scholarly journals Knowledge selection in initial teacher education programmes and its implications for curricular coherence

2015 ◽  
Author(s):  
Lee Rusznyak
Keyword(s):  
South Africa ◽  
Teacher Education ◽  
Prospective Teachers ◽  
Initial Teacher Education ◽  
Limited Time ◽  
Selection Decisions ◽  
Selection Principles ◽  
Internal Coherence ◽  
Rational Knowledge

There are a multitude of concepts and techniques that could be important for teachers tolearn during their initial teacher education (ITE), but indiscriminately including all of themwould result in an overcrowded and fragmented curriculum. Given the limited time for ITE,rational knowledge selection choices must be made if coherent programmes are to beoffered to prospective teachers. This paper explores the approaches taken to addressing thecritical challenges facing education in South Africa and the principles from knowledgeselection that arise from these approaches. Different conceptions about how best to addressthese challenges offer directed priorities to guide knowledge selection decisions for ITEcurricula. Examples of knowledge selection principles that variously promote conceptual orcontextual coherence are presented and analysed, and tradeoffs associated with each one areconsidered. Although some recontextualising principles are mutually incompatiable, othershave the potential to coexist. In a four-year qualification, where sequencing choices can bemade, there exists the possibility of introducing different principles at different timeswithout unduly compromising internal coherence. A challenge for those who design ITEcurricula is to design conceptually coherent and/or contextually responsive curricula fullyaware of the affordances and limitations offered by different recontextualising principles.

scholarly journals Newly Qualified Female Teachers’ Perception of Teaching Practicum as a Component of Initial Teacher Education in South Africa

2021 ◽  
Vol 10 (1) ◽  
pp. 38-69
Author(s):  
Charmaine Helena Iwu
Keyword(s):  
Teacher Education ◽  
Novice Teachers ◽  
Prospective Teachers ◽  
Teaching Practice ◽  
Teaching Profession ◽  
Initial Teacher Education ◽  
Pass Rates ◽  
Structured Interviews ◽  
Teaching Practicum ◽  
Female Teachers

This study was undertaken with the aim of understanding how newly qualified female teachers perceive teaching practicum in the South African context. Teaching Practicum is a vital component of the initial teacher education (ITE) programme because it enriches future teachers’ knowledge, skills and abilities towards a lifelong career in the teaching profession. Teachers make valuable contributions to the growth of any nation as they help produce future leaders. It is therefore necessary to have a competent teaching workforce to improve pass rates as well as reduce dropout rates among learners. The study took the qualitative deductive premise making use of semi-structured interviews to collect data from more than 30 novice teachers. Key words, which helped in the identification of themes, were distilled from the responses. A core overall finding of the study point to a mix of experiences - benefits and shortcomings - which not only affect the development of prospective teachers but also have profound implications for both policy enhancement and implementation. Regarding policy enhancement and implementation, it is suggested that universities and schools where novice teachers are posted for teaching practice should have good relations for support advancements. In this case, it is advised that the novice teachers should be exposed to critical mentoring opportunities to allow for clearer understanding of the real classroom scope. This study believes that for this to be fruitful, schools should among others be well-equipped. Suggestions for further research are also flagged. .   

scholarly journals Teachers’ professional development needs in data handling and probability

Pythagoras ◽  
2011 ◽  
Vol 32 (1) ◽  
Author(s):  
Helena Wessels ◽  
Hercules Nieuwoudt
Keyword(s):  
Professional Development ◽  
South Africa ◽  
Teacher Education ◽  
Mathematics Teachers ◽  
Statistics Education ◽  
Social Contexts ◽  
Initial Teacher Education ◽  
Urban Region ◽  
Data Driven Approach ◽  
Formed Part

Poor Trends in International Mathematics and Science Study (TIMMS) results and widespread disappointing mathematics results in South Africa necessitate research-based and more efficient professional development for in-service mathematics teachers. This article reports on the profiling of mathematics teachers’ statistical knowledge, beliefs and confidence in order to inform the development of in-service teacher education programmes in statistics for Grade 8 and Grade 9 teachers. Ninety mathematics teachers from schools with culturally diverse learner populations in an urban region in South Africa were profiled using an adapted profiling instrument (Watson, 2001). Although statistics formed part of quite a number of these teachers’ initial teacher education and about half of them were involved in professional development in statistics education, they still teach traditionally, rather than using a more data driven approach. Teachers indicated high levels of confidence in teaching most statistics topics but showed low levels of statistical thinking when they had to apply their knowledge of concepts, such as sample and average in social contexts including newspaper articles and research reports.

scholarly journals Exploring Headway Pedagogies in Initial Teacher Education Through Collaborative Action Research into Processes of Learning: Experiences from Eritrea

2020 ◽  
Vol 4 (3-4) ◽  
pp. 139-156
Author(s):  
Khalid Mohammed Idris ◽  
Samson Eskender ◽  
Amanuel Yosief ◽  
Berhane Demoz ◽  
Kiflay Andemicael
Keyword(s):  
Teacher Education ◽  
Action Research ◽  
Student Teachers ◽  
Learning Community ◽  
Prospective Teachers ◽  
Teacher Education Program ◽  
Collaborative Action Research ◽  
Initial Teacher Education ◽  
Collaborative Action ◽  
Self Study

Engaging prospective teachers in collaborative inquiry into their own processes of learning was the driving intention of the collaborative action research (CAR) course which was part of a teacher education program at a college of education in Eritrea in the academic year of 2018/2019. The course led by the first two authors was collaboratively designed and developed by the authors who were closely and regularly working as passionate learning community of educators who are committed to enact change in their own practices for the past seven years. Embracing the complexity of learning teacher educating we align with the notion of inquiry as a stance in learning to live up to the complexity. Accordingly, we engaged in an intentional collaborative self-study into our own practices of facilitating a course on inquiry. The aim of this paper is to articulate key experiences of committed collaborative learning in facilitating a course of inquiry. Employing a self-study methodology, we were engaged in individual and team reflections documented in our shared diary, regular meetings to discuss and develop the CAR process, and analyzing written feedbacks given by our student teachers (STs). In this article we attempt to explore headway pedagogies while we were collaboratively learning to facilitate and support a senior class of prospective teachers (n-27) carry out their CAR projects into their own processes of learning for four months. We argue that those experiences have critical implications in developing professional identity of prospective teachers, creatively overcome the theory-practice conundrum in teacher education by developing essential experiences that prospective teachers could creatively adapt in their school practices.

scholarly journals Preservice Mathematics Teachers’ Knowledge about the Potential of Tasks to Promote Students’ Mathematical Reasoning

2021 ◽  
Vol 7 (4) ◽  
pp. 1300-1319
Author(s):  
Hélia Oliveira ◽  
Ana Henriques
Keyword(s):  
Teacher Education ◽  
Mathematics Teachers ◽  
Prospective Teachers ◽  
Teaching Practice ◽  
Mathematical Reasoning ◽  
Initial Teacher Education ◽  
8Th Grade ◽  
Preservice Mathematics Teachers ◽  
Grade Classroom ◽  
Huge Challenge

The use of tasks to promote mathematical reasoning (MR) in teaching practice is essential to meet curricular goals. However, that practice is often a huge challenge for teachers, and particularly for prospective teachers and thus it is essential to highlight it as a goal for initial teacher education. This study focuses on preservice mathematics teachers’ (PTs) knowledge about the potential of mathematical tasks to promote students’ MR, in a teacher education course. Results show that PTs were able to justify their option for a mathematical task with potential to promote students’ MR, and through its implementation in one 8th grade classroom they have deepen their knowledge and gave greater meaning to task design principles and acknowledging their students’ knowledge. Thus, the activity of selecting and adapting a task, although less demanding than the design of a new task, can still provide PT with important reflection and knowledge about its potential to promote students’ MR. The study stresses the relevance for initial teacher education of considering four domains associated with the recognition of the potential of tasks to promote MR.

scholarly journals Development of Prospective Teachers’ Noticing Skills Within Initial Teacher Education

2021 ◽  
Author(s):  
Reyhan Tekin-Sitrava ◽  
Gabriele Kaiser ◽  
Mine Işıksal-Bostan
Keyword(s):  
Professional Development ◽  
Teacher Education ◽  
Mathematics Education ◽  
Mathematics Teachers ◽  
Prospective Teachers ◽  
Education Program ◽  
Initial Teacher Education ◽  
Teacher Education Programs ◽  
Education Programs ◽  
Education Courses

AbstractAlthough the effects of professional development programs on teachers’ noticing skills have attracted considerable interest among mathematics education researchers, little is known about the developmental process of prospective teachers’ noticing skills within initial teacher education. This paper examines the extent to which prospective teachers’ noticing skills are developed through the mathematics education courses taken within the mathematics teachers’ education program using exemplarily the topic division of fractions. The study is grounded on the framework of Professional Noticing of Children’s Mathematical Thinking which specifies three facets of noticing, that are attending, interpreting, and deciding how to respond. Twenty-two prospective mathematics teachers (PSTs), who were enrolled in the Middle School Mathematics Teacher Education Program at a Turkish university, participated in this study. The results revealed that most PSTs gained expertise in all three kinds of noticing skills during their teacher education. The highest progression could be identified in the interpretation skills and the lowest in attending skills. These results are important for initial teacher education programs, highlighting that general, non-specialized mathematics education courses within initial teacher education have the potential to provide an efficient professional development program to develop PST’s noticing skills. The study points out that further research is needed in order to provide additional details about how teacher education programs could be redesigned and implemented to ensure opportunities for PSTs to develop noticing skills within all three facets leading to robust or at least substantial evidence of all three noticing skills.

Mentors and student-teachers “lesson studying” in initial teacher education

2016 ◽  
Vol 5 (2) ◽  
pp. 84-98 ◽  
Author(s):  
Wasyl Cajkler ◽  
Phil Wood
Keyword(s):  
Teacher Education ◽  
Student Teachers ◽  
Teacher Learning ◽  
Student Teacher ◽  
Prospective Teachers ◽  
Lesson Study ◽  
Teaching Practice ◽  
Initial Teacher Education ◽  
Content Type ◽  
The Uk

Purpose – The purpose of this paper is to study an adapted version of lesson used with mentors and student-teachers in a one-year initial teacher education (ITE) programme for prospective teachers of geography and modern languages. In partnership with eight secondary schools, the effectiveness of the lesson study cycle was evaluated as a vehicle for exploration of approaches to aid student-teacher learning during school placements. Design/methodology/approach – In total, 12 lesson study case studies were completed and analysed. Findings – Three principal findings emerged: first, most collaborating mentors and student-teachers reported that they engaged in a reflexive process, exploring the complexity of teaching, each learning more about the characteristics of teaching; second, in cases where collaboration allowed student-teachers a degree of autonomy, lesson study provided a collaborative scaffold for understanding the complexity of teaching, contributing to professional development along a continuum which the authors tentatively term “pedagogic literacy”; third and less positively, some mentors struggled to shed the shackles of traditional roles, dominating the discourse as advice-givers so that a traditional “parallel” approach to mentoring continued. Originality/value – The work expands the experiential base of lesson study efforts in ITE in the UK and elaborates a view of teacher learning that challenges reductive approaches to the preparation of new teachers. For the first time, it presents student-teacher and mentor perspectives on the use of lesson study in teaching practice in England.

scholarly journals Educational Research Within the Curricula of Initial Teacher Education: The Case of Slovenia

2020 ◽  
Vol 10 (3) ◽  
pp. 31-51
Author(s):  
Tina Štemberger
Keyword(s):  
Teacher Education ◽  
Educational Research ◽  
Professional Learning ◽  
Prospective Teachers ◽  
Education Programme ◽  
Initial Teacher Education ◽  
Credit Transfer ◽  
Teacher Education Programme ◽  
Research Competence ◽  
Accumulation System

Professional learning is a continuum starting in initial teacher education and persisting throughout the teacher’s career. Initial teacher education programmes should therefore prepare prospective teachers for professional learning via research. There is, however, little knowledge about how initial teacher education programmes educate students about this important subject. The aim of this study was to identify how initial teacher education programmes in Slovenia address the question of empowering prospective teachers with research competence. We analysed all of the initial teacher education programme curricula and established that: (i) overall, more than half of the initial teacher education programmes do not include acquiring research competence as an aim of their study programmes; (ii) the majority of bachelor initial teacher education programmes include courses aimed at gaining research competence, but half of the master’s initial teacher programmes do not provide any courses related to research; and (iii) there is a variety of European Credit Transfer and Accumulation System weightings for educational research courses across initial teacher education programmes in Slovenia.

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