report on why providers chose to engage (or not) in formal professional development activities; specifically, we explore the relationship between career phase and engagement and the levels of participation reported by seasoned providers. Second, we describe the way many providers strategically self-customized their quality improvement (QI) activities by drawing flexibly on available programs or by finding a coach who would work with them on their specific needs. Practice or Policy: Our findings suggest that in order to increase engagement with formal QI systems, designers of professional development supports must better align these supports with the needs and interests of family child care providers in terms of content and modes of delivery. We propose the concept of just-in-time professional development as 1 way to make QI offerings more responsive to some family child care providers’ needs.

Formative Interventions in Leadership Development in Early Childhood Education: The Potential of Double Stimulation.

This article critiques the usefulness of double stimulation, a key concept in Vygotskian analyses of human development, with leaders in early childhood services in Australia. A series of formative interventions was conducted to identify and address systemic tensions that were confounding leaders’ attempts to realise a central object of activity in their work: the development of their staff in order to enhance children’s learning. An example of double stimulation is drawn from workshop comments and interviews with one of the participating leaders. The article elaborates on a tension identified between explicit cultural expectations of professionalism and an implicit division of labour that position leaders as having the primary responsibility for solving problems of practice. The article concludes by reflecting on the usefulness of double stimulation in fostering sustainable leadership practices in early childhood education.

Complexity and diversity in teacher education research

As this issue of Asia-Pacific Journal of Teacher Education goes to press, I find myself again reflecting on the richness and diversity of teacher education research internationally, and welcoming the scholarly stimulation provided by A-PJTE authors as they offer glimpses into practices of teacher education in their part of the world. As always, this Editorial is written from the Australian context. Here, we have recently seen the appointment of a new Minister of Education at the Federal government level, and we wait to learn how long-debated changes to higher education funding might impact on teacher education. Throughout the changes brought by shifts in policy (and politicians), particular themes endure in teacher education research. Some of these themes are evident in this issue, including the teacher education practicum, pedagogical content knowledge (PCK) and inquiry-based teacher development. At the same time, it is exciting to see the continuing growth of research literature around areas that have long been neglected or silenced in teacher education, including sexuality and gender diversity amongst preservice teachers, teachers, students and teacher educators. Ian Hardy’s paper, which opens this issue, is a clear example of the rich insights available to researchers of teacher education when a synthesis is created between data, theory and scholarly commentary. The data in Hardy’s paper were generated during teachers’ Inquiry Cycle activities in one Queensland school. Hardy brings recent articulations of practice theory, as they have been expressed by Theodore Schatzki and colleagues and by Stephen Kemmis and colleagues, to his analysis of professional learning, whilst also paying attention to the specific sociohistorical moment within which the practice is occurring. This is complex work that can easily overflow its limits, but Hardy makes use of Robert Yin’s design principles for case study research to maintain the highly situated boundaries of the case at hand, without sacrificing awareness of the broader sociopolitical pressures on teachers’ work. A theme that appears in this issue that might more accurately be described as “emergent”, rather than “established”, in teacher education research is the oppression of Lesbian, Gay, Bi-sexual, Transgendered, and Queering/Questioning (LGBTQ) preservice teachers. Despite contemporary discourses of human capital and educational “effectiveness”, many teacher educators remain committed to teacher education as antioppressive work, and to practices that foster social justice and human dignity. How, then, do our practices of teacher education – and of teacher education research – engage with the strengths and diversity brought to teacher education by LGBTQ colleagues, preservice teachers and students in schools? This work must happen simultaneously at a number of levels. Teachers have a major responsibility for inducting young people into the cultures in which they learn and grow, so schools must be safe places for students to question and declare their sexuality. Teacher educators, in turn, have a major responsibility for the formation of the teachers who will work with these students. This work is important both within the culture where pre-service teachers are learning now – the university – and for the cultural contexts in Asia-Pacific Journal of Teacher Education, 2016 Vol. 44, No. 1, 1–3, http://dx.doi.org/10.1080/1359866X.2016.1122307