Laura Blythe Liu

Year One Implications of a Teacher Performance Assessment's Impact on Multicultural Education across a Secondary Education Teacher Preparation Program

This case study examines the impact of the 1-year implementation of a state-mandated, standardized teacher performance assessment (TPA) on a facultys infusion of multicultural education across a secondary education teacher preparation program. Findings show that faculty and teacher candidate (TC) perceptions predominantly concluded that the TPA supported multicultural education infusion by preparing TCs to teach academic language and connect curricula to student background yet hindered critical, in-depth reflection vital to preparing TCs to teach diverse populations. The programs cohort learning communities cultivated TC reflection on background, bias, and inequity, mitigating these limitations. Is it possible for TPAs to serve as a unifying standard for teacher preparation reform while engaging TCs in authentic, in-depth inquiry on diversity and inequity, or should certain aspects of this sensitive work be left for programs to address more carefully in their unique contexts? How faculty respond to TPA-related challenges is central to this question.

Technological innovation in twenty-first century multicultural teacher preparation

Purpose – An increasingly diverse student population coupled with rapid technological change makes it paramount to examine how technology is being employed in multicultural teacher preparation (MTP) to prepare US teachers to develop the knowledge, skills, and dispositions to foster globally minded, twenty-first century world citizens. The paper aims to discuss these issues. Design/methodology/approach – This review employs constant comparative method of analysis to examine empirical research on MTP practices employing technology to prepare teachers for the diverse student populations of twenty-first century classrooms. Although prior reviews have synthesized research findings on MTP, no systematic investigation has examined the role of technology in preparing teachers to support diverse learners. This review of research conducted from 2002 to 2012 explores how technology has been utilized in MTP to enhance face-to-face, online, and blended teacher preparation experiences. Findings – Collectively, research...

Silos to symphonies? Hopes and challenges implementing multicultural programme infusion

The need to infuse multicultural education (ME) across teacher preparation programmes is well documented by research, yet institutions are at very different stages in this endeavour. While most programmes demonstrate a segregated approach to ME, confining diversity to specialty courses, ME programme infusion places diversity, equity and social justice at a programmes centre. This study presents triumphs and challenges faculty faced in integrating ME across one teacher preparation programme. Via one academic year of observations, interviews and document analyses, this study was informed by Cochran-Smith, Davis and Fries’ 12 factors for multicultural teacher preparation, Gays descriptors for ME programme infusion and Melnick and Zeichners promising programme practices for preparing teacher candidates effectively to teach in diverse twenty-first century classrooms. Findings show that the faculty members approached ME infusion by establishing a vision in support of diversity and ME and creating professional learning communities offering a safe context for critical reflection on attitudes and pedagogies supporting diverse populations. However, a lack of connection between the ME and the core programme courses, and discrepancies among participant perspectives, demonstrated the need for more extensive ME programme infusion. Implications for practitioners, policymakers and researchers are given.

The honourable road and its impact on teacher practice: an analysis of China's national honour system in cultivating professional development

Chinas national teacher honour system, initiated in 1949, is designed to recognise the academic and pedagogical performance of individual teachers and professional collectives at national, provincial, municipal, and school-based levels. This study employs grounded theory analysis to examine the phenomenon of Chinas teacher honour system by analysing documents, narrative stories of 11 award recipients and five non-recipients, and interviews with four government officials who manage the system. The paper discusses sociocultural aspects of this honour system by exploring the impact of three types of professional honours on teacher professional development. This system aims to balance government leadership in conferring honour with individual pursuit of professional development in ones local setting. Contextualised in a Confucian culture, the teachers immersed in this honour system benefit from collegial support in engaging in professional growth activities. Challenges with this system include the need to enhance teacher efficacy by engaging teachers in shaping the policy, as well as the possibility of political – rather than professional – criteria determining honour conferral, discouraging rigorous pursuit of professional growth.

Teacher Educator Quality and Professional Development in an Era of Globalization

Teacher quality is a “highly contested” concept (Organisation for Economic Co-Operation and Development in Teachers matter: Attracting, developing and retaining effective teachers. OECD Publishing, 2005), and measuring teacher quality across international settings proves to be equally perplexing in our assessment-driven twenty-first century global society. The work of teacher educators also must evolve to keep pace with our twenty-first century global complexity, and involve a lifelong learning that is “not limited by any space, institution or diploma” (Cobo in The Curriculum Journal, 24(1), 67–85, 2013). International teacher educator professional development emerges. This study draws upon the Confucian concept of ren as it evolved amidst the regional conflicts of ancient China, and applies this concept to our twenty-first century global society. A question that emerges is if and how ren may serve as a meaningful modern guide for our globally multicultural society. Teacher educator international professional development involves building a relational wholeness cultivated by looking in to look out, and reaching up to reach down. In this, three intersections are key: (1) personal and professional development; (2) research- and practice-based development; and (3) aesthetic and pragmatic development. Adding to the international teacher educator professional development as 仁 (ren), each of these contributes to a more benevolent, harmonious twenty-first century global society.

Navigating individual and collective notions of teacher wellbeing as a complex phenomenon shaped by national context

Abstract In an era of globalisation (Spring 2008), wellbeing no longer can be explored within one’s own national borders, but necessitates cultivating shared international understandings to maintain healthy twenty-first-century classrooms. This literature review across Chinese and English international publications contends that understanding wellbeing entails more thoughtful global discussions examining wellness as a personal commodity and shared societal experience. This paper initiates explorations of teacher wellbeing as an individual and collective phenomenon that includes teacher autonomy, goal orientation, professional efficacy, personal health and positive collegial relationships, institutional recognition/support and professional development opportunities. This review suggests teachers in Western and Chinese contexts may benefit from unique forms of support to balance and reconcile individual and collective aspects of teacher wellbeing. Teachers across contexts must have professional opportunity and incentives for engaging in autonomous practice supported by professional collaboration and development.

Findings as Aesthetic Storytelling

This two-year case study of 14 faculty members of a teacher education research center at a large, urban normal university in China involved ethnographic immersion (Geertz in The interpretation of cultures: Selected essays. New York: Basic Books 1973) and narrative inquiry (Bloom in Qualitative research in practice, Jossey-Bass, San Francisco 2002a: 310–313, b: 289–309). Three complementary tensions emerged as central to a teacher educator’s international professional development: (1) personal and professional, (2) research and practice based, and (3) aesthetic and pragmatic development. Connecting Confucian and Western perspectives, this study further explores international professional development as a globally relational becoming, or ren.

China’s Evolving Education System and Conceptions of Achievement

Teachers play a key role in China’s twenty-first-century educational reform, particularly in anchoring the nation’s progressive future with the nation’s rich history and cultural traditions. This academic anchor is central in the shared work of shaping and understanding China as an evolving twenty-first century global participant that remains culturally distinct (Zhang in John Dewey, Liang Shuming, and China’s education reform. Lanham, MD: Rowman & Middlefield, 2013). This developmental work has involved retracing Confucian roots to surface cultural legacies lost throughout the 1900s. This work continues amidst an increasing interest across society to cultivate global, individual identities.

Teacher Educator International Professional Development as Ren

Teacher educator international professional development is an essential practice for our global society, growing increasingly interdependent in trade, culture, and communication (Xu and Mei in Educational policies and legislation in China. Education in China series. Zhejiang, China: Zhejiang University Press, 2009), including how we educate our children and future citizens. International professional development as ren cultivates a capacity to embrace tensions as complementary, a key form of achievement in our increasingly global twenty-first-century society. Liang and Alitto (If we do not take action, what about the people? Beijing: Foreign Language Teaching and Research Press, 2010) discusses lunli benwei (伦理本位), or ethically/aesthetically associated living, as a relational form of achievement that realizes connectivity within perceived dualities. This bridgework is “aesthetic” in that it redefines “accomplishment” as something “we do” and “become” (Ames and Rosemont in The analects of Confucius: A philosophical translation. New York: Ballantine Publishing Group, p. 49, 1998). The teacher educator seeking to attain such balance amidst tensions cultivates wholeness (Awbrey et al. in Integrative learning and action: A call to wholeness. New York: Peter Lang, 2006) via (1) personal and professional, (2) research- and practitioner-based, (3) aesthetic and pragmatic development.

Implications for Teacher Education Practice, Policy, and Research

In this study, ren emerges as a key practice for twenty-first-century teacher educators to appropriate, particularly through international professional development experiences. As globalization places individuals previously separate together in community, it becomes important to conceptualize what it means to become human together as a global, international work. The increasingly important global work of international relations cannot be left to political diplomats alone. Professionals across fields must engage with this call. Education practitioners and researchers play a central role and may need to lead the way in the shared work of cultivating not only national, but also global citizens. Humility is paramount as a skill to teach within and across cultures, languages, and nations. This study builds on the Confucian call for ren across cultures and dynasties throughout ancient China during the Confucian time period (551 BC–479 BC). This study imagines how the relational work of ren extends beyond the regional diversity of Confucius’ time to include the global diversity of our twenty-first century. In this light, the modern Confucian junzi (君子), or exemplary person, is the teacher educator who is willing to take on the role of a learner in crossing international borders of cultural and linguistic difference. Such global engagement entails much more than tourist experiences of a culture’s highlights. Engaging in this global work meaningfully entails long-term international immersion to begin to understand deeper nuances and structural dynamics involved in a culture’s relational and political systems. Language learning adds significant insight in beginning to understand another domestic or international culture and is a practice highly encouraged by this study, even if cultivated at beginning levels.